Members Vito Corleone Posted December 3, 2012 Members Share Posted December 3, 2012 Originally Posted by MartinC When I was booking them on my own, I was getting decent money, but the money went way up with the agent. I think if you are booking them on your own, it's pretty easy-you'll probably ask a lot less than an agent and will get the gig if you are what they want. Getting the confidence of a good agent is what will propel you into getting the better wedding and corporate gigs IME. It could be different in your area. This brings up a good point: it's REALLY important to know your market area and how people are finding bands. You and I approach the same market from different angles--but it's a big enough and diverse enough market that we can do that. In our case, the agents we work with aren't putting us into weddings--they've got other bands they use for that it seems for whatever reason. Where we are able to go around that is the fact both Tahoe and Napa Valley (and SF as well) are "destination wedding" spots. Probably 2/3rds of the weddings we play are for people that are coming in from way out of the area. Which might make them more likely to do their own internet searches for bands in the area rather than try to find an area talent agency. Clearly, in the Nor Cal market, there's room for both types of marketing. In other areas, there might not be. Or it might be something different. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members wheresgrant3 Posted December 3, 2012 Members Share Posted December 3, 2012 Originally Posted by guitarguy19 We have a couple of subs at our disposal right now that we've used for club gigs when necessary, so that's a plus on that note. As far as what to charge, right now our club gigs vary from $600 (gigs where we provide no PA or lights) to $800-$1200 for us providing everything. After contacting several wedding bands in our area to get bids to see what the going rate is, I got quotes from $1000 to $2500 so far. I actually expected them to be higher...but that was speculation. I'm thinking of charging $2500 if we put together a package for both us and a DJ; I'd try to sell this as sort of an "all inclusive" package...we handle all the emcee duties, coordinate with them ahead of time to nail down a detailed itinerary, provide band sets plus DJ sets, learn 2-3 songs free of charge, allow for everything under the sun musically, etc. This would leave them absolutely nothing to worry about on the day of...we handle everything. A lower tier package would be $1500 for just the band to perform as if it were a club (essentially)...without the emcee duties and the full on DJ. I'd still offer our sound system to be available for whoever wanted to run the music during breaks and host/make announcements/etc. Does that sound viable? I would really guess it depends on your market, your reputation and the competition in your area. In my market a decent club band who had no experience playing weddings and not a huge following to draw off of, $1500 would be a fair price DJ or no DJ. We started at the $2500 mark (keep in mind we made for many years $1600-2200 for bar and nightclub gigs) and DJ'd ourselves. As we grew more experienced we added a dedicated DJ not only in our wedding package but for our nightclub gigs as well. That increased us to $3600 for a package. That's fairly expensive around here. Good wedding bands charge between $3K-5K per wedding. Up and comers under cut $1500-2500. It really depends what the market will bear and what your act will be sold on. In other words is it some 'green' bride and groom unfamilar with your band, lumping you with the rest of the wedding bands in the area. Is it someone who's seen your band before and loved you guys and said "I want THAT band for our wedding?". I can tell you that we've lost some weddings to some older and more established bands who actually charged more because they were able to sell what they do best. It really depends on your market and what it's able to bear. I can tell you in my market reputation means alot. Upstarts have a hard time getting a foot in the door, mostly because the pros know the business like the back of their hand. I second Martins advice. Get a good agent if you can. They will take the legwork out of the pitch and you can focus on the presentation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members wheresgrant3 Posted December 3, 2012 Members Share Posted December 3, 2012 Originally Posted by wesg wheregrant3 is totally on the money on designer vs. programmer. I'm a good programmer with allllll kinds of web programming experience, but my design skills suck ass. Your design is better than anything I am likely to come up with. Thanks. It's a $35 template from some designer in India. It took a weekend to tweak but since then has been incredibly manageable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members wesg Posted December 3, 2012 Members Share Posted December 3, 2012 Geez, Grant, that's a good idea. I'm so used to have the resources of my company to do whatever I need that it never occurred to me not to do it from scratch by myself when it came time for outside-the-office web work! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members wheresgrant3 Posted December 3, 2012 Members Share Posted December 3, 2012 Originally Posted by wesg Geez, Grant, that's a good idea. I'm so used to have the resources of my company to do whatever I need that it never occurred to me not to do it from scratch by myself when it came time for outside-the-office web work! I looked at using Drupal first. Some templates and modding them, but the content management side of Word Press appealed to me. I get it... as a designer and creator doing something cookie cutter seems disgenuine. Our singer was afraid our site would look like everyone else. But I convinced him that content, as well as navigation and ease of use is the real different-or for people visiting websites. We work hard to keep ours regularly updated. Some new and different every few days. The result is daily web traffic. Last year we had more than 20,000 visits averaging 3:58 mins. More than 54% were repeat views, and about 90% were from a three county radius (love Google analytics). So in terms of local traffic (which is what I really care about) it has reach and stickyness. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members jimiv Posted December 4, 2012 Members Share Posted December 4, 2012 Originally Posted by guido61 OK, gotcha. Yeah, everyone is interested when they are at the gig, excited, and maybe even drunk. Some just wanna play bigshot and talk to the band. Then they get home and suddenly they don't want a band as much as they did the night before. In my entire life I doubt if I've booked more than 1% of "private event" inquiries coming from regular patrons at gigs. Yeah, that's been our experience as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members guitarguy19 Posted December 4, 2012 Author Members Share Posted December 4, 2012 Originally Posted by guitarguy19 I'm thinking of charging $2500 if we put together a package for both us and a DJ; I'd try to sell this as sort of an "all inclusive" package...we handle all the emcee duties, coordinate with them ahead of time to nail down a detailed itinerary, provide band sets plus DJ sets, learn 2-3 songs free of charge, allow for everything under the sun musically, etc. This would leave them absolutely nothing to worry about on the day of...we handle everything. A lower tier package would be $1500 for just the band to perform as if it were a club (essentially)...without the emcee duties and the full on DJ. I'd still offer our sound system to be available for whoever wanted to run the music during breaks and host/make announcements/etc. Well I sold them these packages over the phone last night and they seemed interested. They're planning on coming to our gig next weekend to see us play live. I guess the guy's wife saw us already once and really liked us. So if we knock it out of the park next weekend while they're there...maybe we'll actually land this deal. We're hopeful! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members guitarguy19 Posted December 5, 2012 Author Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 Another update on this...I ironically ran into a DJ that I actually went to high school with today and I told him what I wanted to do. We have a meeting Thursday night to discuss things further. I REALLY think putting a package together with a band plus a DJ could be cool for wedding and potentially even high end club gigs and parties. None of the wedding bands I found on gigmasters offered anything like this. Am I crazy or could this be a really good idea that it sort of un-tapped? At least around here...I don't see anyone else really doing this. Another good thing will be that us partnering with a DJ will have upsides for both parties. I'm thinking the DJ will make the same or possibly even better money packaged with us, and will have to do less work because we'll provide the sound system and he'll obviously get nice breaks during our sets. All he'll need is his laptop/interface equipment wise. Also, we'll benefit because he's already connected and involved in that market (he has 10 weddings booked for 2013 already). I'm thinking of making up some kind of pamphlet to hand out at all our club gigs, and he can do the same, that highlights this package, plus the "band only" package and the "DJ only" package. Since we get so many inquiries, a pamphlet might be a pretty cool thing to hand out (rather than just a business card). I can also design a section on our website that discusses this wedding package, and he can link the same way from his end. Good cross promo. Pretty excited about this opportunity right now! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Vito Corleone Posted December 5, 2012 Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 Originally Posted by guitarguy19 Another update on this...I ironically ran into a DJ that I actually went to high school with today and I told him what I wanted to do. We have a meeting Thursday night to discuss things further. I REALLY think putting a package together with a band plus a DJ could be cool for wedding and potentially even high end club gigs and parties. None of the wedding bands I found on gigmasters offered anything like this. Am I crazy or could this be a really good idea that it sort of un-tapped? At least around here...I don't see anyone else really doing this. No, I think it's a great idea and one I've been tossing around for a couple of years. I know that Jimiv's drummer does DJ at weddings for his band. Wheresgrant uses a DJ for their club gigs. I've talked to one of our soundguys who DJs on the side about doing it for us. We've a played a few weddings that have hired us AND a DJ. I see no reason to give up that business to somebody else if we can take it ourselves. Plus, just offering the service can be a plus. There's a few bands out here doing it already. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members guitarguy19 Posted December 5, 2012 Author Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 Reworking our press kit also. Ignoring the image on the first page which will be replaced with a better one, I'd love some feedback on our kit. Goal is to shoot for high end clubs, festivals, etc, as we've been discussing in this thread. Note, the cover is in a black folder, all you can see is the middle section through the window. The whole thing is presented in a black "pocket" folder with a business card holder on the L, and a slim case with our demo CD on the R (outfitted with a label and cover with another promo pic), and then a cover letter draped over the top of the CD paper-clipped to page 1. Any advice on wording, what more to include or cut, or anything else would be greatly appreciated! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Vito Corleone Posted December 5, 2012 Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 I really don't see anything wrong with the press kit. The layout looks fine to me. I would only suggest a couple of things: you need to be clipping a demo DVD to the kit rather than a CD. I'm sure you know this and are planning to do this when you update your video, but don't let that slip by. Without good video, you're in a deep, deep hole. Use your current video until you get a better one. Don't settle for just audio.Your "about" bio stuff is good, but also very generic. Somebody going through promo kits is going to see a dozen bands who are all "a fun and exciting show with everything from oldies to hip-hip geared towards getting the crowd moving and singing along." So try to add something that you think is distinctive about your band. Think it about it from the POV of the client: "why would I want to hire THESE guys over the 10 other bands with great promo kits and similar songlists?"Give 'em a reason why SpaceCat is a better choice than the other bands. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members guitarguy19 Posted December 5, 2012 Author Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 Originally Posted by guido61 you need to be clipping a demo DVD to the kit rather than a CD. I'm sure you know this and are planning to do this when you update your video, but don't let that slip by. Without good video, you're in a deep, deep hole. Use your current video until you get a better one. Don't settle for just audio. Yes...we're going this route and we're HARD planning how we're gonna get it done. We have a really big gig at a local club on Jan 11th. This place does it to the max with terrific house lights and PA, the crowd is always totally off the hook and rowdy, and for $100 they'll give us multitrack audio recording of the whole show. (These are definitely some of the best sound guys to work with in the area; they've mixed national acts and run some of the best clubs around. So, we're hoping for pretty good quality audio from this gig). We're coupling this with hiring someone to shoot video of the whole night as well, and a separate head to photograph everything. Killing lots of birds with one big ass stone, at a GREAT venue to work with doing it. From here, we can make a pretty solid base from our promo video with the audio and video track combined. We'll couple this with (your idea Dave) doing sort of "interview" clips that we can edit in of hotties saying how much they love the band/etc. Fortunately our sound guy is a guru with video editing, so we're expecting a pretty kick as video to be completed early next year. From that point forward we'll attach that to the press kit rather than the audio CD, and we'll have updated live gig photos to work with for the website and press kit as well. Also, we're planning on scheduling a 'studio' or 'staged' photo shoot to get new promo photos done. We need to find someone creative to help us with ideas and get some good staged shots of the band. No more hacking it, we're gonna pony up the dough and hire someone who comes recommended. Still looking for the right person... Back to the DVD, question: How should the format of the DVD work? Should this be a 'data' DVD or whatever that they can put in their computer and pull up the promo video or the audio tracks then? Not something they pop in their Samsung on their home TV right?? Originally Posted by guido61 Your "about" bio stuff is good, but also very generic. Somebody going through promo kits is going to see a dozen bands who are all "a fun and exciting show with everything from oldies to hip-hip geared towards getting the crowd moving and singing along." So try to add something that you think is distinctive about your band. Think it about it from the POV of the client: "why would I want to hire THESE guys over the 10 other bands with great promo kits and similar songlists?" Give 'em a reason why SpaceCat is a better choice than the other bands. I've been fighting with this as well. I hate the last line "...clubs, private functions, yada yada, we can tailor the event to meet your needs." The first part is repetitive of what I have at the bottom of every page. The last part about "tailoring the event" is decent I guess. I think this is the tough part because deep down we're not offering clubs something totally off the wall different than our competition. I think our best selling points are: 1. We're 5-10 years younger than most of our competition that has achieved this "stature" in this market, and that makes us appealing to crowds 2. We're extremely professional and we have the ability to really control volume on stage and keep it comfortable for any room...working with a full time sound man helps. 2. We're very energetic and fun on stage. (Maybe even more-so than some others...but it's hard to describe. Really, at the bars we're trying to book, what band on their roster doesn't have this as a selling point?) 3. We (with or without working with a DJ) play above average quality dance club mixes during our breaks. Much of our competition doesn't do this...they're playing a mix of rock and whatever bs...gaps between songs...not 100% clubby music with no lull like we do. I guess I need to keep thinking how to incorporate this stuff into the last solid 1-liner for the written part....feel free to chime in with ideas!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Vito Corleone Posted December 5, 2012 Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 Originally Posted by guitarguy19 I guess I need to keep thinking how to incorporate this stuff into the last solid 1-liner for the written part....feel free to chime in with ideas!! Just quick, off the top of my head, but I'd start working with something like: With stage experience that exceeds most musicians of a similar age, SpaceCat puts on an exciting performance that uniquely blends their youthful energy with mature professionalism. The songlist, stage attire and volume will always be perfectly tailored for your event. SpaceCat specializes in a "no-breaks" performance by providing a DJ that plays upbeat dance music and the latest club favorites in-between the bands' sets. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members guitarguy19 Posted December 5, 2012 Author Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 Originally Posted by guido61 Just quick, off the top of my head, but I'd start working with something like: With stage experience that exceeds most musicians of a similar age, SpaceCat puts on an exciting performance that uniquely blends their youthful energy with mature professionalism. The songlist, stage attire and volume will always be perfectly tailored for your event. SpaceCat specializes in a "no-breaks" performance by providing a DJ that plays upbeat dance music and the latest club favorites in-between the bands' sets. Dude...that absolutely blows what I wrote out of the water!!! That is exactly what I wanted to say...and it's not generic at all. Seriously, thank you for taking the time to write that. Dave...you da fricken man!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Vito Corleone Posted December 5, 2012 Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 Originally Posted by guitarguy19 Dude...that absolutely blows what I wrote out of the water!!! That is exactly what I wanted to say...and it's not generic at all. Seriously, thank you for taking the time to write that. Dave...you da fricken man!!! Hey, my pleasure! All this ummm.... verbose-ness (?) I carry around has to be good for something once in a while, right? Tell ya what. Before you 'go to press' with this kit, PM me your 'about' page copy and we'll tighten it up and hit your biggest sell-points a little harder. Just like with writing/arranging a song, I believe that every word makes a difference on these things and you want to deliver the most impact possible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members guitarguy19 Posted December 5, 2012 Author Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 Originally Posted by guido61 Hey, my pleasure! All this ummm.... verbose-ness (?) I carry around has to be good for something once in a while, right? Tell ya what. Before you 'go to press' with this kit, PM me your 'about' page copy and we'll tighten it up and hit your biggest sell-points a little harder. Just like with writing/arranging a song, I believe that every word makes a difference on these things and you want to deliver the most impact possible. Well, you are verbal that's for sure! I will definitely get back with you before finalizing. At the risk of screwing it up I can think of a minor detail or 2 we could add. Just don't demand a consulting fee. This is more of a "help a brotha out" kinda gig. Better yet, use this before and after example to start DBPKCI (Dave's Band Press Kit Consulting Inc). You'll earn hella work! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Vito Corleone Posted December 5, 2012 Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 Originally Posted by guitarguy19 Well, you are verbal that's for sure! I will definitely get back with you before finalizing. At the risk of screwing it up I can think of a minor detail or 2 we could add. Just don't demand a consulting fee. This is more of a "help a brotha out" kinda gig. Better yet, use this before and after example to start DBPKCI (Dave's Band Press Kit Consulting Inc). You'll earn hella work! LOL... yah, no 'consulting fees' here. Just put together something with everything you want to say about the band, and I'll tighten it up for you. In all honesty---for whatever reason---this sort of "press copy" writing is something that comes very easily to me and that I do pretty well. Maybe I'm in the wrong line of work....lol....but it won't take more than a few minutes for me to come up with something pretty good. And I'd never charge a brotha for a couple of minutes effort. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members jimiv Posted December 5, 2012 Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 Originally Posted by guido61 Just quick, off the top of my head, but I'd start working with something like: With stage experience that exceeds most musicians of a similar age, SpaceCat puts on an exciting performance that uniquely blends their youthful energy with mature professionalism. The songlist, stage attire and volume will always be perfectly tailored for your event. SpaceCat specializes in a "no-breaks" performance by providing a DJ that plays upbeat dance music and the latest club favorites in-between the bands' sets. Not bad, Dave, not bad. I think I may just stick that in our press kit as well.....hahahahaha Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members guitarguy19 Posted December 5, 2012 Author Members Share Posted December 5, 2012 Originally Posted by jimiv Not bad, Dave, not bad. I think I may just stick that in our press kit as well.....hahahahaha ^^Like. I'm telling you...DBPKCI. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members guitarguy19 Posted January 6, 2013 Author Members Share Posted January 6, 2013 UPDATE: Booked a wedding today!! The thing that SOLD them on us as opposed to the other 2-3 bands they looked at was in fact the "no breaks" performance with the integrated DJ. They even said that the other bands they talked to didn't even really discuss or even describe what would happen during the band breaks.Really hoping that this is a selling point that sets us apart!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Vito Corleone Posted January 6, 2013 Members Share Posted January 6, 2013 Originally Posted by guitarguy19 UPDATE: Booked a wedding today!! The thing that SOLD them on us as opposed to the other 2-3 bands they looked at was in fact the "no breaks" performance with the integrated DJ. They even said that the other bands they talked to didn't even really discuss or even describe what would happen during the band breaks. Really hoping that this is a selling point that sets us apart!! Right on! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Blackbird 13 Posted January 6, 2013 Members Share Posted January 6, 2013 Originally Posted by guitarguy19 UPDATE: Booked a wedding today!! The thing that SOLD them on us as opposed to the other 2-3 bands they looked at was in fact the "no breaks" performance with the integrated DJ. They even said that the other bands they talked to didn't even really discuss or even describe what would happen during the band breaks. Really hoping that this is a selling point that sets us apart!! That's an interesting point. As a guy who's played in clubs and seen bands in clubs, I know that the good bands will play dance and club music during the breaks. Someone who's interested in booking a band though... they might well have no idea about band breaks, and that's a perspective that I wouldn't have even thought of. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members 992gnt Posted January 7, 2013 Members Share Posted January 7, 2013 I've got a question, do bar bands doing weddings just play bar band music? I know for my wedding, and good friends band played for us. Unconventional wedding music for sure with appearances by Volbeat and Motorhead... At any rate, are you guys not playing "wedding" type songs at all? They band I just joined is very new, but the eventual goal is to play corporate events and weddings, so this is a very topical thread! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Vito Corleone Posted January 7, 2013 Members Share Posted January 7, 2013 Originally Posted by 992gnt I've got a question, do bar bands doing weddings just play bar band music? I know for my wedding, and good friends band played for us. Unconventional wedding music for sure with appearances by Volbeat and Motorhead... At any rate, are you guys not playing "wedding" type songs at all? They band I just joined is very new, but the eventual goal is to play corporate events and weddings, so this is a very topical thread! The first couple of weddings we did---when we were still a 5-piece all male bar band---went OK but it became clear that we'd need to learn some standard 'wedding' type songs if we were going to be any good at it and be able to ask any sort of 'real' money. ANY band can, of course, be hired to play a wedding or a corporate gig. And an otherwise 'specialized' type act will do very well getting hired because somebody WANTS an AC/DC tribute band playing at their wedding. But as far as just being a standard bar band? I know some good ones that don't go out of their way to do anything special who pretty regularly get $1200-1500 for corporate/wedding gigs. But that's probably where it tops out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Blackbird 13 Posted January 7, 2013 Members Share Posted January 7, 2013 Originally Posted by 992gnt I've got a question, do bar bands doing weddings just play bar band music? I know for my wedding, and good friends band played for us. Unconventional wedding music for sure with appearances by Volbeat and Motorhead... At any rate, are you guys not playing "wedding" type songs at all? They band I just joined is very new, but the eventual goal is to play corporate events and weddings, so this is a very topical thread! Granted, some songs play well to some crowds and not to others.. but I've always kind of operated under the idea that there are good songs for a cover band to add and bad songs for a cover band to do.. and for the most part, 80% or so of the good songs will work at most any gig. Stuff like "I Want You To Want Me", "Save A Horse", "Don't Stop Believin", "I Got A Feelin", "Play That Funky Music", "Dynamite", "Let's Get It On".... there's a very short list of where those songs aren't appropriate, and a very long list of where they are... so from a BUSINESS standpoint, there's no reason not to play them. Granted, songs like "The Chicken Dance" and many of the slow dance wedding standards ("Amazed", "Wonderful Tonight", "Lost In This Moment", "I Loved Her First") are songs you'll only play for those particular events.. but I would venture to say that if you've got an across the board setlist of popular stuff to begin with, a lot of it will work just as well at a wedding as it will at a bar. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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