In this episode, Jared shares the rollercoaster journey of finally getting on the preferred vendor list of a prestigious wedding venue in Colorado—after years of getting ignored. From strategic outreach to a well-timed performance and a surprising twist involving an injured coordinator, you’ll hear how persistence, empathy, and daily follow-ups ultimately opened the door. Jared breaks down key lessons for musicians who want to break into high-end events and why sometimes not pitching is the most powerful move of all

"As a strong marketer and salesperson of my musical act, it is up to me to be persistent, know what I want, and then keep doing the actions to get there"

- BookLive: Everything you need to start marketing and booking your act online (without having to hire or rely on a tech team!)​
- Your First Gig: Everything you need to book your first high-paying gig.
- Fulltime Music Masterclass: The Secret To an Unlimited Stream of High-Paying Private Event Gigs …Without Spending a Fortune on Online Advertising or Having Any Connections!
- Fulltime Music Academy (Gig Vault): 24,665 High-End Venues + Event Planners: Use this directory to book your highest-paid gig to-date.
- Breaking Into High-end Gigs Masterclass: How I Went From Broke Musician to Thriving By Breaking Into These Largely Unknown High-Paying Gigs

What's up, renegade musicians? It's Jared Judge. Welcome back to another episode of the Gigging Musician Podcast.

All right, it is August 18th or 17th, something like that. Actually, I want to be accurate with you. It is the 19th, Tuesday the 19th.

And you know, if you've listened to this podcast for a while, you know how much I believe in getting your act on the preferred vendor lists of high end venues and event planners.

Because if you want to book high end gigs, those don't happen at most bars and restaurants because the bar and restaurant owners, if they're the ones planning the music, they've got very limited budget and they're probably not willing to gamble more than that budget on a musician whom they see as a way for them to make the bar or restaurant more money.

So that's why I like getting on the preferred vendor lists of venues and event planners that really host and plan these high end events such as corporate events and weddings, nonprofit galas, things like that.

And so I want to share a little bit of a recent story because there is this one venue up in Broomfield, Colorado, 25 minutes away from where I live, it's called the Chateau at Fox Meadows.

And they have been pretty hard to get a hold of because, you know, one of my, my strategy for, you know, getting on their preferred vendor list is to ask them to give me a tour of the venue.

And on that tour I bring my instrument, play them a couple tunes, and then they realize, oh, you sound great, we want to add you to our preferred vendor list.

And so I've been reaching out to this venue for a couple years now and they just have not responded. In fact, I've DMed them on Instagram, I filled out their contact form, I've emailed them and I've even called them.

And none of the times I've called have they picked up, which is kind of concerning because they actually don't know my number.

And so my number could be a potential client trying to rent their facility. But if they don't pick up, then they may lose out on that business. But that's neither here or there.

Although that is a lesson to us as musicians. Like if you put a phone number on your website and you don't answer it, you're probably losing money. So that's lesson number one.

Lesson number two, though, is like, you know, I've been calling and emailing and DMing them. Still no response. Until I recently played event there.

Somebody found me on, I believe it was thumbtack, and hired me to play a Wedding ceremony. And finally I get to play this, this venue. And I show up, I do a really good job.

I connect with the event planner, who may be one of the ones who could have responded to my emails, but I'm not sure either way, when you show up, and even if, like, you may have some kind of resentment or hard feelings, you should not let a show.

And that was kind of my goal there was, you know, be my normal friendly self and just say how excited I am to play there.

And so I chatted with their coordinator and we made some, some last minute adjustments that were necessary that were not part of the original plan.

So I just wanted to show how flexible I am and how, how much of a team player I am. So I do a really good job. Couple says, it was perfect.

And then as I'm packing up, you know, one of the things I do to build these relationships is after I play the gig, I always try to find either the venue representative or the planner or both if they're different and just thank them, give them a couple business cards and say, I'd love to work together more.

And so I go in search of this coordinator and I find them in their office surrounded by a couple people, including the bride and groom.

And there are tears streaming down her face, the coordinator's face, And I find out, and I see she's got a pretty bad cut on her leg.

Turns out she fell down a couple stairs and was a bit injured as her kind of put a little bit of a damper on my plans because, you know, someone's hurt, can't be going into pitch mode.

And so I just kind of say, oh, I'm so sorry to see your hurt. And I kind of like, let it be. I said, we'll chat soon, and then I leave.

Which, you know, sabotaged my marketing efforts a little bit. However, probably did not sabotage it because if I were to be very pitchy about it right then and there, that would show I have no empathy, I'm not a decent human being, and I just care about me.

So, in fact, it was, in my opinion, the right thing to do. But, you know, just kind of upped the risk of not hearing back from them yet again because then I'd have to reach out after I got home.

And so that's what I did was when I got home, I sent them a message on Instagram saying, hey, it was so great to meet you and play. I hope your knee is feeling better.

Just hoping I'd get a response. But we returned back to the cycle of not hearing back. And so that was like two weeks ago. And so I messaged him like Monday after the gig, waited a couple days to hear back, then heard nothing again.

So starting on like Wednesday, I was like, I played this venue, I met a human there. It's not right.

I didn't actually say this, but that's how I was feeling because it's not right for you to just ignore somebody who you met in person, let alone, you know, somebody who performed at your venue. And the couple said it was perfect.

And so I go into like hyper follow up Jared mode where I DM them every day. And then I called and left a message on their answering machine every single day.

And there's only after maybe like four days of these repeated contacts, four voicemails on their phone, that finally I got a text message back saying, hey, it's so and so.

We love having you, we'd love to recommend you send us some business cards. And they gave me their address. So I consider that a win because I finally got on their preferred vendor list and I actually saw when I was in the venue they have a table of all the different business cards of vendors that they like to work with.

So I do consider myself to be on their preferred vendor list, although they do have one on the Internet that I do want to work my way onto.

But I feel like for some venues it's just like it's a grind, you know, they just prioritize other things, which is fine. But that as a is a strong marketer and salesperson of my musical act, it is up to me to be persistent, I know what I want and then keep doing the actions to get there.

So yeah, made some progress, made some inway and it's not exactly what I want yet. And so I will keep going until it is. My next step, I think is they host open houses maybe once or twice a year.

And so as soon as I see one posted on their Instagram or anything like that, that's when I'm going to go into one call a day mode until I get them to agree to let me come and exhibit at their open house.

So persistence pays off and sometimes even when you've gotten a small wins, you still need to keep going. All right, that's all I got for you today by the way.

If you want some help with your own high end gig strategy, I do offer free high end gig strategy game plan calls where we'll map out a strategy for you, figure out what's holding you back and how to break through that.

So book a free call with me at fulltimemusicacademy.com/call. Can't wait to meet you and help you out. And yeah, that's all I got for you.

So thanks for tuning into another episode of The Gigging Musician Podcast.

Remember, "Your music will not market itself!".

Bye, everybody.