15 Terrific Nightclub Marketing Ideas

A successful nightclub comes about because of reputation and image. Revenues might come because you sell drinks and cover charges to see hot live music, but you won’t make any money if people aren’t coming through your doors. Your marketing efforts need to be focused on making people feel like they’re getting an exclusive experience every time they come to your club for a good time.

Being open and honest about the experience someone will receive when they visit your club is a good place to start. If you provide a high level of perceived value that isn’t backed up by a fantastic experience, then you’ll have a customer who will never come back and will tell all their friends about how lousy you are.

Good Nightclub Marketing Ideas to Increase Customers

1. Your most powerful message will come from happy customers, so make sure the ambiance of your club provides a unique experience that will have people wanting to come back as soon as possible. From the music you play to the live entertainment you might have to the lighting, if you create a feeling of exclusivity, you’ll create loyalty.

2. Host plenty of events throughout the year outside of your normal operating hours so that you can have target groups that might normally not come to your club experience your atmosphere.

3. Have nights that focus on just one of your target demographics so that this particular group feels special and will want to come out on that particular night. Give that targeted group special prices or no cover charge and you’ll create a foundation of loyalty. Ladies’ nights are a classic, but you could do everything from a local band contest to an open mic night and find success.

4. Build relationships with other businesses in the area so that you can cross-promote each other and drive traffic through everyone’s doors. A classic example of this is to partner with a limousine company to provide exclusive transportation to and from your nightclub. You could partner with a local catering company to provide exclusive snacks. The ideas in this area are only bound by your imagination.

5. Use your marketing budget to sponsor certain events in your community that will drive further awareness. If there’s a golf tournament held annually that raises money for a good cause, consider sponsoring a hole. Anything that helps kids achieve is always a good way to reach their parents. Just remember that your sponsorship needs to make sense for your target audience – sponsoring church camp might not be as welcomed as sponsoring a softball team.

6. Drop the traditional advertisement methods and let your marketing staff hit the streets. A 1-on-1 interaction with a potential customer is always better than a headline in a newspaper. Use your promotional products, like stickers, to put small reminders of your community presence everywhere.

7. The more you surprise someone, the more likely you are to get them wanting to come to your club. That might mean needing to amp up your creativity levels to eleven, but that effort will pay off every night as people come through your door.

8. Promote your strengths every single time because that is what makes your nightclub unique. Whether it is your ability to come up with creative, tasty drinks or have a packed dance floor because you have a great sound system and staff DJ, that’s what will drive people through your doors: your uniqueness factor. Custom names for drinks is a place to start, but make sure your custom drink provides a custom experience.

9. Sell lots of complimentary products for your nightclub because that will help to extend your brand throughout the community. Think about creating designs for t-shirts, hats, sweatshirts, and even shot glasses. If it can be safely sold from behind the bar, someone will buy it if it looks cool and that’s advertising that pays for itself.

10. Get extremely active on social media because this will help people share information about your promotions with all of their friends and help them plan a fun night out. Create cool graphics that put your message out there in a catchy way and people will be quick to post this image to their newsfeeds.

11. Solicit people for their cell numbers, so that you can begin a text messaging campaign. Offer exclusive deals through this campaign to help encourage people to sign up. Why focus on SMS texts? Because most texts are answered within 90 seconds and the open rates of some campaigns are nearly 100%. That’s marketing power right there.

12. Email campaigns are a good way to help keep in touch with people, but they aren’t so successful in driving overall traffic. Don’t put all of your eggs into this basket because even the best campaigns only have an open rate of 20%. Use it to communicate fun info, provide people with a good time for a few moments as they read the email, and maybe offer special promotions. That will be the best way to utilize this campaign.

13. Get people involved with your promotions by allowing them to offer suggestions and this will create a sense of loyalty and ownership to the concept. If you get a particularly good idea, considering offering prizes or other items of value to the customer who provided it and those good vibes will resound throughout your entire customer base and likely spur even more creativity from those who’d love a similar reward.

14. Create a VIP club for people to invest in themselves. Going to a nightclub can be tough sometimes because of a long queue and a packed bar. With a VIP table, ways to bypass the line, and other perks, you may just find that some people are willing to pay a little more to get a better overall experience.

15. Offer incentives for online reviews to further enhance your reputation. A free drink, bypassing the cover charge, and other small rewards are a great way to get people to leave positive, public feedback about you.