We had an author event at my library last night.
Thirty-one (31) people were booked in.
Thirteen (13) showed up. That's right less than 50% of those who had gone to the trouble of booking actually showed up.
Even for my branch this is very disappointing statistic.
At my last author event 37 out of 55 showed up - which as a tad disappointing as we were telling people it was booked out (room capacity = 50)
Whilst last night was a higher no show rate (% wise) - it shows a general trend - the no show rate at my branch is significantly higher than at the other branches.
So my questions to you are:
1. What are we doing wrong?
2. How can we improve our booking to audience ratio?
I should add that I sent an email reminder to those people who had booked online.
Do we ring everyone who has booked to remind them? (I'm somewhat anti this as it would be time consuming)
Do we issue tickets?
Do we make a nominal charge for our events?
Our events are free (and we offer light refreshments).
From an organisers point of view last night was disheartening. Just thinking of the staff time and effort that went into organising the event, promoting the event, organising a bookseller to sell copies of the authors books, catering, ...
Nevertheless the 13* people who did show up last night got to meet and hear a very interesting internationally renowned, young, successful, Australian, author talk about how he writes, what he writes, and why he writes.
It's a shame more people weren't there to hear him speak. He was certainly an interesting and inspiring speaker. (I'm almost tempted to dust off ye olde manuscript...)
* of the 13, three were members of the authors family but they had booked...
6 comments:
What you are doing wrong is allowing the flu to strike down people who had signed up to come. Unfortunately, this particular strain of the flu, when it strikes down said people and their whole families, also affects memory and so sometimes people are too sick to come and then forget to call to say so.
Very sorry :-( I should know better.
I didn't even realise you were booked in... You missed a great evening - I catered up a storm!
This is exactly why we canceled the Hawthorn Historical Society talk this coming Wednesday: we had 8 bookings and on the sort of past practice you are talking about 2 would turn up. I think this time of the year is bad with Spring Racing Carnival, Flu and bronchitis, Melbourne Festival, Fringe etc
What I find really frustrating is people go to all the trouble of booking - then don't show up.
Anecdotally BL has a higher no-show rate than other branches which makes it even more disheartening - despite rumours to the contrary I do put a lot of thought/work into organising these events, we all do but sometimes it just seems like a waste.
I know it is disappointing and frustrating but I don't think there is an answer - except that we expect a certain % not to turn up.
BTW do you read Dennis Lehane? A friend just put me onto him. I have only read first book of his PI series and part of a book of short stories. I think he's a bit too black and blood and guts 4 me but he certainly writes well and great at giving sense of place and locational atmosphere (if these are not the same).
I love Lehane - he's one of the few crime authors to give me nightmares with a single well written sentence (ie: no excess blood & gore)
His early stuff is dark - more recently he's going thru a clint eastwood (western) phase which I don't enjoy as much.
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