In the past year, 20 comedians have done AMAs in the /r/IAmA subreddit promoting a Comedy Central program. It is likely that Comedy Central is encouraging their talent to do reddit AMAs to promote their shows and specials. Some of the AMAs have been huge successes and others received little attention. In this post, we go through a few Comedy Central AMAs and uncover why they didn’t do as well as they could have.
#1 Jeff Ross
The title is the biggest problem with his AMA and is likely the reason that the AMA only received a final score of ~111. The title simply promotes his upcoming Comedy Central special and does nothing to grab the attention of the reddit audience. His comedy special was filmed inside a prison, so something like this would have done much better:
I am Jeff Ross. I’ve been a roaster on 11 Comedy Central roasts and last year I roasted prisoners at the Brazos County Jail. AMA.
This title establishes his credentials and then gives the reddit audience an intriguing experience that they will want to ask questions about. In the body of his post, he should of then went on to list more of his accomplishments and experiences.
Jeff did very well when it came to answering questions. He answered just about every question that was asked and his answers were funny, topical, and authentic. With a revised title, we are confident this AMA could have topped /r/IAmA and been a huge promotional opportunity for Jeff’s special.
#2 Whitney Cummings
Whitney Cummings is in a similar position as Jeff Ross when it comes to popularity. Any comedy fan will know her by name, but the average redditor probably does not. While the title of her AMA plays to the name of her latest comedy special (it’s titled “I Love You”), it doesn’t give the reddit community any information about who she is or what she does.
A better title for Whitney’s AMA would have been:
I am Whitney Cummings. I’m a comedian, actress, and co-creator of 2 Broke Girls. I love you. AMA.
This title would grab more attention and upvotes because it describes what she does and it includes a notable accomplishment (2 Broke Girls is a popular network show that redditors have likely heard of).
#3 Kurt Metzger
Kurt Metzger is a hilarious comedian, but only serious comedy fans know who he is. A title like this is perceived as arrogant by the reddit audience because it makes no effort to connect with them. The title even prompted one redditor to ask, “Who are you?“. Kurt’s AMA would have done much better if his title explained who he is and included an interesting fact about himself.
Kurt’s title choice was especially bad because he chose not to use one of his greatest strengths – his skills as a comedy writer. Instead, he should have written a funny title that makes people laugh and gets the reddit audience on his side.
For Kurt, it also might have been a better idea to do his AMA in the /r/StandUp community. /r/StandUp is much smaller than /r/IAmA, but it is filled with comedy nerds that would have been much more interested in his AMA and are more likely to know who he is.
TL;DR
Many Comedy Central actors and comedians have done AMAs to promote their content, but it appears that they have very little guidance from anyone that understands the reddit platform and community. All three AMAs were lacking a quality title which resulted in AMAs that did not live up to their potential.
It is a smart move by Comedy Central to encourage their talent to do reddit AMAs, but they should give the talent resources to help them with their AMAs so they can be as successful as possible. Our free AMA guide would have helped Jeff, Whitney, and Kurt improve the title of their AMAs and achieve more significant results.
