Today we’d like to introduce you to Keith Kong.
Keith, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been obsessed with understanding the human mind and even today, I believe that the more you know about people, the less you need to know about anything else.
When I was ten years old, I saw a magician on TV and just a few days later, on my eleventh birthday, I decided to give it a shot.
While most kids might have a performer at their birthday party, I was the kid performing at my birthday party and to my surprise, I was actually pretty good! Not only were the grown up’s entertained but they really had no clue how the magic was happening and that’s a crazy feeling for a kid to have.
Seeing the adults scratch their heads that day is probably what encouraged me to keep going.
Fast forward a bit and I’m fourteen years old performing in bars and lounges that I wasn’t even old enough to get into! A bouncer would escort me to the stage and once my performance was over he would walk me back to the lobby.
Even at that age, the performances were well received and while the money wasn’t great, I was happy to be earning it in such a fun way. I continued performing part-time while going to school and even traveled and performed internationally during my summer vacations.
Once I was in high school, I began taking every psychology class that was available and even dual-enrolled simultaneously in college to get an early start.
One day I was in the hallway when I noticed a poster for a hypnosis show which peaked my curiosity. I arrived to the show three hours early hoping that I could talk to the hypnotist and I was there when he arrived at the auditorium. I introduced myself, helped set the stage, and asked him question after question until he mentioned a famous mentalist.
Up until that point, I hadn’t heard of mentalism but as soon as I researched it, I came to a pretty surprising conclusion. Literally, everything in my show at that time was considered mentalism and I had been calling it magic without realizing.
After that, I sort of shifted my brand and continued performing while earning my degree and certificates in psychology and criminal profiling from UCF.
Once graduation was over, I decided to perform full time and less than one year later, I was in talks with network producers about potentially appearing on a tv show. In July of 2020, that came true when I appeared on the CW’s international hit tv show, “Penn & Teller: Fool Us” where I went on to win the trophy in season 7!
Since then, I’ve continued to perform internationally for some of the most amazing corporate audiences and even a few celebrities along the way.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
It hasn’t always been smooth sailing and that’s because it took me a while to realize the importance of the business side in “Show Biz”.
When I first started performing, I only wanted to entertain people but I didn’t always know how to sell myself. While I know that I can make a companies award show 1000x better, it’s not always easy getting prospects to realize the impact that active entertainment can have.
Fortunately, I’ve gotten much better when it comes to selling and now I even work with one of the largest sales training companies in the world to help make their presentations more engaging and positively memorable.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I think that one of the things that set me apart is that I have a real understanding of the psychology that goes into my presentations.
I’m able to use visual, verbal, and nonverbal cues to understand how/why people make certain decisions so you’re not just getting entertainment but you also walk away with a sense of knowledge and empowerment.
Most event organizers are afraid that their event will have low engagement so they want to bring in something fun and interactive. I take a lot of pride in working closely with them to produce something great because know that each event is different.
We love surprises, fun facts and unexpected stories. Is there something you can share that might surprise us?
Most people probably don’t realize that I’m insanely critical of my work. I overthink everything and often have to force myself to realize that done is better than perfect (even if only on rare occasions). It’s not uncommon for me to work 14 hour days because I take all of this very seriously and if an audience is giving me their time, the last thing I want to do is waste it.
Contact Info:
- Email: booking@kongmentalist.com
- Website: www.kongmentalist.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kongmentalist/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/kongmentalist
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/kongmentalist
Image Credits:
Jim Pinard (personal photo)
