Charismatic leadership is a powerful, trainable set of skills. Charismatic leaders achieve their effect on followers through the use of stories, metaphors, emotional messaging, and nonverbal gestures (Antonakis, Bastardoz, Jacquart, & Shamir, 2016). Although many modern organizations rely heavily on technology-mediated communication, the power of charismatic leadership has not been fully examined in this context. Further, the field is lacking experimental research on charismatic leadership and behavioral outcomes, such as task performance. To address these limitations, I draw upon signaling theory to investigate how observable charismatic leadership tactics (CLTs) affect follower task and extra-role performance in a realistic setting. I conducted two experimental studies in which participants completed a task after receiving instruction from a charismatic or non-charismatic leader. CLTs were effective in increasing follower performance in a face-to-face setting (Study 1), but not in a virtual setting (Study 2). In order to explore potential theoretical explanations of the effects of CLTs, I also conducted a study in which participants viewed a video of a charismatic or non-charismatic leader and responded to survey items (Study 3). CLTs positively affected some perceptions of the leader (i.e., prototypicality, competence, and influencing ability). Theoretical and practical implications are discussed. Specifically, I explain how signaling theory can be applied to charismatic leadership, and how charisma can be trained in an organizational context.