How to Use CRM Templates for DJ Contracts, Brochures, and Proposals

What Is a CRM and Why DJ Businesses Need One

A CRM — client relations manager — is software that lets you manage all your clients and send templates in just a few clicks.

There are tons of them out there. DJ Event Planner is one of them. You've got Clover Book, and then there's HoneyBook, which is the one used for the examples in this post.

What a CRM allows you to do is have all sorts of templates and the ability to send those templates to clients within a few clicks. You can categorize all your clients, and beyond that you can send a client a contract specific to them in like two clicks because you have it set up in a template. Same thing with an invoice, same thing with a brochure.

The Process of Getting a New Client: Start With a Brochure

The first thing you're going to do with a new client is send them some sort of brochure, because they're going to want to know your pricing and what you offer.

Inside HoneyBook's template section you'll find invoices, contracts, proposals, brochures, questionnaires, packages, and lots of email templates to make communication even easier. There are a few different brochures worth setting up:

• A general events brochure
• A weddings add-ons only brochure
• A wedding DJ only brochure
• A wedding full brochure showing DJing and add-ons

The pricing is left out of the brochure intentionally. Pricing should be relative to your area. Pricing is different all across America and you should be basing it on what's the going rate in your area.

Once you have your brochure set up, it takes like two clicks to send it to a client. You get a new lead, you put them in HoneyBook, you click new file, send brochure. HoneyBook makes that super easy, and it produces a nice clean looking brochure that's laid out in a nice clean fashion.

You can customize this. You can add pictures, you can add elements — different column tags, images, left align. You can customize these to your liking.

How to Book a Client: Invoice, Contract, or Proposal

After you've sent a client a brochure, the next logical step is you meet with them, pitch them, sell them, and now it's time to book them.

You can do it multiple different ways. You can just send them a general invoice and a general contract, and there are templates in HoneyBook for both of those. But the preferred option is to send them a proposal.

The Invoice Section of a Proposal

The first page of the proposal is your invoice, and you can add any item into it very simply.

As you start using the software, every time you create an invoice or proposal it's going to save that entry. So if you create one that says uplighting at $225 with a description for five up lights, it saves that. Then you can pull it up later.

You can also go into templates and there's an area for packages with pre-made packages already set up — the Essential Package, the Love Story Package, the Signature Package. All of these are already pre-made so you can just add them in very easily to the invoice to make things as quick as possible.

Even if you don't have packages pre-set, it's super simple to go in and type a description, add a photo from your library, put in a quantity, set hours, type in your price, apply a tax if needed, and put a discount at the bottom. That is your invoice.

The Scheduled Payments Section

You can create basically whatever payment structure you want for the client, and you can save this as a payment template.

You click on the amount, set a custom amount or percentage — divided equal to percentages is the most commonly used. You can describe when payments are due based on the invoice date, the project date, a fixed date, or a custom date, and you can do as many payments as you want.

A common structure looks like this:

• $300 deposit due on the day of signing
• 50% of invoice due one month before the project date
• Remainder due two weeks before the project date

You set this up once in a template and it's ready to go every time.

The Contract Section

The client contract sits inside the same proposal, and all the fields automatically generate the client's information.

You set up fields like project location and client full name so they automatically populate into the contract. You really never have to go in and tweak the contract unless there's a specific reason. Your payment structure is there, your client contract is already there, and your invoice is already there.

All you have to do is put in the little details on the invoice and click send, and they have a complete invoice and contract ready to sign.

What the Client Sees When They Receive a Proposal

When you send the proposal, the client receives an email with a View Proposal link that walks them through everything in sequence.

At the top they see the invoice. They can look through the package details. Below that are the scheduled payments laid out clearly. If they like what they see, they click Continue to Contract.

As the client, they can review the contract and see highlighted fields they need to fill out — their initials and full name. It won't let them proceed until those are completed. At the bottom they click the signature field and an electronic signature is generated for them.

After they've signed the contract, it takes them directly to the payment window. They can enter their credit card, defer and send a check or cash, or pay via PayPal. Once they do it right there, their payment is done.

When they enter their credit card the first time, they can actually set it to auto pay at those next two payment intervals. That is really, really cool.

How HoneyBook Handles Payment Reminders Automatically

HoneyBook takes care of notifying clients when their payments are due, so you never have to chase them down.

It notifies them three days before the payment is due. It notifies them the day it's due. And if they don't pay on the day it's due, it also reminds them again.

Since using HoneyBook, there has never been a missed client payment. When it sends that reminder email, it says click here to pay and brings them straight to the credit card window.

Back on the home screen, you get notified that the project has been signed, so you can then go in as the DJ and sign the contract as well.

Other Templates Worth Knowing About

HoneyBook includes several other template types beyond brochures and proposals that are worth being aware of.

Questionnaires are available but not something heavily used day to day — potentially useful for a review template down the line. Packages are used actively to store all pricing schemes.

Contact forms are available to embed on your website. And with 104 email templates set up, combined with workflows, the system handles automated follow-up entirely on its own. Workflows is a super, super, super powerful thing — it's basically automated email systems implemented into HoneyBook to take care of follow-up for you.

Summary: The Full Client Booking Process Using CRM Templates