Advancing a show

Advancing a show is the process of sharing your technical and logistical requirements with a venue before you arrive. This guide walks you through the full advance workflow in Roadcase — from creating your documents to sharing them with the venue.

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What goes in an advance

A complete show advance typically includes:

• Technical rider — Your sound, lighting, backline, and power requirements
• Hospitality rider — Your food, beverage, and dressing room requirements
• Stage plot — A visual diagram of your stage setup with input channel list
• Documents — Any additional files (production schedule, parking requirements, etc.)

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Step 1: Create your riders

If you have not already, create your tech and hospitality riders.

1. Navigate to Riders
2. Click New rider
3. Choose Tech or Hospitality
4. Use a built-in template as a starting point or write from scratch
5. Customize the content for your act

You only need to do this once. Riders are reusable across all your shows. See Riders for details.

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Step 2: Create your stage plot

1. Navigate to Stage plots
2. Click New stage plot
3. Drag equipment items onto the stage canvas
4. Build the input channel list
5. Link channels to stage items

Again, this is a one-time setup. You can create multiple plots for different configurations. See Stage plots for details.

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Step 3: Create an advance template

Templates let you bundle your riders, stage plots, and documents into a reusable package.

1. Navigate to Advances > Templates
2. Click New template
3. Name it (e.g., “Standard club advance”)
4. Attach your tech rider, hospitality rider, and stage plot
5. Add any standard documents
6. Save

Now you have a one-click advance package ready for every show.

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Step 4: Apply the template to a show

1. Open the show from the calendar
2. Navigate to the Advance tab
3. Click Apply template
4. Select your template
5. The template contents are copied to the show’s advance

At this point, you can customize the show-specific advance if needed. For example, you might:

• Adjust the tech rider for a festival set (shared backline)
• Update the hospitality rider based on venue capabilities
• Add show-specific documents (parking map, load-in instructions)

Changes to the show’s advance do not affect the template.

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Step 5: Make sure venue contacts are set

Before sharing, confirm that the venue has contacts in Roadcase:

1. Open the show and check the venue
2. Navigate to the venue’s contacts
3. Add the production manager, talent buyer, or whoever should receive the advance

If you set up contacts when creating the venue, they are already there.

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Step 6: Share the advance

1. On the show’s advance page, click Share advance
2. Select which venue contacts should receive it
3. Click Send

Roadcase generates a secure, tokenized link and sends an email to the selected contacts. The recipients can view your full advance — riders, stage plot, and documents — without needing a Roadcase account.

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Step 7: Track engagement

After sharing, check back to see if the venue has reviewed your advance:

• Page views — Has anyone opened the link?
• Document downloads — Which files have been downloaded?

If the advance has not been viewed in a few days, use the Resend option to send it again.

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Step 8: Handle changes

If you need to update your advance after sharing:

1. Make the changes on the show’s advance page
2. Roadcase flags that the content has changed since the last share
3. Resend the advance to notify the venue of the updates

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Managing the shared link

Shared links automatically expire 7 days after the show date.

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Tips

• Advance your shows 2-4 weeks before the date to give the venue time to prepare
• Follow up if the view tracking shows no engagement within a few days
• Keep your advance template updated so every show gets your latest requirements
• Create separate templates for different show types (club, festival, acoustic)