What is a corporate magician ?

I am often asked this question - so thought that I would answer it here

Whilst growing up, few if any children ever say they want to be a “corporate magician” when they are adults! Some might want to be wizards, conjurors or straight magicians - but that is a different line of work. In the UK there are VERY few corporate magicians in fact I would say less than 20 - so this is still a very specialised and small niche. However in the US there are many more and really that is where the idea of a corporate magician stems from.

In brief terms a corporate magician - uses magic as a communication tool for organisations. It is a blend of the skills of a magician (20%) and the skills of a coach / marketer or other business professional (80%). Therefore it is impossible to become a corporate magician without having developed business acumen in a corporate or public body. As the emphasis is on communication, those that become successful at corporate magic are generally from a marketing / sales or similar discipline. It would be virtually impossible for someone that has grown up in magic and entertainment to make the transition to being a corporate magician. The vital element is the ability to develop communication strategies that are viable for clients. To be honest pretty much anyone can learn the magic skills required. Obviously performing quality magic is important (otherwise you are not really a corporate magician you are a communications consultant!), but the magic can be learned far more easily than the requisite marketing skills. The use of magic is a visual and emotional hook.


Having defined the nature of the skills required to be a corporate magician, where typically will a “corporate magician” be found? Many place; speaking at conferences; presenting at internal company meetings; helping to sell at trade shows or presenting training workshops (usually on communication or presenting skills). There appears to be a huge myth in the world of magic that if you perform close-up magic at a corporate dinner, or you do some clever magic tricks (occasionally mentioning your clients name) at a trade show then you have suddenly “arrived” as a corporate magician. Let me be very clear this is not the case. If you do close-up magic at a corporate diner then you are a close-up magician. If you do magic tricks at a trade show then you are probably still a close-up magician but you have been hired as a “stand attraction”. You might be VERY GOOD at building a crowd, but then a troop of strippers in the middle of the NEC or perhaps a rattle snake in a box would have the exact same effect. The strippers would not call themselves “corporate strippers” and the snake would not (I imagine) consider itself to be actively working with the client on their marketing strategy. So why do magicians believe that simply being employed to build a crowd makes them a “corporate magician” - I don’t really know but I imagine that it is to do with fees.

There are many magicians, there are very few true “corporate magicians” - so if you wanted to hire the genuine article how can you sort the wheat from the chaff? Simple, here is the one ‘golden bullet’ question. Ask them what they did before they learnt about magic and started using it professionally. Even easier, if in their marketing literature (and they will have lots of it) they make a feature of telling you that they have been in magic since the age of two years old, you will know that you have found a fantastic wizard, conjuror or straight magician. Won’t you?