If you are planning your big event and you want your dance-floor to be talk of the town, there are several considerations you should be made aware of to ensure your night is all it can be. The following 4 tips will ensure your dance-floor is a blast and talked about for sometime afterward:
The Size of your Dance-floor
Perhaps the most overlooked dancefloor consideration, the size your dancefloor, should be determined by the number and of those attending your event and their personalities. Ideally, your dancefloor is large enough to accommodate 60% of your event attendees as there are some people who will not dance no matter how great your event and others who will come and go from the dancefloor throughout the night.
What determines the appearance of a successful dancefloor is that it is close to full for most of your event. If the size of your dancefloor is too large, it will look bare even with most of your attendees dancing and often will cause them to dance less confidently or not at all. Whereas, if your dancefloor is too small it may not accommodate all your guests and if quite small some guests may wonder if dancing is expected at your event.
If, however you have already chosen your event location and your dancefloor is not the correct size for your event, you can often move tables and chairs to make a dancefloor of your desired size.
Lighting
Most people would rightly assume that disco lighting is needed to set a party mood but sometimes forget they should be almost the only source of light on your dancefloor. Your guests often feel self-conscious dancing when the dancefloor is well lit as they feel exposed whereas dimmer lighting allows them to feel more at ease on your dancefloor.
When considering the lighting of your dancefloor try to avoid having lights on or near your dancefloor if possible and avoid holding your dancefloor during day-time hours if possible.
Scheduling
If possible, there should be a set time when the dancefloor begins so guests are not confused and more importantly, to start your dancefloor off with a bang. During a wedding reception this time is ideally after the first dance as it can easily transition into inviting close friends and family onto the dancefloor, followed by the remaining event attendees.
However, other events can be more complicated but should follow a similar structure to a wedding reception; with the event’s formalities happening first allowing for the remaining 1-2 hours of the night dedicated to only dancing. This is for 2 reasons:
If the dancefloor is interrupted with formalities, it is often harder to get people back on then dance-floor than keeping them there.
Generally, your guest attendees will be more willing to dance towards the end of the night as they have been mingling for hours and will feel naturally more sociable and less self-conscious and of course, they may have been drinking.
Song Choices
While seemingly obvious, your song choices you for the night truly matter. The songs you choose should of course be good in terms of quality, but most importantly should consider who is attending your event, particularly in relation to their age and cultural background. Typically, the songs people like are reflective of the music they listened to during their youth or for a culture that they identified with during this time.
Given this, if you have a diverse crowd, for example at a wedding reception, a mix of genres and songs from multiple decades is perfect. Whereas if you have a crowd is less diverse, for example an 18th Birthday party, then just songs that the group will typically respond to is best.
It is important to not choose songs that only appeal to you. While it is your night, if your goal is to have a successful dancefloor then your guests need to be your main consideration. The only exception to this rule should be if you have a song of certain significance that should be played during the night, in which case, play it at the start of the night as it will likely go over better as a formality and not discourage those on the dancefloor later in the night.