Focus on Nightlife

A lot of promoters judge the quality of their master guest list by the number of names on it. A different way of looking at it is to evaluate your guests by how ’sticky’ they are — how reliably they attend the events you promote. A highly sticky guest is one that is likely to attend whatever you promote. A non-sticky guest is just a name on your list with no particular propensity to attend your events.

This isn’t about ‘labels’ — it is about understanding the profile of your guests so that you can identify which of them are the most valuable, what their characteristics are, and how best to leverage their ’stickiness’. Handled properly, understanding the stickiness of your guests can significantly improve the payoff you get from your master guest list.

Regularly analyze your master guest list and categorize each of your guests according to their stickiness. How, exactly, you do that depends on your particular needs and interests. A typical approach, though, would be to look at their turnout patterns — which you should be tracking, if you don’t already (use tracking codes on your invites, for example). Set some specific parameters for each ’stickiness’ category. For example, guests that turn out for at least one event / function per week might be classified as Category A guests. Those that attend one to two per month might be Category B, and so on. Create a special ‘holding’ category for guests where you don’t have any suitable information yet.

Once you’ve categorized your guests:

1. Give some thought to any consistent characteristics of each category of guests. If there are any similarities, you will know where to focus your list-building efforts. You want to invest heavily to obtain your Category A guests and you want to minimize expenditures on lower-level guests.
2. Try to find ways to move guests from the ‘holding’ category to their appropriate category (using tracking codes, etc.). Guests in the ‘holding’ category cannot be leveraged to their full limit.
3. Assign a specific value to each guest according to their category. This would typically take into consideration the per-visit and ‘lifetime’ spend. For example, you might determine that your Category A guests are worth, on average, $450 to you. A Category D guest, on the other hand, might only be worth $35 to you. Having clear, quantitatively-generated numbers in this way can make a material difference to your promotional efforts!
4. Look for ways to treat your top-level guests better, to bind them more closely to you and to encourage them to help bring you other top-level guests. This can include everything from ensuring that non-suitable mailouts aren’t done to them (don’t spam them about every single event you are running) to ensuring they get top treatment at the venues.
5. Look for ways to minimize your expenditures on lower-quality guests. This doesn’t mean treating them poorly (low-quality guests frequently become top-level guests), but you do want to generate the maximum overall results from your limited resources.
6. Constantly study your top-level guests to find out how best to leverage them. You don’t want to over-promote to them as they’ll get burned out and cease to be as sticky as they once were. Conversely, you don’t want to under-promote and miss out on potential revenue. By studying them, you’ll learn their characteristics and can best determine how to leverage them.
7. Study your less sticky guests too to find out why they aren’t as sticky. In many cases the reasons will be things beyond your control — no matter how great a job you are doing, you can’t satisfy everyone. However, often you’ll discover factors that you can manage. For example, maybe some of your current lower-quality guests are sticky, but only for certain types of events. If that is the case, then you need to revise your criteria for stickiness to reflect this. Maybe you shouldn’t be focusing only on the frequency of visits, but on the ratio of visits (ie, every time you have an event tailored to a certain guest, what percentage of the time do they attend?). Ultimately, you are looking to move as many of your guests as possible from lower-level categories to higher-level categories.
8. Track the trends in your master guest list over time - what is the rate of change in each category? what is the unsubscribe rate in each category? And so on. Critical info!
9. Be systematic in this process. It is most effective when done as a regular part of your promotional activities.

Of course, managing all this is best done through database software (though it can be done in Excel too, though not so easily). Depending on your software, you can probably automate the entire tracking process — all you’d need to do thereafter would be to review the reports periodically and identify new strategy / tactics to address the trends you find.

Happy holidays to everyone!

I hope you enjoy the holidays yourself — and that it is profitable business-wise.

This is a hugely important time for many venues and promoters.  For some, December does over 40% more than their average month. This is especially the case for those that emphasize private parties - a lot of booking revenue is available (though in many locations the competition for it is brutal…).

That brings to mind the importance of maximizing revenues during your peak times.  Many operators run into capacity issues during the peak periods and cannot truly maximize their revenues. What do you do to maximize your results during peak periods? Do you have a systematic / strategic plan for periods like this? How far in advance did you start your marketing activities? What did you try this season that is new or different?

The fun thing about this industry is that there are always new ways to do things, new opportunities to apply creativity, and new techniques to leverage your marketing initiatives. It is never boring!

Have a great holiday season!

The idea of an ecologically-friendly nightclub is coming to fruition in London. Dubbed the “most ecological dance venue on the planet”, Surya has started multiple initiatives to keep their venue and patrons environmentally aware, while creating a self-sufficient club. Here are a few of the things owner Andrew Charalambous has implemented to keep his club green:

• Customers who can prove they arrived by foot, bicycle, or public transportation are granted free cover (as opposed to paying a £10 cover).
• They will be asked to sign a pledge promising to help curb climate change upon entry.
• Surya sells organic spirits in polycarbon cups.
• Charalambous has started plans to start a recycled water system.
• The dancefloor is being designed to generate energy from customer movement.
• Plans to erect a wind turbine on the roof are on their way.

While this is just one example of a “green” nightclub, a few others have started pushing an environmental message to help clean up the world and, just as importantly, drive customers through their doors. For example, Greenhouse in New York collects rainwater, is built from Earth-friendly materials, and uses lighting that will last for 20 years. Hollywood’s first eco-friendly club, Ecco Ultra Lounge, offers free valet for hybrid cars, has power supplied by the LA Department of Water & Power’s Green Power resources and provides superior organic cuisines and liquors.

Of course, there are costs associated with ‘going green’, and every club owner has to look at the financial impact on the business. Luckily, “green” is increasingly becoming a lifestyle issue for clubbers and, within reason, they are often willing to pay a premium for eco-friendly solutions. Building legitimate eco-friendly characteristics into the marketing plan can be a useful point of differentiation and can drive new business through the doors. Done right, going green can be an investment, not just a cost — while also making a real difference on the environment.

Any club owners interested in environmental tips for their own clubs should visit these sites:

club4climate.com

greenhouseusa.com

eccohollywood.com

Sense Networks recently debuted two highly sophisticated software tools that will give businesses and their clients a new perspective on nightlife. The new technology uses mobile location data to pinpoint high traffic locations in real-time, allowing consumers to see what location is popular on any given night. Essentially, if your cell phone is turned on, you’re anonymously contributing to your location’s “traffic”.

“Just as Google indexed pages on the Internet to optimize web discovery, Sense Networks has indexed the real places in a city and characterized them by activity, versus proximity or demographics, to better understand the context of consumers’ offline behavior,” said Tony Jebara, Chief Scientist and co-founder of Sense Networks.

Described as a social navigation and nightlife discovery application, CitySense will show BlackBerry and iPhone users nightlife hotspots in real-time. Clubbers will now have the option of dropping in on the hottest party of the year or spending some quiet time at an old haunt, without the guessing.

MacroSense is the flipside of Sense Networks’ technology. Businesses can use the software to analyze, in real-time, consumer trends and adjust accordingly. Put to good use, business owners won’t have to rely on dated facts and figures. One quick look will show them where their target market is spending their money at any given moment.

For nightlife venue operators, this technology should change the way businesses adapt to a rapidly-changing industry.

Getting more customers in the door usually requires entertainment in one form or another. Whether you’re the owner or a promotions manager, you need to find tasteful talent that will compliment your club and drive revenues. Hiring entertainment is a great way to bring energy to a venue and introduce new faces to your business. Depending on your club, there are many different options available to mix-up your nightly events.

Many venues prefer to hire DJs to add ambiance to a small space or a pulsing beat to a club with a larger dancefloor. Hiring a DJ is great for several reasons. For one, their setup is usually very compact so space is never a problem. Also, costs are relatively low because you’re often just dealing with them one-on-one. Another reason is that you’re not only paying the DJ for entertainment, you’re also getting free promotion. DJs come with a built-in fanbase that you get free access to. Online resources like The DJ List can give you an idea of what artists live in your area and how to get in touch with them.

Some owners reap the benefits of hiring celebrities to come in and, well, be celebrated. Depending on your talent budget, their are a variety of different personalities that clubs can bring in a few times a year. The financial benefits of these events are huge. Companies like RealityRox organize celebrity events with reality television stars, while other entertainment groups have no problem finding Hollywood talent if you’re willing to spend the money. It’s also a good idea to hire local celebrities (athletes, public figures, etc.) to bring in a crowd.

Musicians tend to fall in the same category as DJs but usually the logistics are a little trickier because you end up dealing with more people. One of the things an owner can always count on is that bands are constantly touring through their city and looking for a space to play. This works in the owner’s favor because it gives them the ability to negotiate a fair cost that will benefit both sides. Depending on the popularity of a given band, it’s often up to the owner or promoter to make sure customers get to the door.

Talented new visual artists can also pull people out to a small to medium sized venue. Leveraging the art or photography exhibit trends is an inexpensive way to draw people to your club. Most new artists are just happy to have a place to display their work and that means no cost to the venue owner. Press for these shows can usually be obtained in local weeklies and daily newspapers.

Club owners must constantly adapt to stay competitive in the nightlife industry. When you focus too heavily on one aspect of the business, you can be losing out on another important area. That’s why balancing your responsibilities becomes so crucial.

One quick (and free) way of promoting your business is by creating Facebook events. By creating a company account on Facebook you can easily gather information on your customers and let them know what’s happening by creating events.

Here’s why you should consider using Facebook events to market your nightclub:

• It’s free and takes very little time. If you are hosting a certain DJ or a theme night you just plug in the details.
• Guests can become “fans” of your club. This will show up on their Facebook profile and inevitably spread to their friends.
• You can instantly send your guests updates about a specific night.
• It’s a great excuse to engage in conversation with your guests. You’ll get to know them.
• Posting flyers was never so easy. Just post them to your profile and invite your customers to do the same.
• It’s the start of a great database of information.

Once you start using these events, you’ll get a better understanding of your customers and learn when heavy online promotions are useful or when you should hold back to really drive another night.

With the advent of social-networking, blogging, and straight email marketing, the value of physical flyering as a form of advertising has certainly come into question. Is the labor, cost, and time of distributing flyers still worthwhile? Is the age-old method still effective? If you’re a club owner or a promotional manager, you should know that the answer is yes.

Many clubs have embraced technology as the new way to get the masses to their venues. Facebook events have become a staple for effective promotions. Potential customers can get online, RSVP, discuss, and even add photos related to your club’s events. Today, if you impress an influential blogger with your lavish venue, you can reach thousands of people. Just take a look at Down By The Hipster, an NYC nightlife blog run by Scott Solish. Hundreds of daily readers visit the site for info on New York’s hottest clubs and a good chunk of the content is provided by reader tips. You can’t ignore the effectiveness of the net as a promotional tool - but is it the be all and end all of advertising?

The fact is that online communications will never replace the direct method of passing out and posting flyers. Let’s get one thing straight: dedicated clubbers don’t spend their nights on Facebook, chatting (does IRC even still exist? Google thinks so), or scouring Flickr for pictures of digital flyers. They’re walking the walk amongst the nightlife crowd. This fact alone puts value in flyering. You’re target market will definitely be walking past (or hopefully right into) your club tonight.

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, here are some tips for managing your flyer distribution:

• You can use a generic template for flyers if you want to save money and get flyers out on a regular basis. It’s good advertising for slower nights and it gets the name of your club right out on the street.
• For large scale events you should put some money into a good graphic artist. You can’t argue that an attractive flyer won’t attract eyeballs.
• If you manage your own promotions, get your staff to distribute close to the club. It doesn’t take long and can easily be implemented as a regular task for bar opening.
• To extend your flyering radius, hire trustworthy high school or college students. Payment can be a low fee or free tickets to a club event if they’re of age.
• Track flyers. It’s easy to find out if that “trustworthy” kid lives up to his or her description by quickly passing by a random spot you had on their target list.
• Use tracking codes to find out who worked hard at passing out handbills and offer them incentives for keeping it up.
• Stay on good (or great) terms with your neighbors - offer them a free drink at your club. You can’t beat the effectiveness of a big flyer in a nearby storefront’s window.

While the cost of flyering can be a larger marketing expense than free online methods, you should never underestimate how beneficial a well-placed flyer can be.

Here’s a tool that can instantly tell thousands of your customers what is happening at your club and it only takes about three seconds. Twitter is an online service, thought up by Jack Dorsey, that tells your friends, co-workers and “followers” what you are doing in 140 characters or less. You can post and receive comments via mobile texting, instant messages, or the web.

So how does this work for a nightclub owner? It’s all about getting the word out. Post some flyers near the door saying “Follow [your club name] on Twitter” with a link to your Twitter updates. While customers wait in line they can instantly join your updates with their mobile device. If your club has an online reservation form or just a contact page, you can add your information there too.

Updating your status to say “queue jump for Twitter users” or Guinness price drop” is sure to send more customers your way.

Many nightclubs have become the chameleons of the nightlife scene. From one night to the next, entire venues can go from a strobing, house-party feel to a laid back, lounge-type aesthetic. Venues that work this way can generate big line-ups and drive huge revenues but they may also run into problems. While the vibe of the club is constantly changing, so are the faces. It’s harder than ever to get to know your customers when many of them may only visit twice a month for an eighties-themed night or come in just to see their friend DJ on the odd night. Customer loyalty goes down because people are coming for the theme and could care less about the venue.

On the flip side is the tried and true establishment - think Cheers (without the laugh track) - where customers can go when they’re looking for a comfortable, no-frills evening. Many people out there love to be in a place where they know the owner and guests by name, the menu stays relatively constant and you don’t have to worry about getting hit in the eye by a confetti cannon being run by an entertainment company’s newest employee. Here, getting to know your customers is easy and you can usually count on their continuing patronage. The big difference is sheer numbers but having a loyal customer-base can be a justifiable trade-off to always hosting rotating, theme-driven events.

So how does a nightclub wanting to keep their image strike a good balance? There are a few different solutions. One idea is to try out some events that don’t infringe on your current clientele’s tastes but broaden your club’s appeal to a larger crowd. Also, it never hurts to hire promoters who can tailor their efforts to make sure you’re not stepping on toes. While you don’t need to rely solely on themed-nights, there are many types of “spin” you can use to give yourself an excuse to promote.

Systematically reaching your target market, and mobilizing that market, is critical for any industry operator. Mobile phone-driven tools, like that just announced by US mobile phone provider Helio, are going to have a growing role over how venues / promoters drive traffic through the doors.

According to Caroline McCarthy:

Helio’s new service, which is ad-supported, lets people in major U.S. cities search on the mobile Web site–linked from the home page of the carrier’s browser–for bars, clubs, and restaurants. Most of the data will be pulled from Buzzd partners like Flavorpill, TimeOut, and the IAC-owned Citysearch. Added on, however, will be “event feeds” with specific pricing and night-specific details as well as short user reviews in real time.

Helio’s service isn’t quite there yet — it still doesn’t fully link into the ’social networking’ of nightlife guests, but it is a tantalizing glimpse at where we are going. Helio may not be the company to succeed with this type of service, but some operator will sooner or later (likely sooner…).

A key characteristic will be the distribution of user / guest reviews. Imagine the impact on buzz on any given night from only a small number of ‘influencers’ shouting out their opinions of your club that night? Already, informal text messaging among friends is playing a huge role in night-to-night turnout at venues. Take that one degree further and systemize the ability for opinions / reviews to be widely circulated in real time…

This can be a nightmare for venues… or a huge opportunity. Those that figure out how to identify, track, and harness the influencers in their local market will have a huge advantage. After that, it becomes a matter of winning the ’small battles’ — encouraging your guests to evangelize your venue and start that viral spiral going in the right direction.