[00:00:00] Bandhive 185-cm: Welcome to episode 185 of the Bandhive Podcast. It is time for another episode of the Bandhive Podcast. My name is James Cross and I help independent artists tour smart. This week on the show we're gonna talk about something that I think is really important, but underutilized by a lot of independent artists, and it's something that I'm probably gonna get flack for saying.

[00:00:22] Bandhive 185-cm: It's nothing bad, but it's just something that a lot of people who have that DIY ethos probably don't agree with, and I think that's a shame because there's nothing wrong with doing this if you do it ethically. And it all comes down to making money. There's so many different ways you can make money as an artist, obviously you can sell merch, you can sell music, you can play shows.

[00:00:43] Bandhive 185-cm: Those are the things that most people would probably think of. Then there's things like licensing That can be a huge income stream if you do it right, but that's not what we're here to talk about today.

[00:00:53] Bandhive 185-cm: Today we aren't going to talk about v I P packages and meet and greets for independent touring [00:01:00] artists. Now, before you hear me saying, we can only sell 20 tickets, who would buy a V I P package from us? Think about this. If you sell 20 tickets, how much mercury are you selling? You probably have one or two people who are there and they really like your music and they buy merch, right?

[00:01:16] Bandhive 185-cm: So when you sell MER at the merch table, cool. People buy something, they walk away. That's it. Maybe you chat for a minute or two, maybe you don't. It depends. But it's really important to curate a positive. Fan experience. This is what makes fans who are into your music now turn into long-term super fans who are gonna be following you for years to come.

[00:01:39] Bandhive 185-cm: So it's really important that. They have a positive experience with you, and of course you should go out and make sure that every single interaction at that merch table is as positive and wonderful as possible. But if you go the extra mile and make specific fans feel special, that is going to elevate you to a next level in their eyes.

[00:01:58] Bandhive 185-cm: Now we've shared [00:02:00] stories of bands who cultivate those personal experiences quite well in the past. I Fight Dragons is One New, politics is another. Those bands both got started out by utilizing the internet, social media, and email lists and message boards and that kind of stuff to really grow their audience and build a community around their music.

[00:02:18] Bandhive 185-cm: And that was one thing that was so important to these bands getting their early success. But you can take it to the next level and do this in person as well. So having that connection between you, the band, and your fans, that's really what makes long-term fans because if they feel connected to you through your music, then they are connected to you.

[00:02:37] Bandhive 185-cm: Maybe you're not really connected to them. It's nice if you are, but you might not even know who they are, but they feel connected to you and they will want to support you because of that. So in a typical V I P package or meet and greet bundle or anything like that, it really depends on what level you're at.

[00:02:53] Bandhive 185-cm: I've done v I P for bigger acts. I've done v I P for smaller acts, and I say [00:03:00] small, I mean like club size acts. This isn't something that I've seen DIY artists do yet, but I want you to try it. The biggest choice I've done were staple center. Like 20,000 tickets or whatever, something like that. It was huge.

[00:03:12] Bandhive 185-cm: Three nights in a row all sold out. And that artist had multiple different packages. Some included meet and greets, some didn't. They all included a drawstring bag, some included blankets and posters, others didn't. the drawstring bag was filled with bunches of goodies, like postcards and a notebook and a hat, and I don't remember what else, but.

[00:03:33] Bandhive 185-cm: Each of these packages was insanely expensive. Now they did come up with a ticket, a good ticket, but the cheapest ones started at like 300 or $350 and the most expensive topped out at about 4,000. And that was an individual meet and greet with the headliner of that show, which is incredible cuz most people were lumped into groups of four.

[00:03:54] Bandhive 185-cm: And if you weren't there with three other friends, they would combine you with somebody else. It was groups of four. And only groups of [00:04:00] four, and that was like a mid-range, I think like $1,500 v I p package per person, which is still incredible. And in my opinion, you know, yes, supply and demand, but that is very expensive.

[00:04:10] Bandhive 185-cm: And that artist actually stopped doing meet and greets at that string of shows. It was the third show. There was no meet and greet and it kind of made some waves in the industry. Another show I did it was also an amphitheater show, so big country star. And there's no meet and greet.

[00:04:24] Bandhive 185-cm: There's a V I P lounge where you got. Two drinks for free. and then after that you'd have to pay and you got a fanny pack with like a little Tumblr inside and that was it. So really it was just a special lounge that you could hang out in. And that tent honestly was just a tent.

[00:04:38] Bandhive 185-cm: it was a tent with some side walls and some decorations, and you could get your photos taken and that kind of stuff. And typically there would've been little games that you could play too, except it was raining at that date. So you couldn't even play the games cause those would've been outside the tent, blah, blah, blah.

[00:04:50] Bandhive 185-cm: It was still a great show to work. I had fun, but honestly I would not have paid for that experience. And you, you got some other stuff like you got into the show early and you got to see the merch booth early. Like great, you [00:05:00] can buy stuff before it's sold out and you already paid so much more for this Now I'm not saying the artist should not have done that. I get the idea. I like the idea. I'm not saying don't do this. But as an independent artist, you can offer more interaction. There was a comedian, I did v I P for last year and she was playing a smaller venue, like I think 900 or 1200 capacity, so still a good size venue, v i P was very simple.

[00:05:29] Bandhive 185-cm: A laminate, a poster, which I believe was signed and a meet and greet where you got your picture taken. and there were still pandemic precautions. There was a line on the stage and you had to stay that far away and that kind of stuff. But when she was taking photos, she took the time to chat with each person.

[00:05:45] Bandhive 185-cm: There were some people who were there for three to five minutes chatting with her, especially towards the end of the line where there weren't as many people waiting. She could see that, oh, hey, we're almost done. She was becoming very talkative with the fans, really having a good time laughing, sharing stories.

[00:05:58] Bandhive 185-cm: And it was really [00:06:00] cool to see this because all of the other v i P events I've worked with were just, hi photo bye. There's nothing of substance there. And again, that's the difference between large shows and smaller shows, Now, here's something that I think you can consider as an independent artist.

[00:06:16] Bandhive 185-cm: Instead of offering a traditional meet and greet or a traditional V I P package in the sense that we've been talking about here so far, what about saying, Hey, we have a V I P package. get to join us for dinner. It comes with this free merch bundle, and we'll cover your meal as part of the cost of this.

[00:06:33] Bandhive 185-cm: So you want me to take two, maybe three people and you say, We'll pick a restaurant to eat. It's gonna be near the venue. You're gonna join us there and we'll have a good meal and we'll chat. We'll have 45 minutes to an hour to sit down and talk. And you can ask questions about the band. We can really get to know you.

[00:06:49] Bandhive 185-cm: And you know what, you're gonna break even on this. Maybe it covers the cost of your meals, which is always a good thing. But you're gonna make a lasting connection with this fan. So let's say you [00:07:00] charge. A hundred dollars, which sounds like a lot, but it's not. You charge a hundred dollars. That covers the meals for your one guest and one of the people in your band, and then the merch package.

[00:07:11] Bandhive 185-cm: So maybe you bring in three people and you have $300. You've covered your costs for three band members and three merch packages. might actually even be losing money by having all of your band members eating at the same place. But guess what? Those fans are gonna be so stoked about the conversation they had with you.

[00:07:27] Bandhive 185-cm: As long as everything goes well, that they might just go up to your merch table at the show and buy more merch. And even if they don't buy more merch, you know what they're gonna tell all their friends about how they got to hang out with one of their favorite bands. And before I hear you saying, says that my band is their favorite band. You don't know that because every single week, Somebody reaches out to me and says, Hey, I love your podcast. Thank you so much. I've been listening for so long, blah, blah, blah. And it's somebody that maybe I've never even seen them comment on anything before, but they're reaching out, saying they've been listening to my show for like a year or two, and they love what I do.

[00:07:59] Bandhive 185-cm: So first of [00:08:00] all, if that's you. Thank you. Thank you so much for being a longtime listener. Feel free to reach out anytime. Please, like I'm happy to chat about the music business at any time. Just shoot me an email, James Bandhive.rocks or Mad Rock x vx on Instagram. Shoot me a DM or join our Facebook group, which you can find by going to Bandhive.rocks/group or searching for Bandhive on Facebook.

[00:08:22] Bandhive 185-cm: But all of those like. There are people out there who you might not even know, but they know you very well and you are their favorite band and it doesn't hurt to try. The worst thing that can happen is you put this up and no one buys it. Who cares? You can market as sold out and say it's sold out, and people will think that it's been purchased.

[00:08:40] Bandhive 185-cm: cares? If you're worried about optics, you can market as sold out and people will say, okay, cool. It's sold out. Good for them. No one really cares though. the only person who should care about this is you. And as long as you're not making it some slimy scummy offer, it's gonna be a good deal for both you and your fans who book it because you're providing these lasting [00:09:00] memories.

[00:09:00] Bandhive 185-cm: You're providing them with an exclusive merch bundle people who purchased v I P on this tour, or even if you're doing a one-off show, you can offer this. Now, before you jump in and start doing this, I do want to talk about some of the challenges and best practices for any V I P program. The first thing is coordination.

[00:09:18] Bandhive 185-cm: You need to coordinate with anyone who's participating. Maybe if you're doing it at the venue instead of restaurant, you have to coordinate with the venue to make sure that they know, hey, there's gonna be a few people coming in before the show to meet us and hang out with us. It all comes down to communicating clearly and effectively with every single party involved.

[00:09:35] Bandhive 185-cm: So if you're gonna go to a restaurant, maybe it's a Friday night, you know, find out if they take reservations because maybe for seven people, let's say it's a four piece band, plus three guests, you might need reservations for a seven person table. next thing is scheduling. A lot of times bands don't know their schedule until a week or two before, But you can't go out there and schedule things on that specific day until you know about loading times, set times, all that. So you need to be able to [00:10:00] quickly schedule with your fans the times that you're gonna have those meals or those experiences, because guess what? If you have a 4:00 PM load in and a 7:00 PM set, that doesn't leave you that much time. You have maybe an hour to go to the restaurant, meet with your fan, hang out, and then go back to the show.

[00:10:15] Bandhive 185-cm: It's very important to make sure that you can actually fit this in. Maybe you have to say, Hey, we're gonna do this after our set. but. Having that scheduling in place, making sure you're able to do it quickly, and then communicating it to your fans who've purchased this experience is so important.

[00:10:30] Bandhive 185-cm: The next thing is ensuring a valuable experience, because if somebody pays a hundred dollars and they don't feel valued, That's gonna leave a bad taste in their mouth. so you wanna make sure that when you're interacting with them, you're not just off on your phone doing random things, even if it's business.

[00:10:45] Bandhive 185-cm: You focus that time you're spending with your fans on those people. There is no excuse for somebody paying you a hundred dollars and then you just ignore them. So be sure to have an active, engaged conversation. maybe one of your band mates is shy. That's [00:11:00] fine. But be sure that your other band mates make up for it.

[00:11:03] Bandhive 185-cm: you can help kind of prod that shy band mate into conversation by saying like, Hey, yeah, you know this funny story about John. Like, John, go ahead and tell it. And then John has a prompt and can tell that story. It all depends on the dynamics of your band and how the conversation is going.

[00:11:18] Bandhive 185-cm: If your fan is just talking and talking and talking, that's fine. Be an active listener, try to remember some of these things that they're saying so that way when you see them again, you can remember, oh yeah, that story that you told when we were hanging out at dinner, I remember that.

[00:11:30] Bandhive 185-cm: That was so cool. they're gonna feel so special because you remembered them. and then last but not least, communication with fans. It's. Quite likely that some people might see this and say, you're not famous. Why are you doing this? And it's quite simple. Well, because we're an independent band and we believe that we get to meet every single one of our fans, we wanna do that.

[00:11:49] Bandhive 185-cm: But if you wanna sit down and have a meal with us, you are welcome to do that. And that's why we have this. Plus you get this huge merch bundle that comes with it. So, It's not really a money maker for [00:12:00] us. We're breaking even at best, and we are still absolutely welcoming any single person who wants to meet us to come to the merch table and we'll have a conversation with you.

[00:12:08] Bandhive 185-cm: We're not saying that we're not gonna talk to people outside of this. Anybody can come talk to us, but if you want to get to the next level have this shared experience over a meal, please feel free to sign up. We know it's not for everyone, but we're giving it a shot because we want to be able to go out there and make the best connection possible with our fans.

[00:12:28] Bandhive 185-cm: And the only time we can really do that is over a meal. So why don't you join us for a meal. We'll give you this merch pack, we'll cover your meal. It's all included in this. Whatever price you set, please feel free to do that. And if it's not for you, that's fine. We get it. Just stop on by the merch booth and we'll talk to you there and we'll have a good time anyway

[00:12:44] Bandhive 185-cm: That's not to say that any single v i p package you do as an independent artist has to be over a meal. That's just an idea I'm throwing out there. I would not recommend doing a, we only meet people who pay us type deal. If you're not selling that many tickets, that's just not a great look.

[00:12:59] Bandhive 185-cm: bigger levels. I [00:13:00] get it. If you're playing to a thousand people, yeah. Meeting even 50 can be exhausting. So it makes sense. But if you're playing to. 50 to a hundred people and you have maybe 10 or 20 fans in the room you don't need that. You can meet every single person in that room and you can spend a minute or two with them.

[00:13:14] Bandhive 185-cm: It's not gonna take you that long. But if you want to go the extra mile and make something unique, by all means go for it. Maybe you can do laser tag with them. That would actually be really fun. fans versus band laser tag match, like that's just cool. People are gonna love that. They're gonna enjoy it.

[00:13:29] Bandhive 185-cm: You can do activities with your fans and bundle it into these V I P experiences, and it's not gonna seem scummy or scammy because they aren't getting an actual service that you have to pay for as well as spending time with you. So take a look at it cause I think this might be something to consider.

[00:13:46] Bandhive 185-cm: Now if you wanna truly master this, you have to think about the benefits for both your fans and for you. So obviously for fans, the benefit is the merch bundle and insider access. They get to have that direct access to you and your band mates.[00:14:00] But for you, it's you get to know your fans, you get to know what makes them tick.

[00:14:03] Bandhive 185-cm: You get to know what they feel, why they like your music. This is as much an opportunity for you to learn about your fans as it is for your fans to learn about you. Now, of course there is a financial incentive here. Like I said, if you can break even and get some meals paid for, that's absolutely fantastic.

[00:14:18] Bandhive 185-cm: I'm all for that. But that's not the primary driver at this level. At this level, you are just trying to make sure that you have time to go sit down on those fans and you have that time set aside for them. They are getting value and you are getting value. Now, let's just stop you from just having a meal with fans.

[00:14:34] Bandhive 185-cm: Nothing but. Why not see if maybe a fan will pay for that. And again, it's not just the meal. They're getting a bundle. So that's their selling point, is you get to hang out with us for a whole meal. It's not just a few minutes, it's not just a photo, it's a whole meal. And you get this bundle too. Now all of this has to be planned out in advance.

[00:14:52] Bandhive 185-cm: You have to announce this well before your tour happens. You really, ideally, you want to be able to announce it right when the tour goes on sale. [00:15:00] But no matter what, plan it out in advance and try to follow the same rhythm, the same schedule for every show. That's not gonna be possible, but stick to the same rhythm as closely as you can so you don't have any unexpected surprises when it comes to running these meet and greets or v i P events.

[00:15:15] Bandhive 185-cm: You can do so many creative things. I've just shared two examples. you have laser tag, you have the dinner you can do, go-karting, whatever it is, find something fun and unique that will let you bond with your fan base, and they will remember that For years to come. You can even take props, use unique items whenever it is. Do something that is on brand for you to make it more valuable for your fans. Now, when it comes to pricing and promotion, it's a tough call. Like I said, I think a hundred dollars is fair for a merch pack and an included dinner because Because really that's a break even point depending on how much merch you give them. And you're probably gonna have dinner at a slightly nicer restaurant with your fans than you would if you're just out with your band. You might get fast food or Subway or something like that, Subway is fast [00:16:00] food, but you get what I'm saying.

[00:16:01] Bandhive 185-cm: But if you're sitting down for nice meal with fans, maybe you'll go to that, you know, local, family owned restaurant, something like that. You do something a little more personable where you can have more of a conversation and not feel like, oh yeah, we're just having cheap food. We're at McDonald's or Burger King, or whatever.

[00:16:14] Bandhive 185-cm: Then as far as marketing, the more exclusive you make it, the easier it is to sell. Because if you say, Hey, this is only limited to like two people, or three people, or five people, tops. It seems more exclusive and people get the idea that, Hey, we're really getting value out of this because only a few people can do this.

[00:16:30] Bandhive 185-cm: Whereas if you don't put a limit on it, then people just think, oh yeah, we're gonna have dinner and there's gonna be 30 people and you know, no one's gonna really know what's going on. That's no fun. Don't do that. Talk to people, show them what this is. Don't be afraid to message people directly if they've been interacting and they seem really excited about a show, message them, see what they say. Hey, you know we have this offer. We would love to see if you're interested. You get this merch bundle and you get to go to dinner with us. It's totally paid for, so this is what you pay. there's no additional cost. We cover your meal, we cover the merch [00:17:00] bundle, we cover the tip.

[00:17:00] Bandhive 185-cm: All of that is included. Would you be interested? they'll say, nah, I'm not really interested. Maybe they'll say, yeah, I would love to do that. Worst case scenario, they say no and they show up to your show and say, Cool. Great show. Thanks again for the invite. I just didn't have the money. Then you can say, no worries at all.

[00:17:16] Bandhive 185-cm: Happy to chat with you for a few minutes here. Just hang out and get to know you. Thank you for coming to our show. By the way, There's so many things you can do to keep people happy, even outside of any exclusive events like this. last but not least, remind people that you're offering these experiences.

[00:17:29] Bandhive 185-cm: You might not sell any right away. But by continuously reminding people that you do have these experiences available, that's how you're gonna end up selling. You can't just put something out there once and expect it to sell. You have to remind people. It's called promotion. You have to promote, just like you promote your shows or you should be promoting your shows, you have to do the same thing for any product.

[00:17:47] Bandhive 185-cm: product.

[00:17:48] Bandhive 185-cm: You have half.

[00:17:49] Bandhive 185-cm: That does it for this episode of the Bandhive Podcast. Thank you so much for tuning in listening. I really appreciate it. I hope that this episode has given you some ideas into how you can use V I P packages as an independent artist, even if [00:18:00] you're only selling a few tickets per show.

[00:18:01] Bandhive 185-cm: So do me a favor, head on over to the Bandhive community. You can find it by going to Bandhive.rocks/group or searching for Bandhive on Facebook and There will be a thread for this episode to discuss your thoughts on v I P packages as an independent artist.

[00:18:16] Bandhive 185-cm: So please hop on over there and share your thoughts. I want to hear what you're thinking. have you tried this? If not, are you going to, what were your takeaways from this episode? And what do you think would work really well for a year band?

[00:18:29] Bandhive 185-cm: Give us a shout cause I'm really curious to know. We'll be back next Tuesday at 6:00 AM Eastern Time, right here in your favorite podcast app. Until then, I hope you have a great week. Stay safe and of course, as always, keep rocking.