GigMasters

Terrible experience– had a character come out for my 2 year old birthday. He was less than enthusiastic and was certainly not fun. He did balloon animals and face painting that was terrible quality. Waste of money and the joke of the party. Do not use this company!

Worst money spent. Tried to get help booking gigs. Too many emails telling me I was awarded a fast responded badge. over and over again. Not Possible !!! Never booked a thing. Too many cut throat cheap DJ’s in DJ land. Just hand out cards and flyers. Service has more shoppers (other DJ’s) than buyers.

Do not go here and book DJ K (aka DJ Kurt)!!! Prior to the event he stopped returning phone calls and emails, and cancelled on me less than a month prior to my wedding without explaining why. He was my DJ and my photo booth.
Some of the links he sent me said GigMasters and some was his own company Trans-​Mobil Entertainment. Buyer beware, find someone more professional!

So far, I am EXTREMELY pleased. I found so many great bands to use for work, and they even gave me bartender options! So happy I found this site!

Relentless spam coming from a vast array of email addresses. Several «remove» requests only seem to confirm to gigspammrs that they have stumbled onto a live person (the address they’re sending to is one on my website and never given out to any vendors, clients or other actual people but their email-​harvesting web crawler picked it up just fine). I will be letting every performer and booker I know about this entity and how I came to know about them… Hey look, spam worked!

What a disastrous site. Seems reasonable, until it becomes utterly unclear how to confirm the person you hire. First, I accidentally clicked a button on someone’s page and it said they were reserved. There was no way to «un-​reserve» them without contacting the company. That’s a huge shortcoming. Then, when I finally hired someone (a piano player), I never got confirmation that he was hired. I contacted him outside of gigmasters, and even HE wasn’t clear that he had been booked. I told him to show up and I’d pay him directly… not sure if this is how gigmasters wants it to work or not, but there was no clear solution. Also, after he was «booked» on the site, I got a text message from gigmasters asking me if I’d found someone. First of all, they should know this. Secondly, NEVER TEXT ME without permission. It’s invasive and inappropriate. An email is fine, but I find this sort of high pressure technique repulsive. Will never book through them again. Just hoping my piano player shows up for our party this month.

Bottom line is in certain parts of the country such as in my case– the NY area you don’t have any chance of getting booked unless you have many positive reviews and confirmed bookings. You actually can phony it up and pay the booking fees and make your own fake reviews but I won’t do that. I did receive add on leads but 99% of the time the client had already booked a performer. I always would call the client the minute I got the lead and they would reply– we booked this a week ago.
Less leads and more competition spells failure.. By the way I have no trouble getting gigs on my own so I am not the issue.
It’s a good tool for some– and if the area is not competitive you might succeed but certainly not here in NY.
They stress that you need good media– but that means nothing if you are low in the search results. Spoke with customer service and emailed them often and they have only one answer– try top improve the media or pay more for preferred listing spot.. I’ll just have to be my own «Gig master.

Dont trust there vendors i recently hired a vendor throu gigmaster throu there website witch had his contact info and also gave my info throu there web site the vendor contactes me and i told him everything that i wanted to do for my fiancé it was her birthday and i wanted to surprise her i told him to give here flower and write speacial things in the card i wanted him to give to her and also take pictures and i paid extra for everything come to find out he did not give her plowers the card was ripped and said nothing i said to say in the card and his hand writing was horrible and to top it all off he charged my credit card several times causing it to get canceled i had to call my bank to get it activated again so found out he did not know what he was doing so that was a mistake on his part. So i asked my fiancé how was the suprice she said nice butt i had no pictures because he never took them and has been giving me the run around since aug 10 finally got a hold of him on August 27 and he finally said he cant find the pictures so he said ok ill give you the refund still nothing its now September 10 and the only reason im giving gigmasters one stars is because i called them and told them was going on and the vp called and apologized but still no refunds for all my trouble they said they have no record of me because i went throu the vendor witch i did not know because it was my first time using there services they really need to put something up IM NEVER USING THEM AGAIN JUST HORRIBLE… FAIL DONT DO IT ohhh and the vendor i use was showbiz911 aka robert edwards

This review is aimed at musicians considering using gigmasters for bookings.
Fees, Fees, and More Fees!
The company will charge you a 3 tiered annual «membership» fee ($ 269, $ 379, and $ 499) to list with them. On top of that, Gigmasters takes 5% of the money you charge the client in the form of a BOOKING FEE. GM recently raised their raised their rates. Their service has not improved. They just want more money.
You also have the option to pay an additional FEE in the form of liability insurance for individual gigs. Some clients may request this extra protection, if they are concerned about possible property damage. It will cost you $ 99 per gig and comes with a $ 1000 deductible.
In the beginning your artist listing will show up at rock bottom in search results but can rise higher based on positive client feedback and number of bookings. BUT you can pay yet another FEE and purchase a «Featured Profile» perk that will put your listing at the top. It’s like bribing the search results engine.
The latest FEE that gigmasters has dreamed up is the «Background Verified» Badge. A shadowy looking 3^rd party agency takes your Social Security number and other personal information to scope you out. The fee is unspecified upfront. Supposedly after passing the screening and getting a «badge» for your artist profile page, nervous clients will trust you to play at their kid’s birthday party.
The quality of your PROMO KIT will be very important. Before joining GM you must get photos taken, audio clips recorded, and videos shot of your act. Professional quality is well advised. You need to write a winning description of your show.
Unfortunately, all your hard work in uploading your media is handed over to an automated gigmasters ARTIST PROFILE page. The web designer has cut corners and made navigation non intuitive. Over and over my clients ask me where my song list is and where my audio samples are.
UPDATE 03/​29/​2016 Artist Profiles were recently «revised» and amazingly look even worse! The look is more generic and boring, as if a corporate suit tried his hand at being creative.
Based on my experience many clients are shopping for a deal. They want the best act at the lowest price. Expect to COMPETE heavily with other musicians. Clients looking for a band or a solo artist can get their email inbox and voice mail stuffed with offers from competing artists ALL claiming to be the best performer. As of this writing, gigmasters lists 283 Guitar Players near San Diego, CA alone.
The GM booking service is best utilized by bands and solo artists looking for Corporate, Wedding, and Private Party CASUAL DATES. GM is not a good service for booking bars or restaurants. You’re much more likely to get booked if you do follow-​up with the client (repeatedly). There is always the risk that you will irritate the client with follow-​ups. Be careful and courteous.
Gig hit ratio is another factor. You can bid on 20 gigs and only get one interested client who may or may not book you. You have to learn to UNDERCUT the other guy and still put food on the table. You’ll get lots of hits from low paying clients. If you list your range as $ 275 to $ 700 for a solo act, the bargain clients will always want the lowest fee, make you drive over a 100 miles, have a tough load in, make you play in direct sunlight with no shade, and never pay for overtime.
You can spell out your conditions in a CONTRACT, but there are always people who could care less about your terms on the day of the event. To many clients you’re just a hired hand to use as they please, especially at weddings. Suck it up, forget your artist dreams, and say yes to every demand.
Gigmasters pays hefty fees to Google Adwords to show up at the very top in all web searches for a specific kind of entertainer, whether it’s a pianist, harpist, guitarist, band or whatever for any city you type in. You could have your own nice webpage, but gigmasters will ALWAYS show up before yours. Web traffic and click through rate is important, and GM knows how to play the SEO game.
In case you thought gigmasters was only for musicians, the company also lists DJs, clowns, magicians, limo drivers, etc. in their roster of «artists». If you spent years on music lessons at a conservatory and paid thousands for your instrument, never forget that to a GM client you are simply a vendor.
Gigmasters is to musicians what UBER is to drivers. The executives make big money off your hard work and thousands of other entertainers in their stable. Gigmasters is a Web-​based platform which has set up the equivalent of a labor auction block — but it’s an auction in which the lowest bids win. Members bid against each other to win the job.
GM doesn’t provide any safety net for their workers (health care, Social Security, Medicare, unemployment and injured workers compensation, retirement or paid sick leave and vacations and more). You are a freelancing 1099 «gigpreneur».
Good Luck to you as you scramble for those gigs!

I have been a member of gigmaster on and off for the last year. GigMasters can be a wonderful service for Musicians looking to obtain private party work throughout the area that they perform in.
Your success with gigmaster it will depend on your geographic area, and the competition of that particular type or music service that you perform. For example acoustic guitar vocalist on Long Island is so saturated that there are dozens of musicians competing for one job– and many of them have tons of reviews and so if you are new with no reviews– good luck!!!
If you don’t have well polished audio and video on gig master your money is better spent elsewhere.
My friend plays the piano and sings and gets lots of leads and work– but as for me as a singing guitarist– the leads are few and far between.

Been a member of Gigmasters for about 4 years now and they have stayed consistent, which I love! They don’t keep getting greedier and greedier like Gigsalad. They bring me a lot of good gigs and I love the Rising Star awards they have every year as well for the top earners! I won one in 2012 and two in 2013 :-) Makes us feel very appreciated.

Used GigMasters to search/​hire a harpist for my winery wedding a few weeks ago. I secured my harpist about 5 – 6 months out which I would recommend. Quoting process was painless but I did receive a lot of «sorry, I already have an obligation that day» responses so definitely do your search early.
Came across a great harpist who I would highly recommend. GigMasters made everything super easy… even made my deposit and final payments through the site.
If I am in need of any professional event services in the future, I would look on GigMasters first!

Gigmasters. A great venue to get your Band noticed and allow you to recognize all of the talent that is out there! The process is easy for clients to nook your band send it provides you with everything you need to cover yourself and the client. It’s an awesome booking agency.
925 Rock and Roll Entertainment

I needed a tarot card reader for a large group event, and this company made it easy to search, book, communicate with the artist, pay deposits, and follow up. It honestly couldn’t have gone smoother.

My band «Hooch» has been using gigmasters for over a decade, and they are a great source of work for us. Every year, their support has more than covered the yearly membership fees, and the gig fees are very reasonable. We’ve never missed a show, and have maintained a 5 star rating from our clients, and gigmasters has rewarded us with service excellence badges that help maintain our bookings through their site. Gigmasters allows the cream to rise to the top, and the best performers get their recognition, and their business thrives due to this. Gigmasters keeps their clients at the top of search engines, and is the best online booking site hands down.

I didn’t know where to begin looking for a DJ and photographer for my 20^th anniversary party. By accident, I found GigMasters, and I can’t even begin to tell you what a terrific site this is to find vendors for events!
The process was so easy, and because of GigMasters, I found the perfect DJ (Matt Kotefka from First Choice DJ Service) and photographer (Danielle Albrecht, from Studio Delphianblue). I will be reviewing them separately, but it’s thanks to GigMasters that I was able to find the perfect vendors.
GigMasters’ website is easy to use and you can browse through as many vendors as you want. I also like that you’re able to receive free quotes. The payment process for both vendors was so easy, and with so many options available including PayPal, it was one less thing to worry about so that I could focus on ensuring my party was a hit. And it was!
You’re able to find vendors nationwide, so the next event you’re planning, don’t forget to do some research on GigMasters!

A nice idea, but not useful to new artists in categories where there are already established musicians. Their algorithms have new artists always listed near the bottom at first, and you can only climb up by getting gigs… which you can’t get being listed so low. A catch 22. I tried it out for a year. Alas, it was wasted money. I’ve had *much* better success on competing websites. Won’t be giving any more time/​money to GigMasters…

Such an amazing booking agency Gig Masters, the best in the world.
The talent they provide is the best in the world, and they are simply amazing!
Judy Hevenly, Los Angeles, California 3^rd April, 2014.

I joined Gigmasters back in 2004 and have renewed my membership every year! As a classical/​jazz/​rock guitarist/​singer it is sometimes difficult to find the variety of clients who would enjoy my music. Gigmasters user-​friendly website has made it an easy experience for both me and my clients. Their professional reputation is another key to my success with booking over 115 weddings and corporate events. If there is ever a problem, their customer service department is helpful, quick to respond, and always ready to give great suggestions. I would highly recommend joining Gigmasters if you are a performer or looking for a great performer.
Of Course, I agree with the comments that some performers are pushy and other are bidding very low just to get gigs. If they are too arrogant or pushy and calling at all hours of the night to badger you for the gig, please let gigmasters know and they will help you eliminate these annoyances.
Lastly, carefully check the samples and testimonials of the 5-​Star artists. The most honest artists samples are from a live events and with no editing, otherwise it’s a gamble.
I highly recommend taking advantage of Gigmasters advice to look for professional musicians who are polite and business-​like from the start.

The website is so easy to work with. I used the site to find a comedian for our corporate event.
I had regular emails sent to check up on me, the comedians responded promptly and some even called me to check up.
I had a question about a refund to my account, called customer service and my account was automatically pulled up. That customer service call literally took under 60 seconds.
I was amazed, I wanted to speak to their rep longer I was so thrilled.
Working with this company to schedule some entertainment for your event will be a breeze.
Also, some of the reviews are upset their entertainment for not being great, fyi I wouldn’t say that’s Gigmaster’s responsibility. Hiring solid entertainment is hit or miss at times, they can try their best to be connected with great entertainers but trying is about the best they or any booking site can do I’d say. Gigmasters is just a great booking company!
I bet our event will be great! Thanks!