Friday
April 25th, 2014 – Island Lake, IL
After all of the
painstaking effort I have put in over a lifetime feverishly attempting to
create an identity that is moderately recognizable to the largest amount of
people possible, it’s laughable at how tiny a number that turns out to be. It
isn’t even close to 1/1000th of 1% of people on Earth.
It’s not
anywhere near 1/100th of 1% of the United States, nor does it
approach 1/10th of 1% of the population of the Chicago metropolitan
area where I have been based for the majority of my adult life. How’s that for
taking some humble pies to the face? It’s like I’ve never even existed.
I tried to
figure out as close to a number of people I have performed live for over my
entire life, and the closest number I could come up with is somewhere between
around 750,000 and an even million. And that took thirty years of hard work.
How many of those would remember my name, even if there were cash and prizes
involved? Even at 1% - which it isn’t – I am still an unknown.
Even at a
million I am still an unknown, but that’s more than enough to make a fantastic
living – provided that million is reachable and relatively in a maintainable
service area. If they were all over the globe at random, that would make it
difficult to serve them by doing live performances.
The people
I have performed for are scattered randomly all over North America, and that’s
my biggest problem. Other than the Chicago/Milwaukee corridor, nobody has a
clue as to who I am – and it’s not all that much there. I can draw a few dozen,
but nothing that will define a career.
Most of my
work has been done to groups of about 100-200 on average, and often it’s been
far lower than average. How many times have I worked some road house honky-tonk
hell hole in an obscure town 1000 miles or more from home in front of 50 or far
less? I couldn’t begin to count.
And even if
they liked me – which often they did – was I smart enough to ask for an address
of any kind to stay in touch so maybe they might come back next time I was in
town? Even before email I guess I could have sent post cards, but it would have
taken time and money I didn’t have.
The truth
is, obtaining top of mind awareness with a large group of people is one of the
hardest things imaginable. Even McDonald’s has to keep their name pounded into
the public’s head, and who hasn’t heard of McDonald’s? They have worldwide
presence and a huge advertising budget. I wander all over the country to
entertain random people in comedy clubs. I’m a faceless drifter.
I could
live with that if the money was there, but right now it just isn’t. It doesn’t
matter what I happen to do on stage unfortunately. I used to think that’s all
that meant anything, but that’s just plain wrong. All that matters is if one
can put butts in seats, and that’s something I have not ever figured out how to
do. Mike Tyson is selling out his one man show. I don’t draw flies to manure.
What any of
this means I really can’t say, other than I need to have more people become
aware of who I am as quickly as possible. I started a newsletter this year, but
that only has around 2000 on the list. And how many of those actually read it?
I sure won’t be getting cocky any time soon.
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| Gaining the attention of even 1% of the public is a LOT harder than it appears. I've been trying for 30 years, and I'm not even close. |
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