If you own or manage a venue, you know just how important it is to maintain a steady stream of income. One slow week can negatively impact your earnings and profit margins. If you don't find a way to stabilize revenue, it will become more challenging for your venue to meet its financial obligations.
A great way to diversify your offerings and attract new customers is to consider planning multiple activities at your venue. Whether it's pickleball, open mic night, or private karaoke rooms - this is a great way to diversify your revenue streams and protect your venue from unwanted risks.
In this article, we'll discuss the dangers of relying on a single activity in your venue and explore different activities you can consider for your venue. Here's everything you need to know:
The perils of a one-trick pony
We get the appeal of being really good at one thing. But if you put all of your time and energy into one activity for your venue, you put yourself at risk of losing out on potential income. Many venues in the hospitality industry that put all their eggs into one basket are at risk of failing or having to close.
A great example would be the rise of public dance halls popularized in the United States between 1920 - 1940. During this time, La Monica Ballroom was once situated on the Santa Monica pier. When dance halls weren't popular, the dance hall was demolished and replaced by an amusement park. While this is an extreme example, this example shows how trends often dictate the success of a venue that only provides one single activity.
Instead of following the trends, look for ways to enhance your offerings. A great way to ensure your venue doesn't become a one-trick pony is to offer more than just one or two events and activities.
Building a resilient venue
The secret to building a resilient venue is finding a way to diversify your offerings to appeal to a large audience. The more people you can bring through the door, the more revenue and opportunities you'll see. The added activities work as a safety net, protecting you from unwanted slowdowns or changes in trends. By delivering diverse activities that offer competitive socializing opportunities, you can look forward to:
- Increased customer satisfaction
- Boost in revenue from additional revenue streams
- Attract a wider audience
- Improve your marketing initiatives
- Build connections in your community
A great example of a successful venue with multiple activities is All Star Lanes in The United Kingdom. This bowling alley decided to add karaoke rooms to their venues. Since adding 10 karaoke rooms across multiple venues, they've seen a 36% increase in just karaoke bookings. On average, they see around 88 hours of singing every week. This small revenue boost acts as a safety net for their business, helping them see an uptick in revenue while attracting new customers to their establishment.
Choosing the right activities
To succeed in diversifying your offering, you'll first need to find the right activities for your establishment. There are many great activities, events, and ideas to consider. Here's how you can narrow down your options:
Understand the power of competitive socializing
Competitive socializing brings people together. It encourages people to connect with friends, socialize, and enjoy themselves. Activities that tap into your competitive side will also appeal to a larger audience. It's also a great way to keep customers entertained, ensuring they stay at your establishment longer. When exploring the different options for your establishment, consider what games will ignite your customer's competitive side.
Research indicates that businesses providing competitive socializing have experienced year-over-year profitability gains, outperforming similar venues without such activities.
Explore the trends
Trends come and go. While we don't always recommend sticking to one trendy activity, it can be beneficial to incorporate them into your venue activties.
Instead of relying solely on a trend to keep your venue in business, consider how to use the trends to plan special occasions, themed nights, contests, and more. This is a great way to engage with customers without turning your establishment into another fad.
Consider your target audience
Your target audience's likes and interests should be the driving force for your decisions. When deciding what activities to incorporate during the weekdays or weekends, you'll want to ask yourself:
- Who is your current audience?
- What audience do you want to attract?
- What activities do you currently offer that your customers like?
- What do your competitors have that you don't?
- How can you retain customers with your activity offering?
To get started, consider doing a competitor analysis in your community. This way, you can find ways to mimic what works for them yourself.
Complement your existing offers
Consider how the other activities will complement your existing offerings. For example, All Star Lanes packages their karaoke with a bowling and dining package. At King Pins, they offer a discount on each additional activity booked, allowing people to engage in even more activities and games.
Assessing investment and operational requirements
To maximize your ROI, you'll want to pick activities worth the investment and won't cost you too much money. Once you narrow your search, you'll want to consider the set-up and maintenance costs. Ensure the pricing doesn't break the bank or keep you from reaching your financial goals. You may need to go through some trial and error to ensure the activities are profitable before you commit to offering them regularly. Other things to consider include:
- Software and tools needed for the activity
- Marketing materials
- Training and paying staff
- Space and time
Implementing a multi-activity strategy
Once you know what activities you want to add, it's time to start strategizing. Everything you decide to do should work together to provide a seamless customer experience. To get started, you'll want to start by:
Marketing and promotion
If customers are not aware of the new offerings then they will likley not get used. Marketing is vital to the success of your new activities. You'll want to use printouts, email marketing, social media marketing, and paid advertising to get the word out about your new activities. You'll also want to reward current customers with special deals and offers to entice them to return.
Training staff
Once you decide on the new activities, you must train your team and prepare them to answer customer questions or concerns. Depending on the different activities you offer, you may need to train your staff to answer specific questions or use software. Getting your employees up to speed will help you achieve a seamless customer experience.
Monitor performance
Once you've started offering the different activities, you'll need to measure the success of the performance and the return on investment. Are your customers staying longer? Are they booking activities in advance? Are you seeing a healthy increase in revenue?
Monitoring performance gives you the chance to pivot if necessary or adjust your approach if you aren't seeing your desired results.
It may take some trial and error to find what works best for your venue. Be patient and enjoy the experience. Once you crack the code - you can look forward to healthy profits and happy customers.
Top three activities for hospitality venues
There are various competitive socializing-centric activities you can consider for your venue. Here are three of the top options:
- Private Karaoke Rooms: The perfect source of entertainment. Private karaoke rooms provide an intimate space for friends and family members to get together to sing. This activity can help increase food and school sales. You'll also see a healthy increase in revenue from the bookings.
- Mini Golf: If you have enough space in your establishment, mini golf is a great option to explore. It's a profitable option for family-friendly establishments. However, it also comes with higher set-up and maintenance costs.
- Darts/AR Darts: Darts are a low-cost activity with affordable set-up and maintenance costs. However, it's not the best "money maker" opportunity. There are now also AR darts, which add a modern spin on the bar classic.
- VR Headsets: VR transports customers to another world digitally, meaning you do not need to dedicate spaces soley to VR. While the equipment can be a pricier to star, it can be easily added to a party room in addition to other activities.
Check out The ultimate guide to choosing in-house entertainment for your hospitality venue.
Get set-up with Singa
If you want to add private karaoke rooms or karaoke nights, Singa is here to help. Singa for Business is an all-in-one karaoke software for businesses. With Singa , you can provide a next-level karaoke experiences for your customers. We have an always-growing library of karaoke songs and built-in features to improve the customer experience.
