Josh Spector is the founder of Connected Comedy, through which he provides marketing, business, and career strategies to comedians and other creators. You can read more of his advice at ConnectedComedy.com or subscribe to the Connected Comedy Free Tips Newsletter for more exclusive information. http://connectedcomedy.com/free-tips-newsletter/

Josh graciously let me ask him 10 questions and his answers are invaluable to any creator who is looking to break into Hollywood.

1. How has the internet changed how comedians/artists find opportunities?

It’s changed a lot about the landscape of the business, but the biggest overall change is that comedians no longer need “permission” to have a career. It used to be that you needed the various Hollywood/comedy industry gatekeepers to enable you to reach an audience and build a fanbase, but now the Internet allows creators to reach the entire world with their creations at virtually no cost. The elimination of the need for a Hollywood middle man has created limitless opportunities for artists who understand how to reach fans directly and are willing to put in the work to create content that will fuel the growth of their own career.

2. What’s the best advice you can give to someone who’s just starting out?

I think it’s important to understand two seemingly opposite things. First, be realistic about what you’re setting out to do – it is not going to be easy to build a career for yourself as a comedian (or in any part of the entertainment industry). Most people will not ultimately succeed, and if you do succeed it will likely take a long time to do so. It’s important to understand that going into it. Too many people think it’s going to be easy and they get frustrated when it’s not.

But the flipside of that is that it’s just as important to understand that it is possible to succeed and that now, more so than ever before in the history of the entertainment industry, you are able to control your fate. Thanks to the Internet and new technology, you’re able to create whatever you want and expose it to the whole world – if you have the talent and are willing to put in the time and effort to succeed, you probably will. I think it’s important for people to understand and truly believe they can succeed – it will take time, but it is possible.

3. What would you say is the biggest mistake that rookie comedians typically make?

I think a lot of people decide to become comedians because they don’t think of themselves as business people and have no interest in “working.” They look at the funny comedians that inspire them and assume those guys don’t really work hard because of their personas on stage. But what they fail to realize is that 99% of the most successful comedians out there have been successful because they treat their comedy seriously and treat it like a business. There’s tons of talented comedians who never quite make it, and usually that’s because they weren’t really willing to treat their comedy like a serious career – they just wanted to perform, hang out, and hope that things magically come together for them.

4. What’s the best way to break into the industry?

There’s a lot of different ways you can break into the business these days, but I think the best plan is to work to develop a fanbase for whatever you do. Too many comedians spend too much time trying to get the attention of bookers, managers, agents, development executives and other industry types as opposed to building their own fanbase and working on creating great content. What they fail to realize is that as soon as you have your own fanbase, all the industry people start flocking to you.

5. What would you say is the number one most important quality of a successful comedian or comic writer?

I think it’s important for a comedian or writer to be fearless and willing to find their own way. You can’t be afraid to be unique and to experiment because ultimately the way you’re really going to succeed is if you can find your own distinct voice and you can’t do that if you’re afraid to take chances. Not everything will work of course, but that’s ok. The people that really break out are the ones that do something new and different – too many comedians are afraid to go against the grain of the conventional wisdom and as a result they just blend into the crowd.

6. Are there places besides Hollywood where comedic screenwriters can find success? How?

This is another thing that I think has been drastically changed in recent years thanks to the Internet. A writer can now showcase their writing online in a variety of ways (everything from Twitter, to blogs, to short YouTube videos, etc.) and get themselves discovered no matter where they live. The key is you have to put content out there – too many writers are afraid of getting things stolen – and be willing to put in the work and time to build an audience for your writing. And of course, what you do has to be good.

7. What do you think of blogging as a self-promotional tool for emerging writers?

I’m a huge fan of blogging and believe that every writer and comedian should be blogging on a regular basis. That said, I define blogging in a much broader sense – I mean that they should be creating and posting content on a website that they control. It doesn’t mean they have to write journal entries about what they ate for breakfast or what they did last night with their friends. The word blogging has some negative connotations, but I’d definitely recommend they regularly create content. If you’re a writer, you should write.

8. Obviously tools like facebook, twitter, and youtube can help a comedic performer build up a strong fanbase, which can then be used to launch their career. Does internet marketing have a similar place for comedic writers looking to sell screenplays or TV pilots?

Yes, I think it does. What all of these social media tools really do best is allow you to find, attract, and communicate with the exact audience you’d like to reach. Again, the key is creating content that will appeal to that audience and then understanding how to make sure that audience sees what you’re doing.

For example, if I was a screenwriter who wanted comedy producers to know that I existed then I would consider launching a blog specifically about comedy movie producers. I’d interview them, I’d share stories about their experiences (and my own in dealing with them), and I’d try to create a site that became a must-read for comedy producers. Because in doing so, they would also be introduced to me and I’d be building connections that could ultimately get me (and my screenplays) read by them.

The key to Internet marketing is to understand the audience you want to reach, to create content designed specifically to appeal to that audience, and then to market that content to that audience. When you do that, it works.

9. What’s the best way for an emerging comedian to reach out to other, more established comedians?

Besides interacting with them when you see them in clubs or on shows whenever possible, you can always reach out to them through Facebook, Twitter, or their email address which is usually posted on their website. Not everybody will respond to you of course, but I think you’d be surprised that most people will be responsive to you depending what you’re asking of them.

If you’re just pestering somebody to let you open for them or give you work, they likely won’t respond. But, if you’re asking for advice or suggestions, there’s a good chance they will.

10. What do you think might be the next great unmined frontier for comedic material?

I think there’s a lot of great material out there right now in places that Hollywood thinks it’s tracking, but is still missing. For example, Hollywood is finally scouring things like YouTube, podcasts and blogs looking for material but in most cases they’re probably missing a lot. That’s because the people that came through the Hollywood development ranks weren’t trained to find stuff online – they were trained to look for books and more traditional sources of material.

As a result, they’re trying their best but they don’t really understand how this all works and where it’s all going. In my opinion, the “traditional” development business tends to still be very behind people who are closer to the Internet when it comes to breaking material. I believe that finding material online is its own unique skill set, and most of the people that have it are not working in traditional development at the moment. But that will likely change at some point…

* Special thanks to my intern Jinjin Sun for putting together these great questions!

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