Personal Branding and Blogger Feature: Kel Fabie
Apr 23
Kel Fabie is a professional host, magician, and mentalist. He used to be on radio but decided to go full time with his passion for magic last year. What’s amazing about his story is that he really relied on social media to generate opportunities for his craft and this resulted to him without having to work a 9AM-5PM job for one whole year. Through Multiply, Kel was able to get around 5-6 jobs per month, some of which were performances for celebrities and politicians. Watch the interview after the break. I also summarized his talking points for those who have slow internet connection and can’t stream the video.
What’s good to note about this particular case is that he really stepped in a filled a void in the online space. Other magicians weren’t really aggressive online and relied mostly on mass media to promote themselves. I’m not saying that he’s done it 100% already, in fact, there’s so much more to be done for him to fully occupy that space and be top-of-mind when it comes to Philippine magicians. What he’s done though is to open a window wide enough so that people can contact him and book him online. This also allowed him to network with people who were in the same line of work as he was, and this gave him better and bigger opportunities.
Social Media platforms can be as powerful as blogs. The advantage of starting a blog in a social network is that you already have a captive audience to begin with. If you constantly update your blogs in Friendster, Multiply, and Facebook, all your contacts get a notification that you’ve done so. If the topic is interesting, then they’ll probably read it. Yes, you won’t get revenues from Adsense. However, if you’re self-employed and you’re offering something, then there’s a chance for you to earn even more (versus Adsense).
Lastly, here’s some unsolicited advice for Kel. This is part of the free consultancy thing that I’m also offering here at New Media Philippines.
1. Create a blog that really offers more value. Maybe you can teach simple magic tricks through video and post it on your blog? You don’t have to give everything away, but the basics will definitely get you a lot of traffic. I’m not sure if you’re doing this already but if you are then great! Haha. 
2. Consider online advertising that will drive even more traffic to your blog. Placing ads on Facebook is really cheap. Found that out myself (I’m currently running an ad campaign on FB for New Media Philippines). Suggest you also expand from Multiply to Facebook. In terms of user demographics, there are more young professionals on Facebook compared to Multiply.
3. Protect your Brand. More on this on the article that Sonnie wrote on Personal Branding.
Thanks for the opportunity for the interview Kel. Looking forward to seeing you become one of the premiere Philippine mentalists and magicians.
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Thank you very much for the kind words and the unsolicited but perfectly welcome advice. I’m working on your points of advice, albeit given the nature of Philippine magic, teaching magic on my site will result in ostracization.
Nonetheless, thanks for the opportunity to be featured here as well. I still have a long way to go to establish myself as a magician, but I’m up to the challenge, to be sure.
Teach the cheapest trick like the disappearing coin XD But yeah you’re right. We talked about that before I think. Anyway, it was really nice of you to accept the invitation for the interview.
Good luck man, I know you’ll become one of the pillars of the mentalist/magic entertainment industry someday.
All the best,
Carlo
I think he was a classmate of mine in Ateneo before in one of my theology classes and I remembered him part of the debate group about abortion.