If you are a dancer I am sure that you, like us, want to belong to a vibrant and active dance community. I have been reading internet discussion groups to get ideas on this subject.
It is obvious from the postings from successful dance groups from around the world that frequent dances build up momentum and give improved results. We saw the same thing with the Merry Muse when it went weekly a long time ago, a big injection of vitality and regularity - people remembered it was on.
Here's a typical example from a discussion group: "The more dances there are, the bigger a dance community can or will grow. Places that have (or aspire to having) weekly dances seem to do much better at building their community and the skill levels of their dancers than places with less frequent dances. For one thing, it's a lot easier to become friends with your fellow dancers when you see them four times as often--and that's a big part of why I dance". There are lots of similar observations, but I've found no success stories arising from less frequent dances.
It's hard to get people started, but once they do there's no stopping them. They say things like "Best fun we ever had, why didn't someone tell us about this before", and they want to dance every night. They need frequent opportunities to dance or they'll lose that momentum and enthusiasm will flag.
Financially, consider that after an unpredictable time, but fixed for each person and out of our control, they will move on. They will grow old, suffer illness, have kids, move interstate, whatever. If you are getting $x per dance for a fixed number of years then the more dances you can provide in those years the more income from each hard-won customer before they move on and have to be replaced.
Promotion efforts are to a large extent fixed. It takes effort to put up posters and form relationships with various publicity contacts. To a large extent your publicity can be fixed if your events are regular, weekly dances being a fine example - you just need permanent publicity, you don't need to list dates etc. Having cranked up the promotional & organisational machine you may as well have enough dances to make all the effort worthwhile.
Bands want to play and callers want to practice calling. Frequent dances provide a lot more opportunities, especially for up and coming and scratch players. Twice the number of dances means twice the experience of the dancers, greater proficiency and less walkthroughs than for an occasional dance crowd.
If you are running dances at a profit then more dances means more profits. If you are running at a loss, then more dances gives you more chance to get the customers back and build up numbers. They are less likely to forget you and they are more likely to bring their friends if the previous great dance is still fresh in their minds and they perceive the activity as a mainstream popular activity.
And finally, many members seem to care about the discounts. More dances will mean more benefit from membership, and more members,
Success breeds success.
It is obvious from the postings from successful dance groups from around the world that frequent dances build up momentum and give improved results. We saw the same thing with the Merry Muse when it went weekly a long time ago, a big injection of vitality and regularity - people remembered it was on.
Here's a typical example from a discussion group: "The more dances there are, the bigger a dance community can or will grow. Places that have (or aspire to having) weekly dances seem to do much better at building their community and the skill levels of their dancers than places with less frequent dances. For one thing, it's a lot easier to become friends with your fellow dancers when you see them four times as often--and that's a big part of why I dance". There are lots of similar observations, but I've found no success stories arising from less frequent dances.
It's hard to get people started, but once they do there's no stopping them. They say things like "Best fun we ever had, why didn't someone tell us about this before", and they want to dance every night. They need frequent opportunities to dance or they'll lose that momentum and enthusiasm will flag.
Financially, consider that after an unpredictable time, but fixed for each person and out of our control, they will move on. They will grow old, suffer illness, have kids, move interstate, whatever. If you are getting $x per dance for a fixed number of years then the more dances you can provide in those years the more income from each hard-won customer before they move on and have to be replaced.
Promotion efforts are to a large extent fixed. It takes effort to put up posters and form relationships with various publicity contacts. To a large extent your publicity can be fixed if your events are regular, weekly dances being a fine example - you just need permanent publicity, you don't need to list dates etc. Having cranked up the promotional & organisational machine you may as well have enough dances to make all the effort worthwhile.
Bands want to play and callers want to practice calling. Frequent dances provide a lot more opportunities, especially for up and coming and scratch players. Twice the number of dances means twice the experience of the dancers, greater proficiency and less walkthroughs than for an occasional dance crowd.
If you are running dances at a profit then more dances means more profits. If you are running at a loss, then more dances gives you more chance to get the customers back and build up numbers. They are less likely to forget you and they are more likely to bring their friends if the previous great dance is still fresh in their minds and they perceive the activity as a mainstream popular activity.
And finally, many members seem to care about the discounts. More dances will mean more benefit from membership, and more members,
Success breeds success.
