Instagram, comedy and adding a little good to the world with comedian, Andrew Barr

You don’t need perfect lighting, fancy edits, or a crazy life to make captivating content. And you definitely don’t need to be like everyone else in your industry.

In this episode of Shiny New Clients, Jenna sits down with comedian and creator Andrew Barr, who has built a thriving social media presence by combining the most unlikely topics—sobriety, cooking, fitness, and comedy.

From 1,500 to 124,000 Instagram followers in just a couple of years, Andrew shares how he dove into the content world shamelessly and without any formal knowledge of how it worked.

He started making content his way—quick edits born from noisy city streets, recovery stories told with honesty and humour, and a focus on engaging real humans (not just algorithms).

You’ll hear:

• Why your content's primary job is to connect with real people
• The mindset shift that makes posting less stressful (and less personal)
• How to handle negative comments without taking it personally
• Why arguments in your comment section can actually boost your reach
• The powerful metaphor behind Andrew’s upcoming 12-hour treadmill run and live comedy special/rehabilitation fundraiser

If you’ve ever felt too boring, too scared, or too “unpolished” to show up online, this conversation will change the way you think about marketing, business, entrepreneurship, and social media.

🔗 Follow Andrew: @andrewbarrcomedy
🔗 Follow Jenna: @jennaspaige

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Music by Jordan Wood

Hosted by Jenna Harding (Warriner), Creator of Magic Marketing Machine

Transcript

Speaker 2 (00:00)
it's really normal for people to say that they have nothing to post about, nothing to post about. And I think what really happens is we just get so stuck thinking there's only one way that our social media can look, especially if you're looking at other people in your industry and trying to emulate them. ⁓

Don't do that. Don't try and be like anybody else. monthly reminder that you have no idea if their content is actually working. I had a client come to me who had almost a million followers across platforms and she wasn't actually really selling that much until after we worked there are loads of people out there who have millions of followers, I'm sure, who aren't actually selling anything. And there are millionaires who have a couple hundred where

Couple thousand followers, all right? You don't know what's going on. Anyway, sidebar. Actually, great transition. Our guest today is named Andrew Barr. I know this guy from a past life, but he recently blew up on social media.

It's really fascinating to me how he was able to take the different things that he was interested in and craft this presence that is so fun to watch, also so inspiring. Like who knew he'd be able to talk about addiction and cooking in the same video and they would just go viral. It's wild. So anyway, he isn't here yet, but I am here just to give you a content warning. We are going to be talking about

and recovery in this episode. There's probably gonna be some swears too. Andrew is a comedian. He is a recovering drug addict and that is a big part of his presence. he's also about to do a really wild the rehabilitation center that he went to, which is why I wanted to have him on today. So with that, I give you Andrew Barr.

Yay, beautiful. Imagine us back in our days where you worked in the kitchen and I was a bartender and that's how we initially met. And now fast forward to here we are.

Speaker 1 (02:00)
Yeah, it's crazy. You used to find me sleeping in there.

I loved that kitchen. You could really get a nap in. There was not a lot of orders happening.

Speaker 2 (02:10)
It's true, it was so slow and so hidden.

Speaker 1 (02:13)
Yeah, truly one of the sweetest jobs I've ever had.

Speaker 2 (02:16)
We did shots in there too, a lot. I mean, we did it. It was a joke.

Speaker 1 (02:18)
Yes.

Of course, no, would never do that.

Speaker 2 (02:25)
you just tell everyone a little bit of context who you are and what the hell has happened to you over the last, you know, what, three years?

Speaker 1 (02:32)
Yeah, guess, yeah, two to three years I've been actively doing social media. So I'm Andrew Barr, I'm a standup comedian. I've been doing standup comedy for, oh Lord, 15 years now it's been. Started when I was 18. obviously since I've started social media has become an increasingly important thing in our industry.

been taking it more seriously for the last two to three years and in that time I've gone from I think 1,500 followers to 123,000 followers or 124 now on Instagram.

Speaker 2 (03:03)
Yeah, and like millions and millions and millions of views come

Speaker 1 (03:07)
Yeah,

for sure. Yeah, I've had, I don't know, maybe eight to ten videos hit a million and yeah, yeah, I do probably 500,000 views a month or something like that. It's reasonably steady.

Speaker 2 (03:19)
One of the things that I love about your content is the way that you're able to combine topics and bring in the things that you're interested in. Because so many people think that their lives are so boring that they couldn't possibly talk about anything like maybe other than their business because the people listening, their business owners. you have hobbies and interests that you share with the world and are able to like combine multiple topics in a way that makes it really, really interesting to watch and captivating.

Speaker 1 (03:48)
Yeah, I guess if I had any advice for anyone, you know, working on their social media presence and stuff, I would say just throw things at the wall and see what kind of sticks, you know? Sometimes you'll be surprised which videos it is that the algorithm latches onto and that do well. I've definitely had videos where like, I was just like, you haven't posted in a couple days, you've got to make something today. ⁓ And I've like, just scrambled and gotten something together. And then that video got me like 10,000 follows or whatever.

So think it's always better to just make it and get it out there. And you know, if it bombs, whatever. I think people have this thing in their head where if a post bombs, like they think that a million people saw it and hated it when the reality is that just no one saw it. So it doesn't matter really, you know?

Speaker 2 (04:34)
You took the words out of my mouth. I say that like every day, but I think people will actually listen if you say it. If nobody sees it, nobody saw it.

Speaker 1 (04:40)
Yeah, so it doesn't matter. You can take it down if you want or, you know, just it's not a big deal. Whatever. The algorithm didn't grab it. People didn't see it. It's okay. But yeah, I do post a lot of different stuff just because I'm not specifically knowledgeable about this stuff or really that good at it. So I just go volume and variety and throw out a lot of

because yeah, I don't know, it's all kind of new for me. It was just sort of forced upon my industry. Like when I started Stand Up, it didn't matter if you were on social media or not. I remember learning what a hashtag was when I moved to Toronto in like 2010. I didn't know what that was. And now it's like so important ⁓ for all of us to be doing it. play around. do cooking stuff, I do fitness stuff, I do a lot of sobriety content and recovery stuff. That's probably my most successful.

Speaker 2 (05:29)
There are so many people out there that have huge accounts that don't even know, like don't know any of the buttons. They don't know what they do. They know how to record and add subtitles and post and that's it.

Speaker 1 (05:40)
Yeah, and I mean, you can get pretty far with that, it seems. That's basically all I know how to do. It's funny, sometimes people will compliment me on my editing, which I think is hilarious, because I have no idea how to edit, other than like, if you watch my videos, it's very simple. Like, it's just like, I'll say something and then it cuts and then it's me saying something again. And people have like complimented me on my style. But I'm like, it's really just born out of, like, if you watch it, it's very short.

I almost like cut myself off when I'm talking. It's very short clips. I just started doing that because if I tried to talk for longer, someone would like honk their car horn or, you know, like I'm recording stuff in this city. It's just noisy all the fucking time. And anytime I, you know, try to do a long take, somebody ruins it. So I just started recording sentence by sentence because I was like, surely the universe will give me goddamn three seconds to get this one sentence out.

⁓ And I'm always fighting to get it out with people power drills and random generators turning on and off from people's AC units and it's a nightmare recording in the city. So that's the only reason that I do it like that. But people are like, I really like that you do it like.

Speaker 2 (06:53)
Yeah, man, like the quick edits, the voiceovers, which often I wonder if the voiceovers are sometimes born out of the audio getting destroyed as well.

Speaker 1 (07:01)
yeah, right, yeah, sometimes.

Speaker 2 (07:02)
children's television, like you can't watch a cartoon without the scene changing like every three seconds or so. you can play a game where you watch like Pepe the Pig. I don't know if that's it's I don't think that's children's cartoons and try and count to six and you can rarely get to six before it changes. And so that very short quick clips that was born out of necessity for you is exactly what helps people hold focus.

Speaker 1 (07:28)
Yeah, there is some intention there on my end as well because I do think that when people are scrolling through social media, their attention span is shorter than if they were watching like a movie or a TV show. People just, they give things less time. So if you watch my videos, I talk fast and I edit it so that I'm basically, the next clip is almost cutting me off. Like often I'll lose like part of my last word just because I don't want there to be any dead air at all because I feel like that's when people

And it's funny because I do a lot of like addiction recovery stuff and sobriety stuff and often people comment and they're like, I don't think this guy's sober. I think he's still on drugs. Because I talk so fast and my energy is a little manic, but I'm like, I'm truly just acting like that for the medium. I'm not like, I don't walk around the world talking like that to regular human beings, but it seems to be effective for the medium.

Speaker 2 (08:25)
And I mean, listener, you don't need to talk that fast. I talk fast, Andrew talks fast, we're both silly, you don't need to be silly. Like it's not the law. But see what you can take from that in like the pacing of it, even just cutting yourself off a little bit lacking dead air. that's definitely going to help with the views. I suppose you have for over a decade been sharing parts of yourself on stage and been exposed, you know, on stage.

Was it scary starting to talk about stuff like addiction and recovery that was very real to millions of people?

Speaker 1 (09:00)
Yeah, a little bit. Maybe not as much as it is for most people. I always say that like, you know, once you get sober, you try to think of ways that you can give back because certainly it took a lot of help from other people to get me where I am. So you think about what you can do to give back to your community. with addicts, there's a lot of, people have a lot of shame and it's what prevents people from getting help often is that they're ashamed of themselves and they don't want to admit to people that they have a problem.

So a special skill that I have is I am typically like unafraid to embarrass myself in front of large groups of people, because that's what doing standup comedy is for the most part. Right? I've been embarrassing myself in front of rooms full of people for a long time. So it is easier for me to talk about than most people. ⁓ And I decided to sort of use that skill to be helpful if I can. And I do get a lot of ⁓ messages from recovering addicts and stuff saying that my videos have helped them along the way.

But also, I do get a lot of people telling me to relapse and wishing me death and stuff. And there is that part of the internet. You are making yourself a little bit vulnerable. The internet is great, but it's also where all of the worst people hang out. So stuff like that does happen. And sometimes it's a little upsetting. But also, good engagement.

of my videos that have been the most successful are the ones where people do argue a little bit in the comments and I don't like specifically encourage that but you know, sometimes someone will say something horrible and then some kind person will come to my defense and then they'll argue for like days ⁓ in the comment section and I'm just like soaking in the views from their helpful algorithm behavior.

Speaker 2 (10:46)
⁓ wrote an article about that literally so long, probably like seven or eight years ago, an article about that, which was like about how to handle negative comments. And one of the tips I gave was if you can handle it emotionally, if it's really bad and you can't handle emotionally, just delete it, just block them, who cares? But if you can handle it, often your supporters are going to come to defend you in the comments or someone who otherwise wouldn't have said something positive will just have an independent positive comment because that's like their style.

The host gets all these comments, the algorithm sees the post getting comments, shows it to a bazillion people.

Speaker 1 (11:20)
Yeah, yeah, for sure.

Speaker 2 (11:21)
So do you think your ability to like handle embarrassing yourself and criticism, is it just therapy from being on stage?

Speaker 1 (11:28)
I think so, yeah, definitely. If I hadn't done comedy for so long, I don't think I would be as comfortable with it. But part of getting good at stand-up comedy is just that sometimes people will ask me, like, have you ever bombed? And I'm like, yes, thousands of times. are you talking about? Thankfully, not very much anymore now that I've been doing it for a while and I'm a bit better at it. But when you're new, it's a really hard thing to do. especially starting at 18 years old, it's like I've been...

I've bombed so, so many times and it does like callous you a little bit for sure.

Speaker 2 (12:01)
Tell me more about that callous. Like people out here, they're listening. Like people really want to know how to handle it. Even I want to know how to handle the negative comments and the like risk of showing up online and, having somebody not like you. Like for, for normal people, Andrew, it's way harder than it sounds like it is.

Speaker 1 (12:20)
Okay, well then let's don't even worry about the fact that I do stand up. I think just something that's important to remember is that people who are leaving really negative comments on things on the internet are not doing well mentally. They are having a hard time whether they know it or not. They're miserable as a person. Maybe not all the time, but that day at least I've certainly left negative comments on things in my life on the internet. I'm not impervious to that kind of behavior, but

Anytime I do later on, I'm like, what's going on with you? You shouldn't be doing that. You know, could have just, it's such a strange thing to instead of just scrolling by something or, or, you know, clicking the not interested in this button to leave some horrible spiteful thing. It's like, this is just like an unwell person and you don't have to really let that affect you or worry about it too much because there literally will always be unwell people.

and the internet seems to do a really good job of wrangling them. ⁓ So if anything, we could just be grateful that these people kind of have comment sections to exist in and that they're probably in public less.

Speaker 2 (13:34)
Okay, what about on the flip side? What about the praise? Like, do you think that it's supported your recovery to have this many people cheering you on?

Speaker 1 (13:42)
Yeah, I think for sure it's a little bit validating. It makes me feel good that I can contribute and give back in some way and engage with social media in a positive way. When I first started using social media and trying to post regularly, I really didn't know what to do. I didn't start with the recovery stuff immediately.

I just like was posting whatever. had some friends who would do like reaction videos and stuff where they would like roast people and things like that. So I tried that a couple times and I was just, I felt kind of bad, like not to judge them, but I just felt a little gross. I'm at home by myself scrolling through the internet, looking for a stranger to be mean to, to like benefit myself. It feels like.

not the most helpful contribution the world. So I'm happy that with social media that I've found a way to engage with it that is on average, a more positive contribution.

Speaker 2 (14:45)
Yeah, and I mean, if you can fully focus on the audience, right? Fully focus on making them laugh, on inspiring them, on making them feel less alone, then it does take a lot of personal pressure off of you. And a lot of people that I've worked with, when they start doing well in social, I ask them what changed and their answer is often that they started.

not thinking about themselves anymore and just thinking about what people wanted to hear from them and what they wanted to interact with and the experience of the person watching the content. So I'm almost separating ourselves from it.

Speaker 1 (15:17)
definitely good to think about the viewer. That was some good advice I got when I was starting to post on socials. Like ⁓ I have some friends that are, you know, in the hundreds of thousands of followers. And one guy was simply just like, yeah, think about what stops you when you're scrolling, you know, what would you stop and watch your own video? makes you actually click follow on something, you know, think about the fact that it is another human being like you.

watching the thing.

Speaker 2 (15:46)
Yeah, absolutely. You have a very exciting week coming up, you psycho. What have you committed to?

Speaker 1 (15:51)
Yeah.

So I'm doing a comedy special this month. I'm recording a special at Comedy Bar Danforth location in Toronto. of a unique experience it's gonna be. that I've been sober for like coming up on three years, I've wanted to do something to give back a little bit to the rehab center that I went to. And I'm really good at running. That's a skill that I have. So we're doing a big charity run.

I'm gonna run on a treadmill on a live stream for 12 hours. treadmill's gonna be on the stage at the Comedy Club. And then as soon as the 12 hours is up, we're gonna fill up the room with audience, and then I'm gonna immediately record the Comedy Special right after running for 12 hours.

Speaker 2 (16:41)
Why?

Speaker 1 (16:43)
The whole day, well first of all the fundraise for the charity. also the whole day is basically a metaphor for addiction, right? The treadmill is addiction. You you're stuck in one place, you can't move forward, you're doing the same thing over and over again but you're not getting anywhere. Maybe at first it seems like a little bit of fun but it's only getting harder and harder on your body. The more you do it, slowly this thing is breaking you down and breaking you down. And eventually you have to admit, I can't beat this thing.

I just have to get off the machine, I have to stop. And the audience arriving is like intervention. That's people showing up who care about me and are there to support me, but not this weird thing that I'm doing. And then me hitting stop on the treadmill and walking towards the audience is like a return to community. So that's kind of the little story that I'm trying to tell with it. When I tell people about the day, they do think that I'm kind of like a bit of a masochist, probably. ⁓

But the day it's, it's not like there's going to be a lot of pain. I'm gonna really hurt my body. But the day isn't like about the pain. It's about what people are still capable of once they've put their pain behind them.

Speaker 2 (17:52)
that's beautiful. Yeah, that's so nice.

Speaker 1 (17:54)
Yeah, right?

Speaker 2 (17:58)
It's gonna smell in there.

Speaker 1 (18:00)
You have maybe a bit. There's a lot of logistical stuff that can go wrong. That's part of the fun of it too is that no one in the history of the world has ever done this. People have run that long on a treadmill before, but no one has ever done that and then recorded a comedy special right after. Nobody who's coming knows what it's going to look like. I don't know what it's going to look like. ⁓ A million things could go wrong.

Speaker 2 (18:21)
people gonna wander in like throughout the day while you're

Speaker 1 (18:25)
So for the live stream while I'm on the treadmill, putting a couch next to the treadmill and two comedians per hour are going to come in and just kind of shoot the shit. podcast all day. I'm going to like not talk to them. I'll have headphones in and I'll be listening to tunes because I need to super focus on the running. It's really hard to run for that length of time. But yeah, I will have comedy buddies coming in, engaging with the stream, shooting the shit, cracking jokes and stuff.

so that it's not just me running, which would be terribly boring.

Speaker 2 (18:53)
That's so smart. I can run for like three minutes and I'm trying. I'm learning.

Speaker 1 (18:58)
That's how it starts. Three minute, when I started I would run for like two minutes on, one minute off, two minutes on, one minute off, and then know, you gradually, a little longer, and then before you know it you run 100 kilometers. That's the goal, distance is 100 kilometers.

Speaker 2 (19:13)
Well, that's inspiring. Yeah, I'm doing interval training too. I got the app Couch to 5K. Oh great. And so I do, yeah, I do the intervals like one minute on one minute off, but the max I can probably do is about three minutes straight for now, but be up there in a treadmill right next to you.

Speaker 1 (19:28)
Absolutely, was surprised when I started running, like if you're consistent with it, how quickly you can make progress. So yeah, don't worry, you'll be doing that 5K in no time.

Speaker 2 (19:37)
Well, that is just another way that I'm genuinely so inspired by you, Andrew. I have loved watching you grow on social media. I've loved the Friday series.

I was looking forward to those Friday videos. I was looking forward to you asking the audience how our week was and then me literally never responding, but always appreciating being asked. there's so, there's so many things that I've been learning from watching you and it's been so generous of you to even share your journey and care so much about the audience and helping bring that positivity out in the world that definitely shows. everyone go follow Andrew. What's your handle?

Speaker 1 (20:12)
at Andrew Barr Comedy. Two R's in bar, Andrew Barr Comedy.

Speaker 2 (20:13)
to ours.

very Canadian sounding. Anything else you want to share?

Speaker 1 (20:19)
Yeah.

Just that it's nice to see you, you beautiful person.

Speaker 2 (20:25)
Thank you. You

too.