thinking about trying to get a part time job

[djdave01]

if this years going to be like last year, and the first few months are very quite disco wise, im thinking about trying for a part time job. As well as to suppliment my DJ income, it'll give me something to do.

to keep the weekends & evenings free for gigs, i'd be looking at a daytime job but, im concerned id lose out on some discos. I tend to get quite a few enquires during the day and i know, from experiance, that clients often wont leave a message on a machine.

This question is aimed mainly at DJ's with daytime jobs. Do you often lose gigs due to your daytime job?

Cheers

Dave

[Leicester Ben]

I would imagine that DJs with day jobs don't realise that they have lost any jobs as they were not there jobs in the first place.

Clients like to call and get an answer, if they phone 3 DJs and the first 2 don't answer but the third does answer and dosent balls up the call then the chances are that dj 3 will get the job and the first 2 will just have a missed call on the phone each!

[surround sounds]

I got a very flexible job, as long as I do 40 hours a week Monday to friday it's fine. Guess I am lucky really in that sense. Do I need my full time job? Maybe no because I Dj at least twice a week plus dancefloors, balloons and I pass work on to my regular djs. I also think will my website I get a lot of enquiries so I can afford to pick my jobs within reason. Although I do a lot of hours with 2 jobs and that's not good

[DeckstarDeluxe]

"early bird catches the worm" and "when the tough get going" are two sayings that spring to mind instantly.

Having done both I can safely say working for someone else doesn't appeal at all to me right now. I am also experiencing a small increase year on year for both volume and turnover. Just because we have a recession doesn't mean you can't grow and progress.

Question is do you have the stomach to look at your business and review everything top to bottom? Why not diverse (like I have) into other similar areas such as lighting, equipment hire, staging etc..

[STEVE HANLEY]

The last job I was in you weren't allowed to use your mobile at work. So I kept it on vibrate in my shirt pocket. Would then try and sneak outside to return the call. Sometimes that could be up to an hour later:Censored::Censored: Needless to say when I did return the call. A lot of the time the job was gone. I lost a lot of jobs through that. Hence the reason I packed it in.

[hammy]

I`m a lorry driver so can answer my phone anytime (earpiece in), For the email enquiries they all come to my phone as well so can reply as well, So in answer to th OP`s question, No I dont lose any jobs.

[DeckstarDeluxe]

I`m a lorry driver so can answer my phone anytime (earpiece in), For the email enquiries they all come to my phone as well so can reply as well, So in answer to th OP`s question, No I dont lose any jobs.


You can't tell me you can drive safely and give enough concentration to someone on the phone to discuss the details of their event? (this isn't a dig at you but I know I can't do both correctly)

[Jonathan Ford]

I suppose one of the questions you need to consider is how many of your bookings come by phone? For me, I rarely get a telephone enquiry, so not answering the phone during the day doesn't bother me. Having said that, I can rarely answer the phone - but I do return any missed calls. Personally, if I need the money, I'd rather have a part-time, stable, secure income than risk missing the opportunity to answer a telephone call.

[hammy]

You can't tell me you can drive safely and give enough concentration to someone on the phone to discuss the details of their event? (this isn't a dig at you but I know I can't do both correctly)

That is because your not a professional driver Neil, I have been for 24 years, Yes I can concentrate enough, no I cant take down details or remember them after chatting I get them to put all the details into the get a quote tab on website.

[chrisj]

You can't tell me you can drive safely and give enough concentration to someone on the phone to discuss the details of their event? (this isn't a dig at you but I know I can't do both correctly)

My son is HGV1 driver 19 years old and he says he is always talking with mates, other drivers and the base as he is driving 40 ton artics.

I cannot concentrate on my driving if I have to answer the phone but most of the time I am home as I am a full timer. I just have to stop practicing my kids magic tricks to answer the phone or reply to email enquiries.

If I worked for someone daytime I would have missed 8 email enquiries today but then I have not been booked by any of them yet. I do get few enquiries by phone.

Too old to go back to working daytime.

[djdave01]

I suppose one of the questions you need to consider is how many of your bookings come by phone? For me, I rarely get a telephone enquiry, so not answering the phone during the day doesn't bother me. Having said that, I can rarely answer the phone - but I do return any missed calls. Personally, if I need the money, I'd rather have a part-time, stable, secure income than risk missing the opportunity to answer a telephone call.



At the moment, around 50% of enquiries come in by phone. By coinsedance, i had two phone enquires this afternoon, one of which has booked with me.

While the money would be helpful just now, once we get back to a normal level of gigs, it wont be important. Part of the reason for this is that im getting bored stuck at home all day, while the wifes out at work. Once the houseworks done and ive walked the dog theres not much else to do.

Ive been a full time DJ for over 10 years. The novelty of being home all day is wearing thin.

[DeckstarDeluxe]

At the moment, around 50% of enquiries come in by phone. By coinsedance, i had two phone enquires this afternoon, one of which has booked with me.

While the money would be helpful just now, once we get back to a normal level of gigs, it wont be important. Part of the reason for this is that im getting bored stuck at home all day, while the wifes out at work. Once the houseworks done and ive walked the dog theres not much else to do.

Ive been a full time DJ for over 10 years. The novelty of being home all day is wearing thin.

Dave, I've been full time for coming up three years.....I can say I've never been bored.....Look at new ways to promote your business. Have you tried blogging? getting together a decent facebook page? Use twitter to interact with other wedding suppliers, tweak the website...

[WWDJ]

I work full time and also have a young daughter and noisy dog. I guess my point here is that I am rarely in the position to answer the phone correctly to a potential customer.

Around 75% of my work comes from my website and the rest organically from people I know.

With this in mind I decided not to have my phone number on my website at all. Since people often don't want to leave a message it seemed easier to let them contact me via a simple form on the website, since they found via the internet, why would they want to them pick up the phone.

My prices are transparent on my website (competitive with average wedding DJ prices) so the customer has an expectation of price, so I rarely get the 'how much' or 'DJ x quoted me £xxx' emails.

On the whole most enquiries are genuine business asking about availability, so simple diary check allows me to ascertain whether i am available and reply.

My commitment is that I reply within 24 hours at most, usually much quicker, which seems to please many customers as I get the impression they struggle to get replies from some DJ's.

If the customer wants to speak to me by phone I arrange a mutually convenient time when it is quiet to talk, and all customers who decided to work with me get my phone numbers if they they need to talk to me at any point before the function.

Works for me :)

[musicologydisco]

Same as above. Full time job, can take calls (although most work comes via internet) As far as I can make out I haven't lost a single gig as a result of working full time.

[Solitaire Events Ltd]

How do your day time job bosses feel about you using their time to take calls for your own end then?

I know if I employed someone, I would want them concentrating 100% on what I pay them to do.

[WWDJ]

How do your day time job bosses feel about you using their time to take calls for your own end then?

I know if I employed someone, I would want them concentrating 100% on what I pay them to do.

... Another reason why I don't take calls ...

[musicologydisco]

Same as above. Full time job, can take calls (although most work comes via internet) As far as I can make out I haven't lost a single gig as a result of working full time.

I am very lucky with my job as I am a driver so I just pull over to take the call. It's not as if I take very many calls anyway as most gigs come via email which I can deal with at lunchtime then again in the evening. Also, because I put all my info on my website including prices, the calls I do get are very brief as I am usually just taking down the details of the booking because they are simply calling to book me.

[DazzyD]

if this years going to be like last year, and the first few months are very quite disco wise, im thinking about trying for a part time job. As well as to suppliment my DJ income, it'll give me something to do.

to keep the weekends & evenings free for gigs, i'd be looking at a daytime job but, im concerned id lose out on some discos. I tend to get quite a few enquires during the day and i know, from experiance, that clients often wont leave a message on a machine.

This question is aimed mainly at DJ's with daytime jobs. Do you often lose gigs due to your daytime job?

Cheers

Dave

Simple, short answer is "Yes" although I can't give any indication to the frequency of this happening. I'm not in a position to be able to leave the day job just yet but I do have some long-term plans!

[Mark Wild]

If you're running a successful business (full time) which can be some what 'seasonal', don't you prepare yourself financially for the quieter months? My January/February is far from good, but I knew this was coming and budgeted from good months accordingly. Maybe up your deposit fee as bookings Jan/Feb are pretty good normally?

[ukpartydj]

I personally use the quieter months to improve my business ready for the year ahead on my to-do list for the next 2 months are -

Update website with slightly altered new design
Check all my book keeping ready to submit tax return
Adjust booking form to gather more useful information
Re-word T&Cs
Submit entry to competition
Create promotional video
Build new custom podium's for setup (working on it currently).
Buy new lighting
Sell old gear
Clean all equipment (hardly ever do this) and repair some cables.
Get signwriting done for van
organise new locks to be put onto van
look over advertising plan for the upcoming year.

No doubt I will not complete all of this in the next 2 months (especially if I keep coming on here insted of working :)) but as you can see it's plenty to be getting on with and I could never do this and have another job!

[DeckstarDeluxe]

As Ben mentioned earlier you may not "lose" any jobs but you certainly aren't going to gain any if your energy are spent elsewhere working for a fairly low wage for someone else....I pay roadies/event staff £10 p/h which is more than I was on in my full time day job!

To put some figures out there as P/T I was charging £225 and getting maybe 25/30 jobs, last year I was nearly double that with three times the volume......

[djdave01]

If you're running a successful business (full time) which can be some what 'seasonal', don't you prepare yourself financially for the quieter months? My January/February is far from good, but I knew this was coming and budgeted from good months accordingly. Maybe up your deposit fee as bookings Jan/Feb are pretty good normally?


Normally, a very busy December would provide enough cash for the quiet Jan/Feb period, unfortunatly my December was crap. Although i worked most Friday & Saturdays i hardly did any kids parties and had no mid week adult events. The hotel i had worked in the previous year chose to go with a cheaper disco. I did more birthday parties in December than christmas parties.

Although bookings are coming in, there mostly for March onwards, but unless i quote quite low, im not getting the bookings.

20 years ago, the guy i was working for was charging £130 for a night, now im lucky to get £180. Im aware that some DJ's round here are quoting £140 or less :mad: