datamusicata

With the current economic climate, it is harder than ever to get folks to show up for concerts.   And the competition is more fierce than ever, so I wanted to share some ideas with everyone with regard to venues and how to get folks to not only come, but to come again.

First of all, you have to bring in the best talent you can.   If you have several class a acts in a row, then the venue itself begins to get some reputation for bringing in top notch talent.

If you bring in an amateur as a headliner just once, you have done yourself some serious damage.   Folks will not come back if they’ve had a bad time and for some reason they are more inclined to tell their friends about a bad time than a good one.   

So remember, you are doing no one a favor if you place a performer in over their heads.

Secondly, you must build a dialog with the community, so host some benefits at your venue; do some kind of classes at your venue, beginning guitar, singing, something that serves the community.   You might try doing an open mic once a week.   Give folks one song.   If someone is promising or actually good, give them two songs.  Let them build up to being an actual performer there (in an opening slot capacity).

And when you do an open mic it is important to teach your participants how it works.   They sign up early, then a featured act goes on.    If anyone leaves, they lose their slot.   All participants must stay for the evening.    After the featured act is finished (one forty to fifty minute set) THEN you put on the open mic people.   They should stay to support all of their open mic compatriots.

This way, they are forced to watch other people and THAT’s where you learn a bunch.   You learn from the pros and you learn from the amateurs.   Everyone has something to teach and something to learn, and this never changes.

Finally, if you are open in the day time, then play the music of the person (s) next coming to your venue to perform.   Play it all day, all week.   If they have more than one CD, all the better, as you can get pretty tired of a CD after a while.   But the customers aren’t there all day, so you must endure this.

You want to play that music for as many people as you can, as only a percentage of them are going to like it, so the more folks you play it for, the more chance you have of getting some of them into the venue to hear the act.

If you are only open at night, then from the moment you are open until the current act walks on the stage, you play the music of the next act you are having.  

And if you know who you’re next ten acts are, don’t bother telling the audience before the current acts performance.   They can’t remember everything.  Just tell them about next week and perhaps the really incredible act you managed to get for an off night next Tuesday.

If you have a window on the street, you want to display large colorful posters of the upcoming acts.  All professionals have posters and they will cheerfully send you some.   Put them up in every window that faces a street.   And don’t put up events that compete with your event.  That’s just silly.

And have a display place inside your venue where people can view the upcoming acts in more detail.   The one sheets, photos, post cards, and if you can take the trouble and the responsibility, sell the CD’s that are currently playing in your room while these folks wonder around.

And finally, keep an updated, easily navigated website, and email list.   It takes a lot of work to make a venue successful, but I promise you, without these things in place, your venue will go away.   You won’t like it.