If you have been doing booked shows for a while, you might be thinking of taking your career to the next step - booking and taking tours to grow your music’s reach further.

However, booking tours is no easy feat. There are several factors involved, and you have to make many complex decisions. Plus, there is the main limiting block of budget. Your band tour can only be as lavish as the funding you have to take the tour. If you don’t have a sponsor or a producer backing you up, you would have to work on a pretty tight budget.

All of these factors and more make it a complicated task to book tours if you have no idea about the process. So, here is a complete guide on how you can book tours as a metal band.

Booking Agents

The easiest and smoothest way to book a tour for your metal band is through a booking agent, such as the Booking Agent Info.

The booking agent will take care of everything — from dates and venue to logistics and accommodation. All you will have to do is prepare for the music gig and give an awesome performance on the tour. You can focus on what you do best while your booking agent focuses on what they do best.

A booking agent will even arrange the most important part of your tour — attracting local audiences via marketing. So, you will be saved from a lot of hassle by just contacting a booking agent.

Target Audience

Whether you get a booking agent or go about the process yourself, the first thing you need to decide on is the target audience. You won’t be able to fit all the cities in a single budget. So, research and see which markets are more suitable for your tour. The target cities are those in which the local people are aware of your music and will be attracted to buy tickets for your tour.

The Route for the Tour

While the target audience is a good layout of which cities you should choose for your tour, it might not be the most efficient route to take when figuring out the logistics of the tour.

Other than logistics, there is a possibility that you might not be able to get bookings in your desired places at the chosen time. Bigger cities have a larger audience, but it is harder to book a show, as the competition is tough with more famous bands taking up the music space.

You might be able to book a show in a small city relatively easily. The crowd is more niche here, but with the right target audience, you can put on a great show.

Another point to consider before deciding on a route is the time you would like to spend on the road per day. If you have to cover more cities in a short time, you will be driving a lot which can be stressful. So, you must know your stamina in terms of being on the road every day.

The route you choose doesn’t have to be rigidly fixed for the tour. You can take it as a rough draft and make changes as you go according to your timetable.

Date Selection

Now that you have the route, you need to decide on the dates for the tour. This can be one of the most stressful parts of the job, as you need to figure out dates during which the entire crew can be on the tour.

A tour is not done in a matter of a few days. You need at least 3-6 months depending on how long your route to tour with the band is. You must decide on the dates at least six months in advance as there are a lot of bookings to be made and several people to be contacted. The timeframe for the tour should be suitable enough so that the most audience will come, and you can get the desired venues.

Booking Local Venues

Booking venues is a very strategic decision. There are several places you could choose to play but not every place will be available or match the vibe of your music. Moreover, some of your shows might be small while the others might be planned as big ones.

For bigger shows, you need to book venues that are just the right size. If you book a place bigger than required, you might have to perform in an empty hall. On the other hand, if you book a place that is too small, you could end up losing sales, as people will be left waiting outside the hall.

You also need a venue that passes the vibe check and fulfills all your requirements. Add to it the fact that not all places will be available for booking at all times. In this case, a booking agent can help you out by taking care of the appropriate venue. They even know local promoters who can give you a close estimate of how many tickets will expectedly sell. This can help you save revenue.

Promotion for the Tour

Once you have all the logistics factors for your tour set up, you need to start promoting your tour and build up hype around it. One way is to do it yourself. There are several mediums you can use to promote your tour.

Make accounts on all popular social media channels and start posting about your upcoming events. Create hype by posting cool stuff. You can even post snippets of your music to give the audience a taste.

Use promotional offers like early-bird discounts and buy two get one free offer. You can even arrange online contests and give away free tickets or some other gifts to the winners. There are other channels for promotion as well besides social media. You can use them too.

Another option is to tie up with local promoters. They’ll handle the promotion of your events in their local areas. If you don’t know any local promoters, a booking agent can help and will handle getting local promoters for you.

The Backup Plan Planning a tour ahead of time and making sure everyone is on board take a lot of effort. But this is not where your effort ends. You might even have to face several cancellations right at the brink of time. This can leave you hanging high and dry with no other option.

To tackle this situation, you need to have a plan B on hand at all times. There are sites like Yelp, Craigslist, and even Google that can help you make last-minute bookings in case something gets canceled. Keep these handy.

If you have a booking agent, you can talk to them about having a backup plan ready in case something goes wrong.

Conclusion

When you are going on a tour, planning ahead of time and doing thorough research is the key. If you have ample time to plan, you can make more sane decisions by calmly weighing all your options. You might even be able to strike discount deals for early bookings.

You may also skip the whole mess and hire a booking agent to take care of everything. No matter which route you choose, make sure to give a great performance and rock the floor.