Promotion - tips/discussion

electrogrimey

I know a few people on this board run nights, so I thought a thread about promotion would be interesting. Just to share advice/interesting ways of promotion that have worked for you before etc. Also about finances of nights, etc etc.

Aside from Facebook, or moreso in the days before Facebook, how did you guys/people promote night?

Is mise le key

electrogrimey wrote: »

I know a few people on this board run nights, so I thought a thread about promotion would be interesting. Just to share advice/interesting ways of promotion that have worked for you before etc. Also about finances of nights, etc etc.

Aside from Facebook, or moreso in the days before Facebook, how did you guys/people promote night?

A lot was done via Pirate radio stations & leaflets being left in Vinyl shops etc,

*Fu.cks sake he on about Vinyl again*

But seriously loads of folks would be in browsing through tunes & would spread the word of night being promoted & it would be aired on radio for a couple of weeks also, theres a million and one internet radios out there but i would say you could still get a lot of listeners to a pirate FM radio station if it was started up & promote gigs on it.

electrogrimey

Flyers in record shops is one I hadn't thought of alright...

Is mise le key

electrogrimey wrote: »

Flyers in record shops is one I hadn't thought of alright...

Yes but im not sure how receptive a Vinyl shop owner trying to make a living would be to a flyer with all this info on it about the DJ Playing the gig:D,

Set up on the night

electrogrimey

Is mise le key wrote: »

Yes but im not sure how receptive a Vinyl shop owner trying to make a living would be to a flyer with all this info on it about the DJ Playing the gig:D,

Set up on the night

Ah I just mean a generic flyer for the night, and my set-up is usually just a CD wallet, headphones, and a packet of Camel Blue.

Is mise le key

electrogrimey wrote: »

and my set-up is usually just a CD wallet, headphones, and a packet of Camel Blue.

Back in the 90's it would have been, record bag, headphones, and a packet of johnny blue

joker77

Don't think you can do flyers anymore because of littering fines?

Hamiltonion

Something that worked well for us was a flashmob in TCD, when the crowd of about 300 gathered we blanket bombed them with fliers after the stunt ended and put the photos up on our facebook page.

although that was an electro night geared towards students.

Spys Deathmob last year worked very well

electrogrimey

Hamiltonion wrote: »

Something that worked well for us was a flashmob in TCD, when the crowd of about 300 gathered we blanket bombed them with fliers after the stunt ended and put the photos up on our facebook page.

although that was an electro night geared towards students.

Spys Deathmob last year worked very well

How much did it help numbers in the club though? Was it just a one time spike or did you get increased numbers for the rest of the nights?

jonnny68

Is mise le key wrote: »

Back in the 90's it would have been, record bag, headphones, and a packet of johnny blue

and...

Fila Trailblazers



And the Dublin's ravers holy grail in the 90's the Schott bomber jacket




sorry ive gone off topic here:o:D

Android 666

Hamiltonion wrote: »

Something that worked well for us was a flashmob in TCD...

A little bit of me died inside when I read this...

Is mise le key

Android 666 wrote: »

A little bit of me died inside when I read this...

TBH i havnt a fuc.king clue what it means

Android 666

jonnny68 wrote: »

And the Dublin's ravers holy grail in the 90's the Schott bomber jacket




sorry ive gone off topic here:o:D

Ohh nice necklace, it really brings out the silver in Schott logo..

Android 666

Is mise le key wrote: »

TBH i havnt a fuc.king clue what it means

Its where a bunch of middle class people gather together in a desperate attempt to show how on trend they are by copying a T Mobile ad from a couple of years ago. It fils them with a rush of sexual excitement I do believe...

Is mise le key

Android 666 wrote: »

Its where a bunch of middle class people gather together in a desperate attempt to show how on trend they are by copying a T Mobile ad from a couple of years ago. It fils them with a rush of sexual excitement I do believe...

Ahh good man android.......i can see your post is laced with sarcasm true to form but im am still baffled Must have missed the T mobile ad yer on about.......i'll take your word for it that its a bunch of bollox's that would make ya want to puke.

Is mise le key

jonnny68 wrote: »

and...

And the Dublin's ravers holy grail in the 90's the Schott bomber jacket




sorry ive gone off topic here:o:D

Na jonny wouldnt have been my attire now.......i was going with the full on scumbag 3/4 length leather jacket with indigo 501's & air max:D

cipher_neo

been thinking about starting up my own night and am following this thread, hopefully some good ideas pop up.

Seems to me that the best way to promote a night is to bring in a big name DJ. That always seems to pull a good crowd...

now if I could just find Nic Fanciulli's moblie number... I had it here somewhere

Logical Fallacy

Okay, so i've been promoting various nights for under a year, so am still fairly new to the game but i have learned many things.

1) Find a good venue you can work with. This can be hit and miss. I wouldn't really rate the business practices of many of the venues i have worked with. Some have been okay, some have been brutal. Where i am now i really like, they understand we are starting something new and a regular crowd will take a while to build up...they are helping to promote and are really helpful and quick to make changes to whatever we need altered on the night.

2) Double check EVERYTHING. I now get to the venue at least an hour before the night is due to start so i can check the decks, the mixer, the sound system etc. I've had every kind of **** go wrong, from venues promising me sound systems and decks and showing up and there being nothing in the room (big respect here to the Audio Terrorists for being my go to guys when i need a sound system ) to be told that the monitors went 2 weeks ago but only on the night itself. Be happy with where you are, but don't have too much faith. Expecting bad **** to happens means you will be prepared to fix it.

3) Flyers, they do help. Drop them into the local vinyl shops (I've never had the lads in All City, City Discs or Spindizzy say no when i asked could i leave in flyers).

4) Record the sets. The surefire way to show people they music being played will be music that they like is to record it. I'm pretty sure that my night is the only night in Dublin being broadcast live as it happens and i'm not sure why but it seems like a good idea to me.

5) A bit of variety is nice i reckon. Last weeks night was dubby styles, the next one is Jungle, after that will be a garage night. Mix **** up a bit and keep things interesting.

5) Respect your DJ's - I am eternally grate full to all the DJ's who have given there time and hard learned skills to play a Stomp set and try and make sure i convey this to them on the night, i genuinely appreciate the fact that these folk would take the time out to play a set for me. So big ups to Exec Steve, Welfare, Bonz, DJ Class A, Gandalf, Siriken, SubOne and CJ Fitz, Modok, Zyme,Tom Lann,M.B Glitchcore and Colz. And in advance to Don Rosco and BeatNik.

electrogrimey

Ok, I'll have a go sharing what I've learned too.

1) Unfortunately, Facebook is a bit part of promotion. Two handy things: 1) make a friend list of your friends for promo. This way you can go filters - promo list - invite all to anything you're inviting people to. It also means you can leave out anyone abroad, or your granny etc. 2) This code selects all on an invite list. Pop in into the address bar and hit enter. Use it wisely.

javascript:elms=document.getElementById('friends').getElementsByTagName('li');for(var fid in elms){if(typeof elms[fid] === 'object'){fs.click(elms[fid]);}}

2) The launch is definitely important. In my experience, (although not always) unless a night kicks off well, it's not going to go well. The usual thing is to get every DJ in Dublin to play the launch, so they all promote it for you. That's a bit gammy though.

3) Try and half more than one 'area' on the night - i.e., if someone doesn't like hardcore breaks, they have somewhere to go other than the hardcore breaks room, they could try the uplifting piano house room for example.

4) Be smart about the deal you make with the venue about how much bar take/door take you get. Don't rip yourself off.

5) Do not ever start booking acts/DJs just because you think they'll bring people. Once you start doing that it's over.

6) Sort out a decent monitor system etc if the venue doesn't have one, even if that means bringing speakers from home. DJs aren't gonna have good things to say if they didn't have a good time DJing your night.

Hamiltonion

@ Grimey, it was a one time spike but we used it for our launch night with the idea of actually getting people in the door and those who liked what they saw would become regulars. It worked well at 1st but our night had somewhat of an identity crisis which slowly killed it off. Too many chefs...

electrogrimey

Hamiltonion wrote: »

@ Grimey, it was a one time spike but we used it for our launch night with the idea of actually getting people in the door and those who liked what they saw would become regulars. It worked well at 1st but our night had somewhat of an identity crisis which slowly killed it off. Too many chefs...

What went wrong? Saying what not to do is just as good advice as what to do.

jonnny68

Is mise le key wrote: »

Na jonny wouldnt have been my attire now.......i was going with the full on scumbag 3/4 length leather jacket with indigo 501's & air max:D

urgghhh jaysus no way would i have been wearing that

Hamiltonion

Well I'd say the other lads would say different but IMO it was a combination of being in a niche venue, albeit of a very high standard, on the wrong side of the city, and sticking to proper house and electro when ideally it should have been more accessible, ie some indie rock and accessible electro. Granted it was meant to be a serious music night, but it was still midweek.

We tried things like art installations but they were badly planned and too sporadic.

Also we had stiff competition for the same small market from Wax and Antics at the time.

Long story short its become far more difficult to draw an audience in the past two years alone

seannash

Ive always wanted to do a night where the dj isnt announced until your in the club and he walks into the dj booth.

You'd need to make it a genre specific night though but can you imagine the buzz if you got a really really good dj for the first mystery gig.

The word would spread like wildfire about the night and anyone who was there will kinda feel like they stumbled upon a secret party.

The whole unknown element would drive the whole thing,you actually have to turn up to find out who was playing and as such the quality of the night would actually dictate whether its a success or not.

Im sure its been done before but i reckon it would still work

Is mise le key

seannash wrote: »

The whole unknown element would drive the whole thing,you actually have to turn up to find out who was playing and as such the quality of the night would actually dictate whether its a success or not.

Im sure its been done before but i reckon it would still work

All sounds very oldskool to me sean, if it aint broke dont fix it:D

seannash

Is mise le key wrote: »

All sounds very oldskool to me sean, if it aint broke dont fix it:D

Ah no,oldskool was still promoted.
If there was a big name dj coming over it was promoted(were not talking about illegal raves here)

My way would be to have big name djs(not stadium fillers but good well known djs) but dont ever mention who it is right til the last second.

The whole night would be a surprise.Its very risky though

I know what your getting at but you cant simply return to the oldskool way and ignore facebook or online promotions.

Is mise le key

Heres something you can do, it wont have punters flocking through the doors guaranteed every week but can have the name of your website popping up in front of people on their PC's etc,

I have MP3's that have embedded into them the names of websites they originated from but i didnt get them from there, see below example of a tune on my PC,





The way to do this is when at window showing your MP3's right click & select properties, then you will see a tab that says summary which will display all these editable options,





Now i just done this one as an example but anyone that has a BLOG or Web site can put their web into the summary of the MP3 & whoever ends up listening to it will see the embedded info in their media player like below,





Windows media player will scroll through all the info embedded into a file but even when being viewed it is visible,







If someone digs a mix you put up on soundcloud & see the website address they will log on to see if there is any more of what they just heard & in doing so will see your latest gigs. Even if someone downloads your mix/file & re ups it to another site, unless they actually go in & edit the summary it will remain with your file. Also if its copied to CD's or one ipod to another etc the info is carried with the file.

Executive Steve

electrogrimey wrote: »

4) Be smart about the deal you make with the venue about how much bar take/door take you get. Don't rip yourself off.

Have someone at the door to count how many people pay in and to keep an eye on the bouncers.

We moved to a venue a good few years ago and were instantly wondering why bugger all people had followed what until then had been a reasonably successful up and coming night across the city; one night was standing out having a cheeky little memory stick when I noticed the bouncers turning away two big groups of people saying "Ah no lads, there's Drum & Bass on down there"

electrogrimey

seannash wrote: »

Ah no,oldskool was still promoted.
If there was a big name dj coming over it was promoted(were not talking about illegal raves here)

My way would be to have big name djs(not stadium fillers but good well known djs) but dont ever mention who it is right til the last second.

The whole night would be a surprise.Its very risky though

I know what your getting at but you cant simply return to the oldskool way and ignore facebook or online promotions.

That could work for another reason too, it'd be a lot easier to book DJs for a secret gig, as you could skip agents etc as it'd have nothing to do with public image, I'd say you'd get around a lot of red tape doing that.

jtsuited

electrogrimey wrote: »

as you could skip agents etc as it'd have nothing to do with public image

?????????

electrogrimey

jtsuited wrote: »

?????????

Few guys I've talked to were happy to do gigs for little money and without the agent as long as they weren't listed on the bill.

seannash

electrogrimey wrote: »

That could work for another reason too, it'd be a lot easier to book DJs for a secret gig, as you could skip agents etc as it'd have nothing to do with public image, I'd say you'd get around a lot of red tape doing that.

Well you would still have to book them so you probably would still have to go through an agent.

the secret part woulod be more about the crowd,but if you can make it so that agents dont need to be involved make it happen:)

was.deevey

Seen that happen a number of times but generally only for promoters who are quite buddyish with the DJ's or Even the Agents concerned if they are coming over for a holiday, flying thought ireland en-route to UK and make it an extra cheap date (in the case of US dj's) or similar.

If its an established night the gig does not have to be secret if the main act just "happend" to have his record bag with him and wanted to play.

... pay for the trip / hotel and some beer money .. as far as the agent is concerned "He just loves DJ'ing so much when he was asked to play at a club he was having a few drinks in ....." Some agents use it for PR too especially if its a reputable venue or night:)

Just leak the word beforehand that there's a good chance DJ XYZ will be showing up for a bit of a spin.

Disclaimer: The character DJ XYZ is a fictional character any resemblance to a person living or dead is purely coincidental.

crank_1975

i am looking at holding a club night and as a complere newbie i would be interested in hearing opinions on the following:

1. Is it better to pay a set amount for the use of the club or to agree a split of the door / bar take?
2. Do you need insurance if you are promoting or does the clubs insurance cover the event?
3. What hidden costs are involved?

Thanks in advance....