diff --git a/logstash/formatter.py b/logstash/formatter.py
index f5c4424..e4ec2d3 100644
--- a/logstash/formatter.py
+++ b/logstash/formatter.py
@@ -3,6 +3,7 @@
 import socket
 import sys
 from datetime import datetime
+
 try:
     import json
 except ImportError:
@@ -10,7 +11,6 @@
 
 
 class LogstashFormatterBase(logging.Formatter):
-
     def __init__(self, message_type='Logstash', tags=None, fqdn=False):
         self.message_type = message_type
         self.tags = tags if tags is not None else []
@@ -28,7 +28,8 @@ def get_extra_fields(self, record):
             'funcName', 'id', 'levelname', 'levelno', 'lineno', 'module',
             'msecs', 'msecs', 'message', 'msg', 'name', 'pathname', 'process',
             'processName', 'relativeCreated', 'thread', 'threadName', 'extra',
-            'auth_token', 'password')
+            'auth_token', 'password'
+        )
 
         if sys.version_info < (3, 0):
             easy_types = (basestring, bool, dict, float, int, long, list, type(None))
@@ -82,7 +83,8 @@ def serialize(cls, message):
         if sys.version_info < (3, 0):
             return json.dumps(message)
         else:
-            return bytes(json.dumps(message), 'utf-8')
+            return str(json.dumps(message))
+
 
 class LogstashFormatterVersion0(LogstashFormatterBase):
     version = 0
@@ -115,7 +117,6 @@ def format(self, record):
 
 
 class LogstashFormatterVersion1(LogstashFormatterBase):
-
     def format(self, record):
         # Create message dict
         message = {
diff --git a/logstash/handler_tcp.py b/logstash/handler_tcp.py
index cc687bd..bb945a2 100644
--- a/logstash/handler_tcp.py
+++ b/logstash/handler_tcp.py
@@ -22,4 +22,4 @@ def __init__(self, host, port=5959, message_type='logstash', tags=None, fqdn=Fal
             self.formatter = formatter.LogstashFormatterVersion0(message_type, tags, fqdn)
 
     def makePickle(self, record):
-        return self.formatter.format(record) + b'\n'
+        return self.formatter.format(record) + '\n'
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index 3329e91..522066e 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -2,6 +2,7 @@
 setup(
     name='python-logstash',
     packages=['logstash'],
+    install_requires=['pika'],
     version='0.4.7',
     description='Python logging handler for Logstash.',
     long_description=open('README.rst').read(),