Karaoke Forums

Much has ben said here about dumb bar owners or freeloaders.All presented in a selfish negative fashion with some type of personal vendetta. I work closely with bars and openly discuss anything that affect our success.

I would like to start a thread that determines what successful venues are doing to establish a food karaoke weekend. Some become traditions and offer karaoke more than one night a week.for years. They do not do this with karaoke alone, karaoke cant save a failing bar you need a good customer base to start with. Instead of trying to blame one petty thing lets do some analyisis.

Does your bar have a happy hour. If so what times and do they ever extend it up to or into the karaoke time? Some stock a table with finger food after happy hour.

Does your bar have waitresses or everybody lines up at the bar to buy drinks? The waitresses are bubbly help with slips and encourage people to sing.

Does it have leagues or poker on karaoke nights that interfere with karaoke? We have a separate karaoke room some bars have separate rooms for pool or darts.In the case of owners paying rent this can be prohibitive but nrcessary in the long run.

Does it provide peanuts or even free food once a week?

Does it cater to small parties with table reservations or provide catering service? Party supplies?

Does it contract with a local florist to put small arrangements on tables. More common in restaraunts.though for parties is appropriate.

Does it provide security and have certified bartenders that are trained to establish drinking limits and preven trouble before it happens.

These are just a few but important aspects of successful bars. What does yours do to advertise or promote karaoke nights?

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Yes from 4-7 Mon-Fri. With free appetizer type foods. The cigar bar next door (also part of the complex) offers free wi-fi as well that reaches into the lounge.

Both waitresses & bartenders.

Dart leagues/tournaments almost nightly. Half the bar is all darts with 9 boards. The other half is karaoke. There are also 5 sit down video games with multiple different games offered - with the new ones being online & 2 2008 golf stand up online tournament machines.

Not anymore, used to give free fresh made popcorn until the machine caught fire. They do have a 'nut bar' with various hot nuts, beef jerkey & other types of microwavable foods for after the restaurant closes.

You can book parties & they will set up & decorate the tables. Catering is available, but seldom used.

No

Security on weekends & trained bartenders that get certified every year.

They have their website & MySpace site that they just started recently so it's still growing. Much of the karaoke advertising I do myself. They used to take out ads in the local papers but found most came in mostly from word of mouth & just stumbling upon them for the first time.

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If you have anything to do with the music industry a Myspace page is mandatory. I wish I had used it long ago but now establishing a network with bars bands DJ'S and KJ"S in colorado. I dont get out as much as I used to but Myspace is a way of keeping track of whats going on and you find out about the local talent. IN FACT NOW I recommend a Myspace over a web site.

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I think Facebook is much easier to navigate, and much friendlier for internet folks!

My computer connection is slow. I hate waiting for Myspace pages to load!

How about quality food? Most bar food to me tastes the same. A place could really stand out by offering something homemade, tasty, and unique.

absolutely agree on the food! The kitchen offerings really will help make a good venue quite successful!

I know alot of people moving from MySpace to Facebook. Although I don't know if it as entertainment friendly as far as promoting goes. Haven't dove into it that much yet.

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Im on facebook too but it seems all the musicians, bars, kj's and dj's are on myspace.

I do have one million, 250 thousand in texas holdem chips on facebook and on myspace I am broke.. If anybody wants to trade let me know..

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The most successful bars I ever knew had good cheeseburgers and they had the grill hot until last call.

As a side note.. In 1945 draft beer was a nickle. Cheeseburger were 25 cents and a nickle extra for chips. They dont have bars anymore like the olden days. The liberals regulated good bars totally out of existence and did not even patronise them. It is interesting to read young peoples posts here about bars and what they should do. Their impressions are formed by movies and not growing up in bars which is nothing more thanl a watering hole or social place. The laws and regulations levied upon small bars make me cringe and puke. If you think they are not paying protection to local police you are in a dream world..

It is interesting to note for all the criteria needed for a successful karaoke bar Lonnie's Tbird met them all..

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I'm with you!
Myspace is pretty much useless for my area. Facebook is much more effective.

In one of my venues, there is occassionaly free popcorn, but nothing else.Dart and pool leagues are held on other nigts. We do not have fresh flowers and bartenders/waitstaff must take a course before being allowed to serve. It's the law in all of BC, so you won't find any "untrained" staff. Having said that, the "course" is a bit of a joke and appears to be more of a money grab for the government. The test is open book so you can see what I mean. Anyone who knows how to read can pass. Doesn't mean they understand any of it or even retain it.
There is no happy hour and we have a bartender and a waitress. We have not needed bouncers as of yet. Hopefully we won't any time soon.

diafel can you post a link to your facebook page? Does your venue have a Myspace or Facebook page? Im not criticizing, just curious and might incorporate this too.

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There's no venue Myspace, they use Facebook as well. I'll PM you the link as I don't want too much personal info out there.
Where Facebook works really well is that you can create events and invite all the group members and you can also post things in your "tagline" under your name that everyone linked to you will see. Word about events spreads very fast in this manner.
Like wildfire, I dare say.
Facebook pages might not be totally customizable but all the information you need is right there. Besides, who wants to wait for annoying visuals and sounds to load?

I am just the opposite google Ollie smith karaoke and the second link is this. People accuse me of bragging here they dont know the art of getting high on google searches and do not know how to work forums.

cabaret karaoke.

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Our area simply insn't large enough to bother with Myspace and I know around here, most people won't bother looking it up. I know I didn't when people sent me Myspace links and such. Facebook, however, is so much more and so intuitive that's it's no trouble to look at the invites and events people send.
We use Facebook to keep our regulars in touch.
For getting hired, it's more word of mouth. People wouldn't do an internet search for hiring Karaoke around here. They call my BF's Music store, usually.
Guess who he points them to?

Our bar gigs are word of mouth and my regs get me gigs. For party's or weddings which is my cream and butter I use the internet and use all sources.

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I sometimes wonder how many bars are missing out on the opportunity of attracting more customers by not advertising that they have karaoke. Do the bars rely on the karaoke operator to advertise rather than advertise themselves?

One example here in Strathmore is the Old Mill Pub... they used to have karaoke but then the KJ told me that karaoke was being replaced by Guitar Hero. When the bar did have karaoke, they used to have a sign in the window advertising it, which is originally how I found out about it. A week or so ago, I did an internet search and found a karaoke company in Calgary that had a page of their gigs on their website, which listed the Old Mill as having karaoke. Problem is the website, like many others, has no indication of when the information was last updated. There is no advertising in the bar window as before. So, if the OLd Mill has in fact started having karaoke again, then they are doing themselves a disservice by not advertising it.

It'd be really nice to have a website to go to that you could find ALL the karaoke venues in the area you are interested in, and know that the information is up-to-date. Maybe there's an opportunity there for someone to provide a service to operators and/or bars/venues.

There are sites but sadly to say some listings are outdated however one can call to confirm.

karaoke listings

Another is hot spots

These are free and are becoming more and more a vital part of internet advertising.

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Murrlyn, you're in Strathmore??? Who knew? If I ever get out that way again, I'll have to look you up. Not so terribly far from me (We ARE talking Canada here! ) We sometimes head to Cowtown and also Saskatchew. Maybe I can convince hubby to sidetrack a little....

it is interesting to know one of the most successful venues on this forum could answer my questions and provide a clubs business format. If you can not provide the answers then you are totally naive about working with a bar and making your business work If you can not answer or reply to this survey with positive statements you have a lot to learn.

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karyoker said:


And you are directing this statement to all those who did not directly respond to your "survey?" A challenging insult isn't going to garner an "only positive" response... at least not from me because I can't speak for anyone else. Besides, not all responses are guaranteed to be "positive." IMHO, if you're only looking for "positive" responses, then it appears you want some sort of "validation" and not discussion.

There is a very big difference between CAN not and WILL not. It has nothing to do with being "naive about working with a bar and making your business work" or that there is "a lot to learn."