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Generally speaking, the most commonly held conception about a mobile DJ is: someone who sets up some speakers and then plays music. Hey, I hear some music. Oh, over there near all that sound equipment stuff. That guy must be the DJ. This isn’t difficult to understand. Why should it be? Sure, folks like us making a living in the Mobile DJ Profession, might refer to ourselves as “Trained Music Hosts,” “Party Facilitators,” “Disc Jockey/Master of Ceremonies,” “DJ Entertainers,” “Skilled Motivators,” etc., etc. We live and breathe all the multifarious facets that contribute to our professional presentations. But, the average person, doesn’t. Even the average, intelligent person doesn’t. They don’t think about, music programming, mixing, staging, or the ebb and flow of a room’s energy and response. They don’t think about effective placement of equipment, sound quality, or optimum levels of volume. Nor do they think about microphone skills, or what goes into serving as a professional and proficient Master of Ceremonies.
Some years back at a bridal show, I met the Food and Beverage Director for the new, five-star Myrtle Beach Radisson Convention Center Hotel. I would have been eager to make a good impression on anyone in this position, but especially on this particular individual who was strikingly beautiful—a tall, captivating, blond woman with a confident bearing, sparkling blue eyes and a warm smile. I introduced myself, gave her my card and asked if it would be okay to call for an appointment to, so to speak, “show her my wares.” She graciously agreed and said she looked forward to meeting with me. Our meeting started out with general chitchat, and I was instantly impressed with her enthusiasm and with her insight into the challenges and possibilities she faced as the F&B of such a large hotel. She was such a stunning lady too—beautiful-looking and intelligent. Additionally, she was very easy to talk to, the kind of person who gives the impression they are genuinely interested in what you have to say. After the initial, friendly, getting-acquainted-session, I felt it was time to segue into a presentation of the ways my company approaches DJ entertainment. At the outset, she revealed she already had some experience with another company in the area. (Ouch! I knew this company and they fit Bill Limbach’s Bottom Feeder description to a Tee!) She then proceeded to pretty much lay out what she liked about them. They arrived on time, seemed to sound okay, and she never received any complaints. Of course that summed up the most simplistic standards and minimal expectations possible. But, okay. I was there to share, and I proceeded with a slide show presentation which was aimed at educating folks about what we provide from an entertainment standpoint, and how we go the extra mile to assure clients will be well-pleased. I delivered the presentation with joyful enthusiasm, replete with photo illustrations, edifying explanations, and glowing testimonies. I went the whole nine yards and really felt I was articulately expanding new Disc Jockey-related horizons for her. My perception was, she was happily drinking it all in. I left feeling I had made an attractive friend who was eager to use our company as her prime DJ resource. Nope. To this day, though she’s at an entirely different and much smaller venue, she continues to refer her clients to the guy who “seemed to sound okay,” and also another guy who, at least in my opinion is, at best, just mediocre. I still think she’s intelligent and a wonderful individual. The guys she refers are nice guys, and we’re on her vendor list too. Some of our company’s associates have performed at her venue and report she was appreciative. But to her, it appears the DJ is still merely there just to set up some speakers and then play music. C’est la vie.
Frustrating isn’t it?
A Venue manager will put friendships first when referring, until that friend makes them look bad. There is a relatively high turn over rate with managers of venues, so you just need to keep checking in with them.
How many times have you been to a venue where you arrive and the only place left to set-up is in a corner with six guest tables between you and the dancefloor?
And I’ve had this happen even after I received a floor plan and did a site visit where I spoke with the banquet manager that would be working my event and detailed what I would be doing and what I needed space wise.
Venues focus on the food first and set the room for their benefit and display of culinary. We are “just the entertainment”. Not a priority for them and most likely never will be. I’ve worked at a few that understand what great entertainment can do, but we still have to keep educating venues.
Larry,
The problem with the subject case and all similar scenarios is the real, specific client is NOT in the mix when you are selling to a venue or referral engine.
Many venues’ concerns are selfisly venue-centric. Sadly, the client is treated a necessary nusance by the process.
There may very well be no way to change her mind or approach.
Larry this is a great subject and gives a very interesting perspective, one that does not get brought to the forefront in most of these discussions. I have witnessed this many times. You met a business woman that was still a person not a robot, she is bias. She is friends with the other DJ company and no matter how bad or bland they might be, she still can not put her business before her friendship and loyalty to this other DJ company.
The perception of the DJ. We have seen so many threads on this subject with hundreds of opinions on why the industry is perceived as it is. I really never see anyone bring up the history of DJing, sometimes you have to look into the past to get answers. Looking to the elders who have 25 years or more in the industry. The ones that had vision in their own businesses but not the industry, but now complain about the direction the industry has taken. Their non action in the past laid the ground for the industry to have gone down this path. Why should anyone be surprised. As years ticked by they continued to let the perception drag down, all the while allowing more and more DJ’s to enter the industry unchecked. They were too busy making their own money and really never gave it a thought on how the industry as a whole was doing. So many things should have been done in the early years that never happened. So now we have to deal with many year of neglect. I am six years in to my DJ business in an environment that says I am just a guy who has speakers and plays music. It is an uphill battle for us guys who care for this industry and who had nothing to do with how it got to this point.
There are two types of venues – those who view the entertainment as a “necessary evil”, and those who view the entertainment as an equal link in the chain of the overall client experience at their venue. And it is easy to figure out which one is which within about 5-10 minutes of entering the venue. Ask a few questions like “would it be possible for me to check your circuit breaker panel to see how many independent 110v circuits I have access to; I really want to make sure I don’t overdraw on one circuit” ,
or, ” what is your contractual stipulation with your client concerning extra time if they choose to have me perform longer that the original time frame?”, or, ” would it be ok with you if I set up in an area where the sound will not directly impede on the five tables between me and the dance floor – I certainly don’t want to upset anyone by impeding on their conversations and have them complaining to me and your staff…” – the answers your receive to these questions ( and ones like them) will tell you EVERYTHING you need to know about how you are perceived in the grand scheme of their event planning and execution – that is why there are certain venues I love to work here in Myrtle Beach and some I would prefer to jab an icepick in my retina as opposed to working in said facility – the truly PROFESSIONAL venues and managers know how EQUALLY important your are to the success of an event – they get it – the rest are clueless pinheads who often times find themselves eventually repeating the following phrase on a daily basis; “would you like fries with that?” Peace Out Ya’ll, and good night to all the ships at sea……………………..
Received the following comment on the Mobile Beat Thread stemming from this post: “i’m curious.. at this ‘presentation’ exactly what parts showed her a personal BENEFIT if she recommended YOU over the other guy?”
I appreciated this comment. It really should be all about the benefits. Knowing the ‘other guy,’ pretty much everything I talked about would be a benefit. (At least in my mind, and probably there’s the rub.)
Our basic presentation back then, as a matter of course, (this was about six years ago) was to use snapshots of our website as a point of reference and provide an overview of our ADJA affiliation in conjunction with our roster, communicating that each of our associates are full-time and experienced, fully-insured, well-equipped, and thoroughly prepared, pointing briefly to the online bios for each. We’d then share our assortment of DJ Intelligence online tools, maybe with a short demo, and then proceed to taking a tour of the main pages of our Wedding section, Corporate section, and in her case Theme Party section. This would then be followed up with a reference to our written guarantee. In the past, when I would give presentations like this, depending upon what popped into my head and the reactions I was getting, I would get sparked into providing enthusiastic descriptions and little stories to enliven whatever is being shown at that particular time. I get excited about what we do, and the main thrust of my presentation, after getting past the “nuts ad the bolts,” is to magnify how we focus on getting our clients involved, and provide the grounds for maximum participation in accordance with their priorities.
Along the lines of communicating benefits that would be relevant to the client, I’d love to share a private message that Peter Merry sent me regarding what probably went down. I really think it’s pertinent and found it to be VERY helpful!
“The only feedback I can offer is that you apparently broke the rule of “Ask…Don’t Tell”
You were telling her why your services were better…instead of asking her leading questions that would have helped her clearly identify for herself what the differences are between your services and the other guy…and this would have allowed her to start grasping what the true benefits would be for her and for her clients.
When you “tell”…people nod their head and appear to agree.
When you “ask”…you get their honest answer and can lead them to see and understand even more.
I hope that helps.”
There are two completely different issues in this thread. The first is whether those who refer us really care about what we do and the second is how to sell. (Whether it be this or our services or anything else.
On the first issue, my experience is that the vast majority of those who sell us really couldn’t care less how good we are and usually can’t tell the difference in talent from one DJ to the next because a.) they’re not usually in the room long enough to see anything in context, and b.) even when they are in the room, they are so tuned-out to what we do, they don’t even notice.
Some do, of course, but they are truly in the minority. Here’s what they REALLY care about: Do we make their job easier or harder?
Changing the floor plan makes their job harder.
Staying with a bad floor plan doesn’t.
Arriving too early makes their job harder.
Arriving too late doesn’t.
Playing too loud makes their job harder.
Not playing loud enough to get a dance floor going doesn’t.
Staying overtime because we’re rocking the house makes their job harder.
Packing it in early because no one danced doesn’t.
Get it? I’m not saying it’s right. On the contrary, I hate this aspect of it, but it’s the world in which we work.
At the very least, you need to make it appear that you are trying to make their job easier. Find out what is important to them and give them as many “wins” as you can. Catering directors, as a group, tend to be power-hungry and if you give them the impression that they’re powerful, their egos will feed on it. (Be careful not to go overboard.)
But on the other issue, sales, I see in this thread a common mistake.
Sales 101 = Remember FAB
F-Feature
A-Advantage
B-Benefit.
Remember that everything you say to someone, they are saying to themselves, “and how does this help ME?”
Feature = Anti-lock brakes
Advantage = Brakes won’t lock up when you slam them on in an emergency.
Benefit = You retain control of your car, preventing a collision and possibly saving your life.
Let’s take a look and see if you remembered to do that on each of these:
(“Our basic presentation back then… was to use snapshots of our website as a point of reference and provide an overview of our ADJA affiliation in conjunction with our roster,”)
Feature – ADJA membership
Advantage= DJs are members of a professional group dedicated to improving their service.
Benefit = Less likely to get a horrible DJ.
Seems simple, right?
But is the venue’s likelihood of getting a horrible DJ really a benefit, or is it an advantage? It’s an advantage.
The benefit would be happier clients who are more likely to be happy with the service of the venue if they had a great experience, which means less work for the caterer.
Always go one more level.
(“communicating that each of our associates are full-time and experienced, fully-insured, well-equipped, and thoroughly prepared, pointing briefly to the online bios for each. We’d then share our assortment of DJ Intelligence online tools, maybe with a short demo, and then proceed to taking a tour of the main pages of our Wedding section, Corporate section, and in her case Theme Party section.”)
All of this is about YOU. There are ways to make this more about them, but this is information you should use to sell your service to clients, not to venues.
(“This would then be followed up with a reference to our written guarantee. In the past, when I would give presentations like this, depending upon what popped into my head and the reactions I was getting, I would get sparked into providing enthusiastic descriptions and little stories to enliven whatever is being shown at that particular time. I get excited about what we do, and the main thrust of my presentation, after getting past the “nuts ad the bolts,” is to magnify how we focus on getting our clients involved, and provide the grounds for maximum participation in accordance with their priorities.”)
Blah, blah blah…More about YOU
I would share things like this, in no particular order:
We use only high quality stage tape, never duct tape, which means we leave nasty residue on your floors that make unsightly stains. If you have wood floors, we’ll use rubber mats and no tape at all.
We are insured and happy to name you as a co-insured, so if something unfortunate were to happen, you won’t be held financially responsible for us.
We’ll work with your captains, making sure to work together as a team. If there are ever any delays with the kitchen or other events, we have the skills necessary to make sure the guests never know there was a problem.
We’ll send you detailed Entertainment Schedule in advance to make sure we’re all on the same page, so you’ll never have to deal with last minute changes based on miscommunications.
We’ll respect your facility. We’ll close doors when we go in and out, keeping the room warm/cool for the guests. We won’t leave our vans parked in loading areas longer than necessary, so everyone has a great experience here. We’ll clean up every last remnant of our setup so that your staff doesn’t have to.
You get the idea. These are not the things I would talk to clients about and it doesn’t make sense to talk to venues about client issues. The venue couldn’t care less about DJIntelligence.
But always think in terms of finishing the thought by adding, “so what that means to you is…”
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