10 Years of gigmit
Wow, that went fast: 10 years of future-oriented live music booking, 10 years of digitization of the music industry, 10 years of gigmit. And with it, one of the biggest (and we honestly say: the best!) live music communities in the world. We have only made it this far thanks to you.
As you may know, this is just the beginning of a new era in the live music world. Every musician has a chance to be seen and heard regardless of gatekeepers and big companies – no matter where you are from, what genre you serve or what preferences you have. This new era should make live music is worthwhile again: for organizers and of course for the artists themselves. That’s why we are democratizing this business with gigmit and making booking so easy and economical that it benefits everyone – and is even fun.
For our 10th birthday, we want to take a look back at the history of gigmit.
How has booking become easier?
The idea for gigmit came about in practice. gigmit CEO and founder Marcus Fitzgerald worked as a promoter, artist manager and gig booker and knew the difficult processes of bringing bands and clubs together from his own experience. And that’s where the idea was born. An online platform that would simplify, modernise and democratize the gig booking industry. That’s what the vision has always been. A digital tool that makes the most important source of income for musicians faster and easier to reach should help.
In 2012 it all began. Current gigmit CTO and co-founder Andreas Kürbis, along with Benjamin Fritsch & Benjamin Knofe wrote the first code. gigmit is live!
10 Years of gigmit: The Milestones
The first 10 years of gigmit weren’t exactly straightforward.
“We experimented a lot – corporate booking, merchandise, etc. – and also started with a transaction model for each booking. What has prevailed is our focus on the essentials: simply bringing artists and organizers together.”
– gigmit CEO Marcus Fitzgerald in an interview with Deutsche Startups.
Today we are happy to have over 220,000 users and a live music network that is unparalleled internationally. Built on a data-based infrastructure that makes booking much easier for organizers and musicians, gigmit has changed the way in which concerts are organized.
The Beginning: Digital Agency Service
In the early years, it was often gigmit booking agents who scouted bands, solo artists and DJs. We then placed them manually, just like in a classic agency – only with gigmit’s own modern digital tools. In particular: gigmit was working with acts that were still too small for established agencies, not economical and therefore, unfortunately, not interesting.
This practice reached its peak in 2017, when gigmit booked around 800 shows in Germany with national and international upcoming gigmit artists within six months with the DYKNOW concert series.
Today, our focus is solely on data-based matchmaking. We are very proud to have personally supported so many musicians in their difficult early days and are now able to see them on the bigger stages and hear them on the radio. A dream come true!
Guidance and Support for all Genres
Enabling every artist to play on every stage is at the top of our agenda. This is why we have implemented numerous projects to promote newcomers and provide knowledge, insights and expertise.
With the Live Music Accelerator Berlin project, funded by the Berliner Senatsverwaltung and the EU, gigmit 2018 reveals to small clubs and artists how useful digital marketing is. With the knowledge provided by gigmit, the participating musicians and organizers booked three times more confirmations/people interested in the event.
Find out more in our free promo whitepaper here.
Furthermore, the gigmit blog went live in 2020. The goal: sharing industry knowledge. With new articles going live every week, the gigmit blog is the perfect place to keep up with all the latest industry information. Important topics and information are made available to the gigmit community through free whitepapers, blog articles and “How to” articles.
Check out some of our most popular blog posts here!
8 Tips to Help You Get Booked At Festivals
The Importance of Music Videos In Today’s Music Industry
Pros & Cons of Music Streaming And Its Impact On Booking
Breakthrough Innovations
After a lot of headwind from the industry in the first few years (“Who are these Internet guys?” “We’ve always done it this way!” “I trust my gut feeling!” “Social media is not for me!”), gigmit surives the difficulties of 2020 and earns international respect in the industry.
Data Analytics
In spite of the pandemic, the global event industry suffered a meltdown which affected every single musician and venue operator. Although many businesses collapsed under the weight of lockdowns and restrictions, gigmit powered through. The reason: we focused on data analysis in the rapidly changing industry and had therefore created a path through the challenges. We also recognized the relevance of live streaming and other opportunities such as radio, playlist and press brokerage. By keeping our vision at the heart of everything we did, we managed to overcome the ruthless landscape of the pandemic and emerged stronger than ever.
The fastest and most useful EPK in the world
In 2019 we are took the gigmit Artist Page to a new level. A gigmit Artist Page is the core of the platform and the innovative must-have for all artists who do serious bookings. After intensive expert interviews, surveys and research, the gigmit EPK (Electronic Press Kit) is now completely tailored to the needs of event organizers and music business professionals.
There are probably more ways you can optimize yours… Find out more here…
Fan Data
At the same time, the EU has been funding our LASER project (Live Artists Search Engine & Recommendations) in order to find out what influences the music industry and to be able to design funding programs from it. Our FAN INSIGHTS and the FAN CHARTS will later emerge from the matchmaking algorithm developed here – a game changer in the music industry.
Organizers can now see in advance who is really trending in their area and how many fans in the region currently want to see a live act – automatically and without any communication effort. We’re getting closer to the future of sold-out shows through dates.
Partners with Sony Music
10 years of gigmit would certainly have looked very different without our various partnerships. gigmit is still an independent digital company in the live music sector. Fortunately, we also have support from the majors: in 2016, SONY Music joined as a partner. On the one hand to discover talent faster and on the other hand to help with research and developments in data analysis. We and our users continue to benefit from their expertise.
There is currently a scouting session every quarter to introduce the best gigmit PRO artists to Sony Music – more information here.
INES (Innovation Network of European Showcases)
In 2017, gigmit, together with 8 festivals, initiated the Innovation Network of European Showcases (INES). The INES network did not exist before and is still growing today and is becoming increasingly important. INES is also co-financed by the Creative Europe program of the European Union. The mission: to create a strong and united European music market and to promote international synergies for musicians and artists across Europe. Through INES, the showcase festivals of Europe are networking with each other for the first time, exchanging ideas, learning from each other and recommending national acts to other countries. Through INES, gigmit acts regularly benefit from festival offers from the most important showcase festivals.
INES Festivals continue to prosper and provide amazing opportunities for upcoming artists. Showcase festivals such as MonkeyWeek, Linecheck, MondoNYC all continue to host events every year. Further INES festivals SHARPE and FOCUS Wales are currently open for applications! Click here to apply: SHARPE – FOCUS Wales.
Find out more about INES here!
gigmit for Brands
In 2019, we brought together the added value of large and small innovative music companies and brands with the gigmit community. Through gigmit for brands, we have expanded our cooperation with partners such as CASIO, D’ADDARIO, HARMAN INTERNATIONAL, SENNHEISER, TEAC, TICKETMASTER, THOMANN, SHURE, YAMAHA, WARSTEINER, fritz-kola and many others.
Our recent projects have created exciting new opportunities for our artists in the post-pandemic music scene. We recently collaborated with the car rental company SIXT to put our artists on the stage at MondoNYC and Linecheck in Milan.
One of our most popular collaborations was a project we undertook with CASIO, where we booked talented gigmit artists to play their songs in amazing live performances, all using brand new, CASIO equipment. Check out one of the resulting videos here:
Our collaborations with brands is one of the ways that we use to give back to our amazing community. So keep checking the gigs and calls page on the gigmit website to make sure you never miss a new opportunity!
Seedmatch
gigmit collected 1.2M€ from crowd investors in 2 rounds of seed-investment. This includes employees from Ticketmaster, Spotify, TikTok, Universal Music and many more. Our first gigmit intern from 2012 is now an investor in gigmit on Seedmatch. Our third round of funding is currently running on Seedmatch: Invest in the future of live music booking today!
GEMA, Germany’s largest and most important collecting society, also became a gigmit partner.
10 Years of Booking Artists for Major Gigs
Here at gigmit, the focus has always been this: simplify and democratize the gig booking process to make it accessible for everyone. It goes without saying that we love what we do. And the reason we love what we do is that we have the privilege of booking talented artists for major gigs and festivals around the world. We are proud to say that we have put our treasured artists on major stages across Europe and beyond. By the end of 2022 alone, we plan to have booked artists for Reeperbahn Festival, The Great Escape Festival, Mondo NYC, Iceland Airwaves, Atlanta Hip Hop Day, Tallinn Music Week, MENT Ljubljana, Linecheck Festival and many more!
Rock am Ring 2022
A high point of 2022 for us was successfully booking an artist to play at one of the worlds most notorious festivals: Rock am Ring! In a collaboration with gigmit, beer giants Warsteiner launched a legendary band contest, with the ultimate prize. To play at Rock am Ring 2022. Artists were encouraged to apply to get a unique opportunity to perform at the stage of one of the biggest and widely renowned rock music festivals in Europe. After receiving hundreds of applications, AKUMA SIX were selected to make history.
“Akuma Six rocked the stage and crowd. I am so proud of them performing the hell out of their bodies and souls. What a great fit and success for the Warsteiner Bandcontest.”
— Marcus Fitzgerald, CEO gigmit
Sziget 2022
But it doesn’t always go so smoothly… In fact, at Sziget 2022, the gigmit team was faced with an unusual problem. After receiving hundreds of applications and weeks of prep time, gigmit had arranged for Lithuanian band Shishi to take the stage at the festival. Unfortunately, just 2 days before the day of the actual performance, Shishi announced that they would not be able to perform. Despite the stress, the gigmit team found a way to solve the problem. Even though things looked bad, we really wanted another gigmit act to perform at Sziget, so we were looking for an artist replacement. It would normally be close to impossible to find an international replacement in such a short time, but thanks to the huge artist community and the great gigmit team, we managed to find an amazing replacement artists within a few hours.
And we were extremely happy with the result, as the amazing band John Wolfhooker, from Chech Republic, made it to the stage.
“I was naked in SPA and received a message from Gabriel from gigmit…and started to dance right in a SPA”
says Rony, a member of John Wolfhooker band.
We are thankful that a band showed high professionalism and managed it in two days before the real performance. Huge thanks to the Sziget production team, to the band and the gigmit team. Despite the rush and stress, the performance was outstanding and left everyone speechless.
The gigmit Team: The people Behind the Platform
In the last 10 years, our team has changed again and again. But the beliefs and commitments have remained the same. We are boundlessly music-loving team players who love the live experience. We are artists ourselves, we organize, program and actively shape the live music business. A team whose spirit of discovery strives for diversity and innovative solutions. Our mission: make booking easier.
We currently have a strong team with employees from various countries around the world. Meet the team and see faces…
A big thank you to everyone who has been with us on this journey!
Last but not least, it’s live music that brought us all here to gigmit. But the art and the work on and off the stage is up to you, dear gigmit community. We are very thankful for you doing this and we love you for it! In the end, gigmit will only have been your tool. But also a trailblazer to a better world for artists and organizers.
We started at a time when music was heard on CD and MP3 and Facebook was just starting to build its advertising platform. Not an easy time for a digital model in the live industry. Many didn’t believe in us at first, but we showed that we are not a flash in the pan, not a startup that will be gone tomorrow. We have set out to simplify the live music landscape and still have a lot to do. Our motivation is the enthusiasm for live events and everything we do, we do for our values and goals, not for money and not for profit. We are here to show that things can be done differently and that we can break conventions for the better.
