1. Nose is to Big: We have all seen these clowns, heck for a couple of years I was guilty of this. While a big red nose is the trademark of a clown a smaller nose will make you seem less foreign to children as well as make it easier for you to see, which is important to the jugglers, magicians and stiltwalking clowns out their.
2. To Much Outlining: Nothing darkens up a clown face like to many black lines on it. When you are designing your face make sure that you only outline the colors where it is necessary. This will allow you to have a lighter look to you face as well as help you appear more human to your audience.
3. Mascara- That is correct gentleman you need to wear mascara. This will get rid of the white eyelashes that most of us get while putting on the white parts of your makeup as well as make your eyes more expressive.
4. Shoes: A lot of clowns feel that they need to have those big crazy shoes. While those big crazy shoes are cool, they really only look nice when they are professionally made and match the rest of your costume.
5. Color Coordination: Being a clown dosen’t mean you don’t have to match. Some of the best looking clowns you will ever see have costumes that match from top hat to big shoes. When a clown first starts out the usual idea is to buy the zaniest brightest outfit you can find, because that is what clowns wear. Most clowns where oversized or colorful normal clothes, giving them that clown look without overwhelming their audiences senses.
6. Untrimmed Wigs: When you buy a wig you might think that it is fine as it is. That unfortunately not true. You need to go get it trimmed to fit your character so that you don’t look like every other clown that wears that same wig. There is nothing worse then one hundred different faces with the same haircut.
7. Wig color: Traditionally clown wigs where “normal” colors such as red, yellow and orange. As dyes got fancier greens, blues, pinks, purples and ,any other colors arrived on the scene. The thing to remember is that the color of you wig should match your character and compliment you costume.
8. Powder: Powdering is the most important part of your clown makeup. Without makeup you will become a melted faced mess. Powder often and you will have a clown face that can withstand the greatest heat as well as getting hit with a pie, jumping in a pool and eating.
9. Makeup: Use actual clown makeup. Women’s face makeup isn’t made to withstand the stress of clowning nor is face paint. There are many manufacturers of clown makeup and their products will stand the test of time.
10. Stay in Shape: Clowning is a physical art form. You want to make sure that you can do whatever it is that you do as a clown without running out of breath. It is ok to act like you are out of breath, but you need to be able to go and go and go. You don’t necessarily need to lose weight or change you appearance, but you do need to exercise to stay in shape.
11. Practice: When you are first starting out practice your makeup, performing in costume, anything that has to do with your appearance so that you know what it looks like and what you need to work on. Even so of the older clowns could probably use some practice on their makeup since you have possibly getting sloppy.
12. Ask for Help: Ask your friends and family what they think of your look. They hopefully will be honest and you will be able to improve your look. If you have no one to show your clown to email pictures to theusableclown [at] gmail [dot] com and I will be happy to critique your look.
13. Be Honest With Yourself: If you think something doesn’t look right with your costume, it probably dosen’t. The hardest part of being a clown is knowing what looks good on you and what doesn’t. If it feels to tight, it probably is.

There you have it, 13 ways to make you a better looking clown. Good luck and keep on being funny.

There is a time in every clown’s life where he\she stops and thinks, “There has got to be a better way to do this” and every time a clown thinks that, they are correct. Here are 5 steps to better and easier clowning:

1. Simplify
2. Practice
3. Market
4. Plan
5. Execute

Here is the third, really the fourth, in the series. We will cover: Why, How and When to advertise, How is covered here, here and

here

Advertising is usually the most costly part of having your own business. Luckily for you clowning is almost self advertised once you get it started, this means that if you have a well put together show and hand a card to every single person that sees you, there is very little left for you to do. This is because most of the advertising is done for you by the people you entertain. But we are getting ahead of ourselves first you have to understand Why.

Why advertise? Especially if you can get your audience to do it for you. Because it is so simple to do. Once you have your cards (l) printed up all you have to do is hand them to everyone in the world. Grocery clerks, church members, coworkers, you get the idea. They all have kids or at the very least parties. Keep in mind that you may only get one call for every 10-25 business cards handed out. That means that one box of 250 cards should net 10-25 clown jobs at at least $50 a party you are looking at $500 - $1250 for the cost of the cards. That is a pretty good profit. But in order to do that you need to hand your cards to everyone, even people you might think have no use for a clown.

Aside from getting your name out there this will also get you a collection of business cards from other people. For some reason you cannot hand someone a business card without getting one in return. These cards are the seeds for your off season marketing plan. Using the names and contact information on those cards you can start to sell yourself to local businesses for grand openings, sales and anything you or they can think of. If you give out enough cards you will be able to coast for a year without having to look for a job. I would advise against that as you should always be looking for jobs so you can clown forever.

How you give someone a cards is as important as the card itself. One thing that you need to keep in mind is that age old first impression rule. The first impression is the most important and may be the only one you get. This means that at all times you need to carry yourself in a professional manner. This doesn’t mean that you need to dress like a business person, you just need to look like someone people want to invite into their home or business. Also, when you are in public out of your clown outfit you are not a clown. Not even a little. You don’t what to approach people in the same way that you would approach them in your clown outfit, you’ll just come off as weird and your card will disappear into the waste basket as soon as you walk away.

The other part of this that is hard for even experienced clowns is when to distribute your cards. It all depends on the venue and the event. If you are making balloons at a restaurant you should give cards, see the ’s’ on cards that means you give them at least two, to every table you visit and have a stack of cards up at the host stand. If you are at a festival, hand them out after every show, performing at a business have a stack at the counter as well as hand them out as necessary. When you are doing a birthday party make sure that no kid leaves without at least one your cards if not two or three. This will ensure that their parents see the card as well as give their parents something to give to their friends.

As you can see the trick with marketing yourself is word of mouth. The more people that have seen you perform that have a card with your phone number the more people will call you. Even if you think someone could never use a clown they might have a friend or relative that could. Leave no card unhanded out.

The first thing to do is to look back on how you started working originally, if you are like most of us you just kind of fell into it. It all started at a friend’s kid’s birthday party and suddenly you where hooked. You made some business cards and bought makeup and poof you where a clown. Your clown evolved over the years and you started to get busy.

You probably made some mistakes and I am almost positive you went through the scary clown stage. Everyone does. The great thing about moving is that you can avoid all of those mistakes. This means that you are brand new but have all of the experience you got while making all of those mistakes.

The first thing you should do is get a new phone number. Go to Grand Central and register for a number in your new area. This number can be set up to forward to your cell, home or pretty much whatever number you want. You then need to get some cards made up with your info on it. I would suggest using your old card design and just putting your new info on it. If you are renting or buying a house in the new area give a card to every realtor you talk to, in fact if you go and visit before moving follow the steps discussed here. Follow those same steps and you will be up and running again in no time.

One of the most important things you can do, once you have moved, is to interact with other entertainers. Talk to them, get to know the area, learn the average pricing. You don’t want to price yourself out of work or undercut your fellows to much. Make sure that you fit in with your pricing model. One of the easiest ways to turn other entertainers against you is to move into a new area and be a hundred times cheaper then all the other entertainers. So to be safe adjust your prices accordingly.

A quick story that will illustrate this point:

When I first started out I was 15 years old. I was excited, this whole entertaining thing was new to me and I was looking for other entertainers to learn from, practice with, etc. The only entertainer in the area at the time was a magician/juggler/Christian entertainer. It just happened that my family where members of the same gym he belonged to and I had seen him practicing on the aerobics floor. So one day I worked up the nerve to talk to him and asked if he would like to juggle together sometime. During this conversation I explained that I was new to the business and was excited to get started working. I also explained that I was going to be a clown (not a juggler, magician or Christian entertainer). Apparently he viewed me, a fifteen year old with zero experience, to be a threat to his hold on the entertaining market in a small to medium sized town. Since that time, eleven years ago, I have never once referred a job to him because I didn’t want to risk him doing a poor job and having that reflect on me in anyway.

At the time there where only two entertainers in Greeley, me and him, and so when I needed to refer someone to another entertainer because I was busy I had to give them to number of an entertainer out of town, thus increasing their cost. Since then a few other companies have sprung up and though I may not agree with everything they do, we all agree that we should get along.

One way to foster a sense of community with other entertainers is to have balloon jams, juggling clubs or other entertainment related evenings planned through out the month or year. This will allow you to get together, trade stories, work on ideas and generally have a good time together. You may find a partner to work with that will allow you to broaden your shows or you may find someone who will be able to cover for you if you are sick.

Keep in mind that not every entertainer is going to have time to come to these, that dosen’t mean that they don’t care or you should treat them differently, it just means that they are busy or may not feel comfortable with all of the entertainment stuff yet. Remember hanging out with a large collection of entertainers takes some getting used to and not everyone is ready for it from day one.

Try to hold your meetings in a neutral area, such as a church or school gym, that way you won’t be infringing on anyone’s hospitality to often. The other option is to have a rotation of whose house it is at and stick to the rotation. Also make sure that you put together some rules so that people are polite to one another, this will also help keep people from directly stealing another’s ideas.

As I mentioned in my last post The Call: Restaurants, it is very important to work your hardest to impress the management of the restaurant. The more impressed they are the more likely they are to hire you on. This doesn’t mean that you need to where a suit and tie, but the clothing you where needs to be presentable and let them know that they are dealing with a professional.

One thing to keep in mind is that unless you are planning to build a balloon tying business in restaurants there is no real need to charge the restaurant a fee for doing your balloons in their establishment. The whole purpose that you are there is to grow your business by giving out cards with every balloon and cards to every table that you interact with in a positive manner.

Take me for instance, I live in a small-medium town in Colorado. I work in two different restaurants in the same chain, on in Denver and one in Greeley. I work only two nights a week and make about the same both nights. Granted if I where to charge I could make more money but the tips that I receive are just a bonus to the publicity that I am getting.

This last weekend I made as much as I make in a night of ballooning in an hour thanks to the card that I gave a family just the week before. Especially when it is getting closer to your busy time this will really help your business pick up and go crazy. And in the slow times those tips will help keep you a float and possibly land you some more parties when you normally have none.

The important thing to keep in mind is that everything you do as it reflects not only you and your business but the restaurant you are performing in. So if you upset a customer, who yells at the manager; it will get back to you and an upset manager is not going to be understanding if you offended someone with something you said. If someone complains about a balloon popping that is one thing, but if you ignored someone or even if they perceived that your where ignoring or harassing them you will get in trouble.

So go out, approach a restaurant that you like and start making balloons for tips and grow your business.

The hardest call to make is the restaurant cold call. This is when you just show up at a restaurant, ask to see a manager and convince him that hiring you to make balloons for tips or otherwise is a benefit to his restaurant. It dosen’t matter how fabulous your balloons are. If he, or she, dosen’t see it as a benefit to his business he will not hire you.

So what do you do, I would suggest these three things: Dress to Impress, Show Value and Ask Questions. Those are the three things that I have done when approaching a restaurant and while I can’t guarantee that it will work for you, it has a better success rate then being a slob, not showing the value and bragging about how good you are.

1. Dress to Impress: A lot of children’s entertainers that I have met feel that since they are “goofy” that they can look goofy when interviewing for a gig. This is so far from the truth that its not funny. If you approach restaurant manager wearing jeans, a t-shirt and sneakers, his immediate thought is going to be that you are going to show up to entertain in that same outfit. The same goes for faded clothes, outdated clothes, tight or baggy clothes. You want to exude professionalism and the best way to do that is start with the dress and the rest will follow. You may have noticed that when you are dressed up you have a different attitude then when you are in sweat pants. That is the attitude that will carry you on towards success and not hold you back. The flip side of this is that you want to look comfortable. So if you hate ties, don’t wear a tie, if you hate skirts don’t wear a skirt. Just make sure that you look nice.
2. Show Value: Showing value in a restaurant situation can seem daunting if you have never entertained in a restaurant before. This is because you don’t have a job description, so you don’t know what your duties as an entertainer is. Well here is a description that should hopefully get you in the right mind set. Your primary job is to help the restaurant run smoother, not to entertain the guests. That’s right, entertaining the guests is secondary to getting people in, fed and back out quickly and efficiently. This means that you don not approach tables until their menus are gone and they have ordered. If asked, politely tell them that you will be back after they have ordered. This also means that you stay out of the servers way. If they come to a table to see how everything is, step back and let them talk to the table. Doing this will also prevent the servers, most of them anyway, from resenting you and thinking that you are stealing tips from them. With those two goals, helping the restaurant run smooth and allowing the servers to interact with their tables, you will be more successful and potentially get more tips.
3. Ask Questions: This means that when you are meeting with the manager(s) you actively find out what they envision or need from an entertainer. By asking them what they want or need you will be able to decide if this restaurant is for you as well as figuring out if they really want a balloon artist. While you are asking them questions you can find out if they have worked with entertainers before and what kind of experience they had with them. When you ask them questions you will be able to allay their fears and help them see you as the superstar entertainer that you are.

These three ideas are just part of your overall presentation. You need to know what you offer to the restaurant, other then adding value. There needs to be a good reason for them to hire you over another. That is something that you have to figure out for yourself since every entertainer does everything a little bit differently.

The first thing that you need to do is sit down and make a list of all your expenses and income for the past year. This will help you get an idea s to what you can expect for the coming year as well as help you make decisions as to what can be cut. When looking at your expenses really decide what you need and what is just a luxury. We all would like to get a new costume or a new electric balloon pump but it isn’t really a have to have item. What you need to order are balloons, face paints and any other perishable or give away items. When it comes to costumes, learn to sew. That way you can fix any problems that you might have and possibly learn to make you own costumes in the future. When it comes to ordering balloons try to work with your fellow balloon users and try to make your order together so you can get a better bulk price. Also most juggling props can be fixed if broken, plus they are meant to be dropped so they shouldn’t break.

Next you are going to want to change your target market. Most, or at least a lot, of us spend a majority of our time entertaining for families with children and those are the people that are going to be hit the hardest when money gets tighter. Businesses are also going to get hit, but they are going to be trying to instance people into spending money at their business. That is where you come in. Make them see you as an advertising asset. Make sure that they know that you will give 110% to there event and will do additional promotion on your website to make sure people know you are going to be there. This is a good time to get in the good graces of businesses by offering discounted rates on multiple dates, filling up your calendar while giving them a discount making them like you better

The third thing you need to do is increase the area that you are willing to travel. Even an increase of 10 miles broadens the impact of your brand and gives you a new area to work. When broadening your area try not to raise your prices any more then to cover the cost of your car and gas to get there. Increasing your brand awareness will not only help you now but in the future, allowing you business to stay big when the money is good again.

Remember that you want to keep agile in the slowing market. you don’t want to be caught stagnant and crumbling as the economy starts to grow again. Another thing to keep in mind is that good will shows will go a long way to help everyone get through these tough times. So volunteer, help out or just make people smile everyday.

Oh and we’re back to posting, thanks for waiting and enjoy.

This is another aspect of clowning where you can let your imagination run wild, too, and the bag you use can be a big part of your routines - as well as a great attention-getter.

You can find a good bag at your local thrift shop and pimp it out to suit you, or you can buy a commercial busking bag. I use a mid-size busking bag that I bought because I like the idea of keeping my colors sorted and separated, but it still didn’t have enough pockets, so I also bought some small canvas pouches and fastened them to it.

Some essentials:

• A good selection of 260 sculptural balloons, of course, is the main thing. My bag has loops for 14 different colors, but I use way more than that, so some loops double up. Robin’s Egg Blue and Light Blue, for instance, share a home. Keeping colors sorted in a busking bag not only makes it easier for you to reach for a certain color, but also helps with ordering and inventory control, but remember that it takes some time to load. I stay away from the jewel tone style of 260s because they tend to be more fragile outdoors. Nothing’s more frustrating that trying to make a complicated sculpture only to have the balloons constantly popping on you.

• A good selection of round and specialty balloons. This is where all the extra bags are needed: Preprinted alien, happy face and silly face balloons, heart-shaped balloons, an assortment of round balloons in various colors, bee-body balloons, etc., should each have a pocket or color-coded bag so that you can go right for what you need and not have to dig around.

• Sharpies. Drawing faces on your animals – even just putting eyes on your doggies – or personalizing a hat with a child’s name can give your work character and style.

• Noise. What’s a clown without a horn? Because they’re too big for my pants, I keep a cowbell and my horn attached to my bag with clips from my hiking gear. That way, they’re always at hand and easy to remove if necessary.

• A rubber chicken. What’s a clown without a rubber chicken? It’s corny, to be sure, but everybody loves a rubber chicken. I glued goo-goo eyes on mine and named her Iris. You can put clothes on her, too, or make her up like a clown. The real reason I carry a rubber chicken on my balloon bag, however, is litter control. When I pop a balloon or break off a piece, I “feed the chicken.” This keeps you from making a mess of your work area. Once kids realize they can feed the chicken, too, they’ll keep the whole area policed for you. A discreet cut between the chicken’s legs allows for easy emptying.

• Business cards. Keep plenty of them, keep them handy, and give one to every parent you see. Even better: I went the extra step and started ordering post cards with my clown face on it from an on-line printing service. They cost a lot more than regular cards (which I still keep handy, too) but when you give a kid a postcard with your picture on it, they feel like they’re really getting something. Plus, you can make a big deal about giving them your autograph if you want.

• Extra gags/pocket tricks/toys: Items you use a lot are better kept in your pants pocket, but for good tricks you just don’t want to leave home without can be easily stored in your bag.

Next week, I’ll talk about how I load my pants, but that’s what I have in my busking bag. What’s in yours?

Your Pal,
Daluni

Projecting your voice is simple to do once you know how but can be hard to learn. The most important thing to remember is that when projecting your voice you are not yelling, you are talking louder. Yelling is the simplest way to lose your voice and potentially damage your vocal cords. Speaking loud is easier for some people then others but when doing it you will use your diaphragm. Your diaphragm is right below your lungs, when you take a deep breath you will notice that you stomach moves out. That is your diaphragm.

To practice using your diaphragm you need to take a big breath and exhale saying “Ha.” This will strengthen your muscles as well as teach you to speak loud and not yell. You will notice, after doing this 15 minutes a day for a few weeks, that your ability to control the volume of your voice without straining it. You will find it easier to do this exercise while you are standing up. Try it is quite easy and can only help you.

Another common mistake that clowns make more then any other entertainer is talking in a strange voice or purposely mispronouncing words. This can be funny if it is done properly; unfortunately it is rarely done properly. For an audience it can be hard to understand and even harder to listen to. If you are going to speak in a “funny” voice make sure to record it and listen to it to make sure that it is understandable and not grating to the ears. Better yet let someone else listen to it and have him or her give you his or her opinion.

The last thing that a lot of clowns do is to decide that their clown is not a speaking clown. If you have been trained as a mime this is great, in fact it is awesome, but for most of us this isn’t true and it leads to a bunch frantic waving and incoherent miming that no one enjoys. Non-speaking clowns are great in a circus or on the stage, but in a birthday or festival setting it is just setup to fail.

If you insist on being non-speaking you should plan out your movements in advance as well as being prepared to speak if the need arises.