One of the most common facets of any bar or club are bartenders.
Bartenders can make or break a customer's experience at any nightlife establishment, and bars and clubs will take great care to make sure that they are hiring the right bartenders to serve customers.
Particularly in Western culture, bartenders have a sort of lore about them.
Famous characters like Sam Malone from Cheers or Moe from The Simpsons portray the bartender has an important personality in the lives of all sorts of different characters.
The presence of famous fictional bartenders only further solidifies the concept that bartenders are a very important component of people's social lives when it comes to bars and other alcohol-serving establishments.
When it comes to people being larger than life and leaning into self-promotion, there is probably no city more alive with compelling personalities than Los Angeles.
Here at promo panda, we are constantly meeting all sorts of people who push the limit of what their role is.
In LA, you can school teachers with top-ranked YouTube channels, garbage men with popular blogs in which they discuss the finer points of waste management, and more.
Bartending too is a profession in which people can promote themselves in a way that benefits not only their actual bartending but their career in general.
Many bartenders (and this goes for most people in any other occupation for that matter) may think that their main role is simply to tend their bar.
Sure, it can help to be friendly to customers and ensure that they have a good experience, but a lot of bartenders just think of what they do as making drinks. No more, no less.
The reality is that there is a light to be gained by promoting yourself as a bartender. Not only can the right kind of promotion benefit you personally, but they can also greatly benefit the establishment you work at.
We've put together this guide on how to promote yourself as a bartender for those of you who are interested and being the best bartenders that you can possibly be. We have seen many big-time bartenders in Los Angeles use these tips to make real careers for themselves in ways a lot of regular bartenders would never even think possible.
If you're looking to promote yourself as a bartender, follow these tips:
Most bartenders will tell you that an important part of the job is being able to talk with customers and make them feel comfortable.
The most successful bartenders we've seen take this step one step further and create characters for themselves that they inhabit while on the job.
No, I don't think that being a bartender means you also have to be an actor. But at the same time, you are playing a role.
If there is anyone part of your personality that you find that customers respond positively to, try expanding on that personality trait and see if you further harness it to work to your advantage.
Maybe you get very good relationship advice. Maybe you're very funny. The idea here is to identify what makes you unique and memorable so you can focus on it.
A lot of bartenders don't necessarily think of social media as a main avenue to promote themselves as a bartender.
But if you are serious about promoting yourself and your bartending skills, one of the first things you should do is set up a bartending centric social media account on a platform like Instagram or TikTok.
We suggest having at least two different social media profiles: one that is all about bartending, and another that you use for your personal life outside of bartending.
Having a social media channel that is totally dedicated to your bartending can serve as a massive boost in showing people what you can do behind the bar.
This is also a great way to begin establishing a brand, which we'll discuss shortly...
With the rise of social media, anyone can become a relatively famous online personality.
This also applies to bartenders, and if you are looking to promote yourself, the first thing you need to start thinking about is how to build a brand.
Branding basics include having a logo, having a website, and other concepts that you can use all over the place (such as having a color palette that people associate with your brand).
If you begin building a brand for yourself as a bartender, you're going to be in a way better position than most other bartenders who wouldn't ever think about doing something like this.
Eventually, your brand can be even more lucrative than your bartending. It will be up to you to figure out how you want to use the good will your brand has built up!
A great way to promote yourself as a bartender is to start finding opportunities in which you can demonstrate your expertise.
Getting featured or interviewed in online publications can be a great way to solidify your place in the community as a bartender.
Finding ways for people to see you as an expert in what you do and it's a bona fide sort of "celebrity" when it comes to bartending is a great way to start building your brand, which will benefit your bartending massively.
Our last tip is simple – don't be afraid to be exceptional.
Far too often bartenders think that because their job is relatively straightforward, it doesn't make sense to try and promote themselves and accel at bartending.
Bartenders can make or break the establishments they work for, and if a bartender successfully promotes themself, not only will the establishment's customers love them, but so will the establishment owners as well.
The truth is that by promoting yourself as a bartender, you can make everyone around you happier and more successful.
Never be afraid to be the best you can be!
