If you’re a comedian, you don’t need me to tell you how many other comedians there are out there trying to carve out a career for themselves. It can be overwhelming to consider how many thousands of people you’re competing with for opportunities and attention from audiences.

As a result, one of the biggest challenges you face is figuring out how to stand out from the crowd.

I have an audience of more than 10,000 comedians from all over the world who regularly read the content I create through Connected Comedy and I certainly can’t know all of those comedians personally. However, there have been several comedians who have managed to stand out from the Connected Comedy crowd and I thought I’d share with you who they are and how they managed to catch my eye.

While catching my attention is certainly different than catching the attention of fans, the principles of what they’ve done to stand out from the crowd of comedians is actually very much the same.

Be Active, Be Present, And Provide Value

Lots of comedians contribute their thoughts, suggestions, and expertise to the Connected Comedy community, but those comedians that have done so the most (and the most consistently) have definitely gotten noticed. For example, comedians Chelcie Rice and Josh Homer have been very active in the Connected Comedians Facebook Group – sharing great links to valuable content for others to check out, answering other people’s questions, sparking good discussions, and even helping to monitor the group so that it doesn’t get too spammy.

As a result, I’ve taken notice of them and their comedy – their activity and consistent presence in the group has made me notice them and likely made everybody else in the group notice them as well.

Being active and providing value in online communities of any kind is a great way to get yourself noticed. Figure out where your niche audience lives, seek out those communities online, and participate often. The more value you provide, the more you will be noticed, and the easier it will be for you to stand out from the crowd.

Create And Lead Your Own Community

Another great way to separate yourself from the crowd is to create your own community by frequently producing targeted content. That’s how Jordan Cooper has separated himself from so many other comedians.

Cooper, in addition to regularly posting content on his website and interviewing me for his podcast, has recently launched LouisvilleComedy.com, which I believe is the first site specifically dedicated to that local comedy scene. As a result, Cooper has positioned himself as the center of that comedy scene and gotten himself noticed by me, other local comedians, local clubs, and local comedy fans.

All because he took the time and effort to create that site and regularly produce content for it!

What Jordan has done in positioning himself at the center of the Louisville comedy scene, you can also do by leading any kind of community that you are passionate about and you think will be interested in what you do. It takes a little effort, but it will be well worth the time you put into it.

Have A Unique Voice And Don’t Be Afraid To Put Yourself Out There

One of the keys to standing out from a crowd of comedians is to have a unique voice, viewpoint, and be willing to expose your talent to the world by posting videos online. Jamie Ward, a young comedian out of Atlanta, is one guy who definitely caught my eye by doing this.

I’ve seen multiple videos of Jamie in action and his unique perspective as an Asian, ex-soldier combined with some really clever material really caught my eye. Plus, he’s got a great Mitch Hedberg joke.

The reason Jamie has stood out to me is because his material and performance feels unique – it feels like he’s telling jokes and stories that only he can tell based on his own real life experiences and perspective. To put it simply, he’s talented.

But most importantly, Jamie has also been willing to put his stuff out there – he has multiple videos online of him performing, he writes blog posts, and he’s putting stuff out there for people to see. If he wasn’t doing that, I never would have even had the chance to notice him.

Take A Chance, Win A Contest

Several months ago I teamed up with Squabbler.com to host a contest where any of my readers could win a prize by submitting a simple video to their site. Lots of people entered, but lots of people didn’t.

Those that actually took the time to do so and give it a shot inevitably got exposed to more people. And the eventual winner, Derik Boik, was a comedian who submitted multiple videos, clearly put a lot of thought and work into what he submitted, and it paid off.

Not only did Derik win the contest and get himself featured on the Squabbler home page, but he also got himself noticed – by me and by others. Now, whenever I have conversations with somebody in the industry who asks me who I’ve seen out there amongst the mass of comedians that make videos that’s worth checking out, I also include Derik’s name. Because he stood out to me when he entered that contest.

There’s opportunities everywhere you look for you to stand out from the crowd if you’re willing to pursue them. You’re not going to just magically be discovered – you need to put yourself out there and put in the work to get yourself seen.

Please note that the comedians listed in this post are not the only comedians that have caught my eye – these are just a couple examples, so if you didn’t get mentioned in this post, it doesn’t mean I haven’t noticed you too.

Because of the seemingly random of nature of Facebook’s news feeds it can be very difficult to figure out why some things you post on the site get a lot of clicks and others are virtually ignored.

But, here’s five simple things that impact the likelihood that your Facebook posts get seen and shared.

1. The Engagement Level Of Your Previous Updates

The biggest thing that impacts whether your Facebook updates generate clicks is whether your updates are actually getting seen in your fans’ Facebook news feeds. I’ve written before about the shocking realities of how Facebook’s news feed algorithms work, and you’ll need to take this into account with all of your updates.

Simply put, the better a job you do at getting your fans to engage with your posts, the more likely your future posts are to appear in their news feeds. And the more your posts appear in their news feeds, the more likely they are to click on the links you post.

So, the most important thing you can do to get more clicks on your posts is to have built up a strong connection to your fans and a presence in their news feeds thanks to the success you’ve had in getting them to engage with your previous updates.

2. The Time You Post

Aside from getting your updates into people’s news feeds, the next most important thing to consider when you’re trying to get more clicks on your updates is to post them at the right time of day for your audience. It may take a little trial and error, but try to figure out when the majority of your fans are on Facebook and post your most important updates during those times – again, the more people that see them in the moment, the more clicks you will get.

In thinking about what time your fans are most likely to be on Facebook, consider whether your fanbase works or not, how old they are, what time zone they live in, and other basic factors that can help you estimate when they most likely use Facebook. And remember, it’s likely your schedule as a comedian doesn’t match up with their schedule as fans.

Just because you’re on Facebook at 1 am after a show doesn’t mean they are, so don’t waste a good post by posting it late at night when most of your fans will sleep through it.

3. Whether Or Not Your Link Has An Image Attached To It

When you post a link to something on Facebook, the site automatically pulls an image from the page you are linking to that it features along with your link. This is important because studies have shown that updates that include images get a lot more clicks than updates that don’t.

Again, this is automatically pulled by Facebook based on whatever images happen to exist on the website you’re linking to so there’s not much you can do to control it if there isn’t an image. However, if you’re linking to one of your own blog posts or content on a website that you can control, you want to make sure that you add an image to the post on your site so that there will be an image on the page for Facebook to pull into the link that you share. That much you can control and it will help you get more clicks to the link you share on Facebook.

4. The Title And Description Of The Link That You Post

When you share a link to a website or piece of content through Facebook, the social network automatically creates the title/description of the link based on whatever is on the website. However, you can easily change either the title or description, simply by highlighting the text and changing it before you post the update.

This is very easy to do and a great way to increase the clicks you get because most likely the title and description you will write for the piece of content will be more interesting and attention grabbing than whatever the default title and description is from the website. Keep in mind that anything goes in these sections, so even if you’re sharing a YouTube video you had nothing to do with creating, you can plug your own website in the description by saying something like “To see more awesome videos like this, check out MySite.com.”

And one more quick hint – if you use the full “http” url in the description, that will actually make it a clickable link in the description.

5. The Relevance Of What You Post To Your Audience

When you share links to content through your Facebook fan page, take a moment to think about whether what you’re sharing is actually relevant to your fans. In a perfect world, all your fans will be interested in everything you post, but in order to do that you need to make sure you’re posting things that are relevant to them.

For example, if you know you’ve got fans from across the country, don’t post an update promoting your local show to all of them because most of them aren’t going to be able to make it and won’t care anyway because it’s not relevant to them. You can select to post an update only to your fans who live in a specific city instead by using the Customize button that’s right next to the Share button on your update screen.

The same extends to content that you share – you may be interested in some inside-comedy industry article about the business of comedy, but will your fans be? Probably not. That’s the kind of thing you might share on your personal page as opposed to your fan page.

Again, there’s no hard rules about this but use your judgment and try to remember that the goal is to make everything you post on your Facebook fan page be relevant to the people that are following you. The more you do that, the more success you’ll have.

It’s not easy being a comedian and it’s a profession that’s filled with rejection and no shortage of things to fear. However, even though fears are a big part of pursuing a comedy career they are too often given more credence than they deserve.

Specifically, here’s three things I’ve noticed most comedians are way more afraid of than they should be…

1. Getting Your Material Stolen

Do jokes get stolen (intentionally and unintentionally)? Yes. Is it something you should worry about? No.

Too many comedians spend too much time worrying about other comedians stealing their material when it’s ultimately meaningless and there’s nothing you can do to prevent it anyway. It’s amazing to me how many comedians will hurt their own career by refusing to share material online (in videos, tweets, Facebook updates, blogs, etc.) for fear that somebody else may steal their material.

At the end of the day, nobody else is going to build a career based on your joke – in order to succeed in comedy it’s about much more than just your jokes. There’s a lot less joke theft going on than you think, and the people who are stealing material rarely have any success with it anyway so it’s meaningless. Don’t worry about what other comics are doing, just focus on your own act.

Sure, there’s a chance somebody may borrow some of your material. But there’s virtually no chance if they do it will have any impact on your career…or theirs.

2. Being Disliked By Part Of The Audience

If you’re not yet a headlining comedian who’s playing to an audience that specifically came to see you and is familiar with your work, then you shouldn’t expect every person in the audience to like your act. When you’re performing to a room that has no idea who you are, it’s likely that room is packed with a wide variety of people who have different senses of humor.

Your comedy, if you’re doing it right, shouldn’t be for everybody. So don’t worry if not everybody in the room loves you, but rather concentrate on making sure that at least some of the people (hopefully the majority of the room) love you. That’s ultimately who your fanbase is going to become.

You’ll find you get more long-term benefit from making half the crowd think you’re amazing than you will making the full crowd think you’re just OK. If you keep that mindset, you’ll be a little less concerned about a few people disliking your act.

3. Being Ridiculed By Your Peers

If you’ve been doing comedy for any extended period of time, then I’m sure you’ve already come to realize the delicate nature of comedian friendships. No matter how nice you are, you’re going to make some enemies and most times their dislike for you will not even be justified (though sometimes it will be – you know who you are).

It’s very easy to fall into the trap of adjusting what you do based on criticism you receive from other comedians and that’s not always the best thing for you or your act. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing more valuable then some genuinely helpful advice from a more experienced comedian who truly has your best interests at heart – but make sure you understand that comedian’s perspective and respect their advice before you take it.

Lots of comedians have their own agendas, jealousies, and other “quirks” that lead their comments to do you more harm than good. You need to follow your own instincts and not be afraid to be ridiculed by other comedians. Just because nobody else does something like you do, doesn’t mean that you’re wrong. It could mean that you’re right.

Can you think of other things comedians are more afraid of than they should be? Please add your thoughts in the comments below…

Yesterday on the Connected Comedy Facebook page I asked readers what their biggest frustration was with the comedy business and the majority of the answers related in some way to stage time and the various ways that clubs, promoters, and bookers determine who gets to perform on their stages.

That didn’t shock me, but what’s interesting to me is how confused many comedians seem to be about the process of getting stage time. Here’s a few common misconceptions I’ve noticed many comedians have about stage time…

1. You Think You’re Entitled To Stage Time

I hate to burst your bubble, but just because you decide to be a comedian it doesn’t mean anybody has to give you any stage time. Too many comedians think clubs and comedy venues exist solely to provide them with a place to get up and tell jokes – that couldn’t be further from the truth.

A promoter or venue’s clientele isn’t comedians – it’s the audience. The audience is where their revenue comes from and therefore the audience is who the venue is trying to please. Most bookers, promoters, or venues could care less about your needs as a comedian when it comes to getting stage time because that’s not the business they’re in.

It’s amazing how many comedians think it’s their right to perform as much as they want at their local comedy venues and then get personally offended when the venues don’t agree. If you’re comedian, you need to understand you’re providing a service to the venues and that they don’t owe you the right to practice your craft on their stage.

If you were a plumber, would you think a homeowner owed it to you to let you come work on their plumbing?

2. You Think You Need Somebody Else To Give You Stage Time

I’ve said it a million times before – stop waiting for somebody to give you permission to have a career. If you aren’t able to get as much stage time as you’d like from your local venues, then go produce your own show.

Yes, it will take some more work to produce and promote a show, but the rewards can be huge – including the opportunity to get as much stage time as you feel you need. Also, once you start producing your own show you’ll quickly find a new perspective on stage time as a whole. Suddenly, you’ll better understand the position of the venues you previously criticized because you too will be more focused on providing a good show to your audience as opposed to making sure every comedian that wants stage time has the opportunity to get up on your stage.

3. You Think Every Stage Is A Place For You To Practice

I understand stage time is important and that you need it to work out new material and practice your act. However, most shows are not designed to give you a place to work on your act.

It’s one thing to work out new material at open mics or smaller workshop shows, but larger venues and “real” shows are designed to entertain an audience. Usually, material you’re just trying out isn’t going to be that entertaining and doesn’t belong on those stages. You need to recognize that not all stage time is created equal and plan accordingly.

Also, the quickest way for you to lose future stage time is when you’re booked on a real show to opt to spend most of your set working out new material instead of going with your best stuff. Remember to pick your practice spots wisely.

4. You Think The Stage Is The Only Outlet For Your Comedy

Like I’ve said before, it’s important to think of yourself as more than just a stand up comedian. Just because you may not be able to get as much stage time as you’d like, it doesn’t mean you can’t still be working on your comedy.

Embrace tools like YouTube, podcasting, and blogging to regularly create comedic content and share it with the world. Stage time is just one outlet for your comedy career and it’s by no means the only one.

Too many comedians spend their weeks waiting around for those 5-minute bursts of stage time they get, thinking that’s the only way they can work on their comedy but that’s just not true.

You’ve got the opportunity to create all kinds of different things at virtually no cost and reach the world with your creations through the Internet – you just have to make an effort to do so. If you limit yourself to thinking the only way you can progress is by getting on stage, you’ll find you’re only spending a small fraction of the time you could be spending on honing your skills and growing your career.

It’s amazing what a difference the words you choose to use can make in what you do. This is especially true when it comes to comedians who are trying to find their way through a sea of marketing buzzwords that may seem a lot more applicable to the business world than they do to your comedy.

To help you cut through the jargon and see the real value/meaning behind some of these terms, I’ve put together a few translations that you may find helpful.

1. “Blogging” means “Creating”

I talk a lot about the importance of blogging as a way to attract new fans, but I know comedians have a very specific (and negative) connotation of the word. They think of a blog as an online journal where they talk about things like what they had for breakfast or other minutiae of their day to day life that most people probably won’t care about. But that’s a wrong impression based on the word.

Blogging is really just another way of suggesting you create content and post it online – preferably on your own website. That content may be written, may be video, may be audio, may be pictures, and can really be about anything you want.

It’s easy to think “blogging” isn’t important to your career or something that fits what you do, but if instead you replaced the word with “creating,” I doubt you’d feel the same way.

2. “Social Media” means “Having A Conversation With People”

Here’s one of the most commonly misunderstood terms that’s floating around out there. Too many comedians think of social media as a promotional tool, as this thing you do when you have something you want to promote, sell, or otherwise tell people about. But it’s actually much more than that.

Social media isn’t just about you talking at people, it’s about you talking with people. Social media tools were created to enable you to have a two-way conversation with people as opposed to just give you a place to ask people to do things for you.

Think about it – way before social media became a big buzzword there were plenty of opportunities for you to promote your stuff to people via email lists, posting on websites, etc. The leap that social media enabled was the ability to converse back and forth with these people. If you think of your use of social media as “having a conversation with people,” you’ll likely start using it much differently (and more effectively).

Remember, the “social” part is more important than the “media” part when it comes to social media.

3. “Promoting” means “Providing Value”

One of the main reasons comedians feel uncomfortable about promoting themselves and their work is because too often they’re not providing value in what they’re promoting. If you’re creating content, shows, or products that truly provide value for a targeted audience that will enjoy them, then you shouldn’t feel awkward about promoting them.

If you think about promoting more in terms of providing value, you’ll also likely wind up promoting different things and doing so in a different way. Don’t think about how you can promote yourself and your career, instead think about what you can do to provide more value to more people. When you do, the rest will take care of itself.

4. They’re not your “Fans” or “Followers,” they’re your “Friends”

It’s very easy to get caught up in the language of Facebook and Twitter and obsess over your fan and follower counts. Besides being meaningless – it’s how many people that care about you that matters more than how many people follow you – those terms can mislead you when it comes to your approach to your fanbase.

Instead of thinking of the people that follow you as fans, with you on a pedestal above them, try thinking of them as friends. They want to connect with you and feel like you’re equal – they don’t want to be your fan, they want to be your friend.

Obviously, you only have so much time and you won’t be able to truly be friends with all of your fans, but in general you can approach them in that way. Treat your fans like you would your friends – care as much about them as they care about you. Invite them to participate in what you do and in your career. Let them feel like they’re a part of your life and like you’re a part of theirs.

The closer they feel connected to you, the more they will root for you to succeed and the more they will try to help you get where you want to go. Don’t keep them at arm’s length, which is too often what happens when you think of them as fans or followers.

As you can see with these four terms, adjusting your own definition of what they mean is a simple thing that can really have a big impact on what you do and how you do it. What other terms do you think are misunderstood? Feel free to post them in the comments below…

Facebook is an incredibly powerful tool and a great asset to any comedian’s career, but unfortunately too many comics have picked up a few bad habits when it comes to using the social network.

Here’s a few things you should stop doing on Facebook because they’re ineffective, counterproductive, and often times just plain annoying to your fans.

1. Stop Sending Event Invites To People That Don’t Live In Your City

Just because you have the ability to invite all of your fans to your show next weekend, doesn’t mean that you should. Like most people who are fans of comedians on Facebook, my inbox is flooded with event invites from comics who are performing thousands of miles away from me.

If you’re sending out an event invite, take a moment to figure out exactly who you want to send it to so you don’t bother people who don’t live in the area of the show and clearly aren’t going to attend. If you don’t, and you just continue to spam people with those invites, they are very likely to block you or even un-Like your page.

Sending out pointless invites actually carries a lot of risk (it will cost you fans) for no reward (somebody that lives thousands of miles away isn’t coming to your show no matter how many invites and reminders you send).

2. Stop Auto-Posting Your Tweets On Facebook

I’d recommend not auto-posting anything on any social network – it looks sloppy, lazy, and sends a message to your followers that you can’t be bothered to take an extra second or two to actually post the tweet or Facebook update manually.

But one thing you definitely don’t want to auto-post to your Facebook profile is your tweets. Twitter and Facebook are completely different mediums, each with their own rules, strengths, weaknesses, and language. Way too often I see comedians posting Facebook updates that include references to @profiles, hashtags, retweets, and other Twitter-specific details. These posts are great on Twitter, but on Facebook they’re just spam.

Again, doing this can actively hurt your Facebook presence because every time you post a meaningless update you increase the chances that your fans will ignore your future updates and you increase the chances they’ll stop following you. If you’re too busy to take a moment to post a Facebook update without auto-posting, then you probably shouldn’t be using Facebook in the first place.

3. Stop Begging People To Do Things For You

Here’s a big misconception that comedians have about Facebook – its purpose isn’t to give you a way to ask your fans to do you favors. It’s actually quite the opposite – people follow you because they believe you’re going to provide value for them and not the other way around.

It’s one thing to occasionally provide opportunities for your fans to help you out with something, but way too many comedians’ Facebook pages read like a stream of them begging for favors.

Vote for me in this contest, share my video with your friends, come see my show, get more people to Like my page, etc. People didn’t Like your page so they could become your employee, so stop begging them to do your work for you. Instead, figure out what you can do to help them and see how that works out for you.

4. Stop Hiring People To Update Your Facebook Profile For You

Even though I work with lots of comedians to help them develop a good strategy for using Facebook, one thing I’ll never do is actually run their profile and post updates for them (and you wouldn’t believe how many successful comedians have tried to hire me to do so for them).

If you’re a comedian and a professional content creator, why on Earth would you then outsource the creation of content (even 140-character at a time content) to somebody else? Isn’t that supposed to be your expertise?

Don’t turn your Facebook page over to your publicist, manager, or whatever social media guru offers to run it. Fans aren’t that dumb – they can tell when you’re the one posting and when you’re not.

5. Stop Repeatedly Suggesting I Like Your Page

It’s one thing to suggest to your personal friends that they Like your new fan page – that’s actually a good thing to do. But do it once. Or once every few months. Don’t do it once a day.

This is another thing too many comedians beat to death as they just continually suggest their friends Like their page which is again, basically another form of spam. If you’ve suggested that I Like your page and I haven’t taken you up on the offer then maybe instead of suggesting it again, you should take a moment to consider why I turned down your invitation.

It’s probably because I looked at your page and saw that you’re doing the top four things on this list and I decided I wanted no part of that…just like most people do.

What else do you think comedians need to stop doing on Facebook? Share your thoughts in the comments…

As you may or may not know, Connected Comedy isn’t the only website that I update every day. I also have a personal website at JoshSpector.com, where I share interesting things I find (usually videos) from my travels on the Internet superhighway.

Here’s the part that may really shock you – in the last six months I’ve had more than 2 million people visit JoshSpector.com.

Today, I’m going to tell you how that happened and how you can do something similar for your own website without spending a dime (because I didn’t).

First, here’s a little background about what I do on my personal site.

Unlike Connected Comedy, JoshSpector.com doesn’t really serve any business purpose and primarily features curated content. I’m not exactly sure why I started it, but it was basically to share things I found cool with people who I assumed would enjoy them. Its purpose was to entertain people.

Because it wasn’t intended to be a “business,” I didn’t run Facebook ads or put any money into growing the site’s traffic. That all happened naturally – here’s how…

A Long Time Ago, In A Galaxy Back In 2009…

I first launched JoshSpector.com in December 2009. I had blogged on and off for years (since 2001), but always through websites that didn’t have my name in the title. Typically, I blogged as just an anonymous guy – uncomfortable with putting my name behind my thoughts – and had multiple blogs on Blogger, Tumblr, and WordPress over the years.

I always liked it, but inevitably would abandon each blog after a few months and then start a new one later. In retrospect, I can’t help but wonder how many readers I’d have if I had just stuck with one blog all these years, but I guess it was just a process I had to go through.

At the end of 2009, I had become comfortable enough to launch a new blog for myself at JoshSpector.com. I didn’t tell lots of people about it (beyond some friends and acquaintances) or do anything to promote it, but I just started posting things I found interesting. I think it’s important to note this because before I get into the details of the traffic explosion over the last six months on the site, it’s important for you to understand that I had been blogging (in one form or another) for almost a decade and had been running the current site for more than a year before it really took off.

The point is, you need to understand it takes time to build traffic – you have to be patient. But if you are patient, great things can happen.

I Kept Posting Even When Nobody Was Reading…

In the first 14 months after I launched JoshSpector.com I wrote 386 posts. I was posting new content on the site multiple times a week – regardless of whether people read it or not. And for the most part, people didn’t read it.

I had just over 30,000 total visitors to my site during those first 14 months and on a typical day I’d be lucky to get more than 40 people to check out the site. But I didn’t let that deter me, and continued to post stuff I found interesting. I didn’t have a master plan (or a goal for the site for that matter), but I knew I wasn’t going to get any more traffic without fresh content so I kept at it.

I Connected With The Few Readers I Had…

You know how I always talk about how important an email list is and how powerful a connection it can give you to your fans? Well, even though I barely had any readers on my site, I always made sure the bottom of every post and the sidebar had links asking readers to subscribe to get each day’s post by email if they were interested.

My hope was if they actually saw something they liked on my site that they would sign up to see more of it by email as opposed to me having to rely on them remembering to come back and visit my site on their own.

Sure enough, even though I didn’t have many readers yet, some of them signed up for the email and I knew I could at least count on them getting links to my stuff whenever I posted it.

The other thing I did to connect with my readers was to put Facebook, Twitter, and other easy share buttons on each post to make it as easy as possible for people to share my content with their friends. Again, my goal was to make it as simple as possible for people to connect and share my content with their friends.

I didn’t think much of these things at the time, but it would turn out that these two things would dramatically impact the future of my site.

February 13, 2011 – A Day That Will Live In JoshSpector.com Infamy…

On February 13, 2011, I came across this really great Taiwanese commercial for a bank. I don’t even remember where I originally saw it, but I posted it on my site just like I would any other cool thing I found.

And at first, I assumed it would be just like any other thing I had posted up to that point. In fact, I only had 22 people visit my site that day. But here’s the traffic my site got over the next 7 days:

Feb. 14: 131 visits

Feb. 15: 183 visits

Feb. 16: 389 visits

Feb. 17: 909 visits

Feb. 18: 1,616 visits

Feb. 19: 1,883 visits

Feb. 20: 2,683 visits

Feb. 21: 5,988 visits

As you can see, that post was being spread by people who loved it to other people who loved it, all of which was sending more and more traffic to my site. And it was growing exponentially – it was truly viral. By the time March 28th came around, I was getting 45,000 people a day visiting my site!

It was pretty crazy and I was excited, but here’s what’s really interesting about it – more than 85% of that traffic was coming from the link that was shared with my original email subscribers. So I know for a fact that this whole thing began because a handful of my email subscribers (there were only about 30 at the time) decided to share that link with their friends.

Had I not gotten people to sign up for that email list, it’s likely they never would have seen the post, never would have shared it, and I never would have gotten that flood of traffic.

Coming Back To My New Reality…

It took a couple months, but the sharing of that popular post eventually died down and I saw my traffic dip with it. But, because I had been offering all the new people who visited my site a chance to join my email list (and at this point my new Facebook page I launched for the site), I had managed to convert a lot of that new traffic into regular readers and email subscribers. I converted new visitors into “fans” that I had a connection to.

By the time things had come back to reality, I realized that the reality of the JoshSpector.com audience had also changed. I now had almost 2,000 email subscribers and more than 1,000 fans of the site on Facebook. The viral hit had run its course, but it left me with a much larger base audience for my site – whereas I was getting about 40 visitors a day to the site, I was now seeing 2,000 visits on a slow day!

I continued to post content just about every day to feed that audience, redesigned the site a little bit, and settled into the new normal. But then, just as I was getting used to that…

Here We Go Again…

Last Tuesday I posted this funny Facebook status update, and it clearly struck a chord with my followers. They started sharing it by email, on Facebook, and on Twitter. The next thing you know, it had somehow come to Roger Ebert’s attention who shared it with his Twitter followers – all 510,000 of them!

Then, soon after, DailyKos.com (a huge political blog) posted a link and tweet to the post as well. Suddenly, my site was being flooded with traffic again and by Thursday I had a whopping 61,000 visits in a single day – my biggest day ever!

Basically, I discovered once again that you never know which piece of content you post is going to take off and that every single thing you put on your website has the opportunity to attract a ton of traffic to your site. Plus, because I capitalized on the first viral hit I had, it made it much easier to replicate the feat. I had more email subscribers and “true fans,” so I had a much bigger base to launch something viral like this.

Now, this latest hit is starting to fade away and once again it will leave me with a new base audience that’s significantly bigger than it was before…therefore increasing the chances of it happening again.

Why You Should Care About Any Of This…

Although I’m obviously thrilled at what’s gone on with my personal site, that’s not the only reason I’m telling you the story here. I’m telling you this because I know that the same thing can happen for you and your website.

I’m not an entertainer. I’m not a comedian. I don’t have shows, or albums, or videos that would appeal to the average person on the Internet looking to be entertained. But if you’re a comedian, you do. You have a much more vested interest in attracting fans who want to be entertained to your website than I do – it’s not my career.

If you consistently post content on your website, make it easy for people to access/share that content, and are patient enough to stick it out for a while – you can get 2 million people to view your website in six months. I know that for a fact because I just did it.

One of the biggest challenges you’ll face as a comedian is to figure out how to grow your fanbase from scratch. Especially when you have limited stage time, or if you’re performing at open mics for small crowds that consist mostly of other comedians, it can be difficult to figure out how to introduce new people to your comedy.

Creating content online and posting it on your website gives you the ability to reach people all over the world and expands your potential audience way beyond the people that happen to see you live, but even then it can be difficult to figure out how you get people to visit your site or view your content.

But, if you have an idea of who is likely to enjoy your style of comedy, there’s actually a few easy places to find those potential fans. Here’s six places that you can go to find new potential fans for yourself…

1. Relevant Blogs and Websites

The backbone of the Internet is blogs and content websites – the vast majority of which are themed around a specific niche topic or sensibility – and those sites are one of the easiest places to find people who may be interested in your comedy. And the best part is, they are relatively easy to reach.

Think about who your comedy is likely to appeal to and track down various blogs and websites that attract an audience interested in those similar topics. If you need help finding these sites, my 100 Places To Promote Your Comedy Content eBook may help.

Once you’ve identified some sites, then spend some time interacting with those sites and their readers. Comment on articles, participate in discussions, communicate with the bloggers or writers that run the site, and become a part of the existing fan community for those sites.

What will inevitably happen is the other fans of those sites will start to get to know you, and in turn be interested in what you do (i.e., your comedy). Plus, since you chose these websites specifically because they have similar appeal as that of your comedy, the chances are that when these blog readers are introduced to your comedy they will enjoy it.

2. The YouTube Comments Section

Obviously, it’s worth setting up your own YouTube channel and posting videos, but that’s not what I’m referencing in this post with regard to finding fans. Once you’ve set up a channel, start looking around YouTube to find other videos that you find funny and – more importantly – that you think may be similar to your comedy.

Then look at the comments on that video and get involved – post comments, interact with the other commenters, and join the conversation. Every time you leave a comment on a YouTube video your username shows up as a link back to your channel – so leaving valuable, clever, and funny comments actually serves as promotion for your own channel.

You can even message commenters on other people’s videos directly, introduce yourself, and mention that you read their comment on a video and thought they may be interested in your stuff. Don’t just spam people obviously, but recognize that YouTube comments are a really easy way to identify new potential fans for your comedy.

3. The Facebook Ads Section

Most comedians spend all their time on Facebook talking to their existing fans and don’t realize it’s an incredibly powerful source to find new fans. If you’re willing to invest a little bit of money in Facebook ads, you can target the exact demographic of potential fans that you think will be most likely to enjoy your comedy.

For example, if your target audience is 25-45 year old Moms who live within 10 miles of Chicago and are fans of the Improv comedy club, you can run a Facebook ad to just target those people! And, you only pay when somebody clicks your ad. Again, Facebook ads are incredibly powerful and potentially the best way for a comedian to find new fans.

If you’re planning to give Facebook ads a shot, you should definitely read my post about how I increased my Facebook fans by 470% for $20.

4. Other Comedians’ Fanbases

Whether you go looking for fans on Facebook, YouTube, or websites, here’s another trick that most comedians don’t consider – target other similar comedians’ fanbases. Think about what your style of comedy is and then think about which more established comedians have a similar style to you. If they’re more established, they probably have a bigger fanbase. And if they’re similar to you, their fanbase will probably also enjoy your comedy – so go after them.

For example, if I were a political comedian looking to grow my fanbase here’s what I would do: I’d run Facebook ads and interact with YouTube commenters targeting fans of Bill Maher, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Lewis Black, etc.

Just like you would try to get a booking as an opener for one of these big comedians because you want their audience to see you, you should try to do the same thing online. But the great thing is that you don’t need to be booked to do it online – you can just find these fans, target them, and reach out to them.

5. Look At Those People Sitting In The Audience At Your Show

This one seems obvious, but it’s amazing that most comedians ignore it. Every time you take the stage to perform you’re staring at a crowd full of people who could potentially become your fans. But most comics are so busy trying to make them laugh in the moment, that they completely forget to give them any reason or opportunity to become fans beyond that moment.

Whether it’s asking people to join your email list, visit your website, get a free copy of your album, or anything else, you want to make sure that you take advantage of the opportunity to convert people who see you and like you into actual fans. The goal isn’t to make an audience laugh once – it’s to convert as many of those people who laughed into actual fans who will come see you again and spread the word about you. Remember the 10% goal?

Obviously, these aren’t the only ways you can find new fans for yourself but these are five simple things that are sitting right in front of your face. Experiment with them and I’m sure you’ll find that it’s easier to grow your fanbase than you may think.