Dance Command · how the platform is shaped

Five hats, one email.

Every professional in the scene signs in once. Each thing they are - an organization they run, a brand they get booked under - is its own account with its own name, page, and money, all hanging off that one login. Here is what each hat does today, and where each honestly stands.

Joining as an instructor, DJ, venue, or photographer? Sign up at dancecommand.com - tick every role you are; you'll name each one right after.

The problem this solves

Written for instructors first, because that's who we're inviting first - but every word holds for DJs, photographers and venues.

Teaching without it

Your rates, styles and availability live in your head and in organizers' memories. Every booking is a text thread; every new community means re-explaining who you are and what you teach. Lesson inquiries arrive scattered across DMs. Getting paid is whatever each organizer's system is - and none of it builds anything that lasts.

Teaching with it

One profile, filled in once: every style you teach, your levels, your rates. You're in the directory - every organizer on the platform can find you and book you, not just the ones who have your number. Requests land in one inbox, gigs on one calendar with directions, lesson requests from dancers arrive as messages, and money settles to your own Stripe. It's yours - it travels with you to every community you work with.

one email one password, one session Organizer runs the nights - the house Venue the room - gets asked to host Instructor own brand - gets booked DJ own brand - gets booked Photographer own brand - gets booked each account has its own name its own public page its own Stripe + earnings its own profile & styles switching = one toggle in Your accounts; tick every role at signup, name them after
A DJ brand is not called after the social - so each hat is named on its own, and travels with the person.

Two species

Every rule in the product hangs off this split. A house runs nights; a bookable gets booked for them. The five kinds are just the five ways of being one or the other.

1 kind

House - runs nights

The Organizer. Creates events, sells tickets, runs the door, books everybody else. The only kind that has a roster instead of being on one.

4 kinds

Bookable - gets booked

Venue, Instructor, DJ, Photographer. Listed in the directory, asked per event, paid per gig. Booking is per event - never a standing gate.

What each hat does

Status is the honest current read. Highlighted chips are the capabilities that set this platform apart.

Instructor

Bookable Complete
The brand
every style & sub-style - 61, with levelsyears dancing vs teachingcertifications, studio, travelown page & rates
The work
gigs: accept / declinetouring roadbook - calendar, directions, organizer contactlesson requests from Dance Seekers
The money
charge students directlyprepaid lesson packsown Stripe, own earnings
Filled in once, carried everywhere. A Latin community sees the Latin half; a Westie community sees West Coast - the profile syncs to their Dance Seekers card.

Organizer

House Complete
Run the night
events & ticketingdoor + POSmulti-day passescomp ticketsmusic flow plannerteam roles: owner → volunteer
Book everybody
find people - styles matched to your sceneper-event bookingnight planning: venue + staff requestsvenue month schedules: propose → edit → lockresident DJ auto-accept
Grow & get paid
audience list + importcampaignscommission repsrevenue splits with prospayouts on your own Stripepublishes to Dance Seekers
The deepest role. Everything a community needs to run a season lives here, and the whole booking loop starts from this cockpit.

DJ

Bookable Complete
The brand
profile & ratesstyles they play and danceset links - no login to view
The night
walk-up song queue - money never moves a song uptips from the floor land on your own Striperesident auto-accept per house
The work & money
gigs + roadbookown Stripe, tips + payouts in one place
The richest bookable. The queue's integrity rule is the product: the DJ reads the room, not the tip jar.

Venue

Bookable Complete for its purpose
The room
venue book: floor, capacity, parking, policieslisted so organizers find it and ask
The arrangements
month schedules: propose → edit → locknight requests answered by email link - no account neededsame email can also hold an Organizer hat
Exactly what it was defined to be: the door through which people come to host at your space. Being somebody else's venue never requires an account.

Photographer

Bookable Functional - thinnest
The brand & work
portfolio & ratesgigs + roadbookdelivers to the org's photo-drop folder
The money
charge for shoots directlyown Stripe, own earnings
Works end to end, but thinnest. No gallery surface of their own yet - delivery happens through the organizer's folder - and their Dance Seekers card is instructor-shaped.

How the accounts reach each other

Every hat is its own account with its own login, and the whole point is that they can find and book each other. Here is who reaches whom, and what actually moves.

Organizer runs the nights Instructor DJ Photographer Venue teaches the lesson plays the night shoots it holds the room asks, one night at a time A dancer on Dance Seekers asks for a private lesson Solid: who asks whom. Dashed: who pays whom.
An organizer books the people and the room, and pays them after the night. A dancer never goes through the organizer to book a lesson: they ask the instructor, and they pay the instructor.
Organizer → Instructor

Booking someone to teach your night

Both of you have an account. Neither of you retypes anything.

  1. You open Find people and search what your community dances. Their profile is already filled in, their styles ranked against yours.
  2. You ask them to work with you. Saying yes books nothing - it lets you offer them nights.
  3. You put them on a night and send the request. They answer that night from their own cockpit, and it lands on their calendar with directions and your number.
A dancer → Instructor

A private lesson, asked for on Dance Seekers

This one skips the organizer entirely.

  1. A dancer taps request a lesson on your Dance Seekers card - the card an organizer you work with sponsored.
  2. It lands in Lesson requests in your cockpit. You accept and talk it through in the thread. No phone numbers change hands until you both want them to.
  3. You add them as a student, plan the lessons, and tick each one off as you teach it.
Organizer → DJ

Booking the music

The same rails as an instructor, in DJ words.

  1. You find them by what they play, not just their name - residencies, equipment, whether they MC.
  2. They accept the connection, then answer each night on its own. A resident can switch on auto-accept so your regular Friday stops asking.
  3. The night carries the room, the set times and who to call.
Organizer → Venue

Asking a room to hold your night

A venue is an account too, not a line of text on your event.

  1. You ask the venue to host - one night, or a whole month across their rooms.
  2. They answer from their own Hosting requests page, and can send a note back with the door time or which room.
  3. Their yes is what lets the night publish. Until then it waits.

The thread through all four: you fill your profile in once. Every organizer who finds you reads the same profile, every night you accept lands on the same calendar, and every way you get paid runs through the account you connected once.

The connective tissue

Three loops tie the five hats into one platform.

Booking

  1. Organizer opens Find people - pros ranked by what your community dances
  2. Opens the pro's page: full profile, your styles first
  3. Asks - per event, never a standing gate
  4. Pro accepts from their own cockpit (or auto-accepts as a resident)
  5. The night lands on their roadbook, with directions and your contact

Money

  1. Every hat connects its own Stripe - once, reused across hats on the same email
  2. One payment platform under both apps - connect Stripe once and it works everywhere
  3. Org → pro payouts are transfers; pro → student charges are direct
  4. One published fee schedule - a tip, a lesson, a ticket all read the same table

Dance Seekers sync

  1. Events publish as they're made
  2. A pro's styles cross in the catalog's own words - sub-styles ride along intact
  3. The roster pushes itself when a pro accepts or edits their profile
  4. A community's declared scenes cross too - the same lens on both sides

Dance Seekers, and why it matters to you

Dance Command is where the work runs - nights, bookings, money. Dance Seekers is the other half: the app dancers themselves open.

What Dance Seekers is

The dancers' app. Someone who wants to dance tonight opens it and sees every night near them - which communities run them, who teaches, who plays. They buy the ticket there, request the song there, and when they want to learn, they tap request a lesson on a teacher's card. It is where the audience already is.

The potential

Every community that joins brings its dancers into one shared catalog - and your card is in front of all of them. Fill your profile once and every scene you work with shows you to its people; when a new community joins, or a dancer travels in from another city, you are already there to be found. The catalog already maps more than 11,800 nights, 2,700 organizations and 3,700 venues; teacher cards are just beginning, which is exactly when being on it costs the least and shows the most.

Everything below crosses automatically, both ways - nobody maintains anything twice.

Dance Command where the work runs organizers run their nights your brand, gigs and money your full profile - every style booking, contracts, payouts Dance Seekers the app dancers open dancers find tonight's dances communities and their teachers one tap: request a lesson song requests, tips, tickets events publish as they're made your card - styles in the catalog's words, sub-styles intact, typed DJ or instructor the community's room - name, brand, what it dances lesson requests - a message thread in your portal song requests, straight to the DJ's queue app ticket sales land in the same books one Stripe platform under both - connect once, money settles to you on either side
The bridge is automatic and two-way: what you publish and who you are flow out; what dancers do flows back as work in your cockpit - never as email.

What that means for a pro, start to finish

  1. Fill your profile once, on Dance Command - every style, level and rate.
  2. Your card appears on Dance Seekers in every community you work with - showing the styles that scene dances, the rest kept behind it.
  3. A dancer taps request a lesson - it lands in your portal as a message thread, and you accept, decline or talk it through right there.
  4. You charge and get paid on your own Stripe - and in the app, tips reach a DJ with no platform fee at all.

Where it stands

The chassis - signup, profile, discovery, connection, booking, money, sync - is complete for all five hats. What remains is named, not hidden.

Working today

  • Multi-role signup - tick every hat at once, name them on the next screen
  • Style taxonomy - 13 families, 61 sub-styles, scene-matched per community, synced to DS
  • Pro detail pages - a profile finally has readers
  • Gallery hand-back + card readers - photographers link the finished gallery; any pro can take cards in person
  • Launch-tested - every flow above runs green before a deploy, on one payment platform across the site and the app

Coming next

  • Venue self-serve availability - a room saying "we're open Tuesdays" instead of only answering asks
  • The phone app - tap a card on your phone to get paid, no reader needed; the rails for it are already live

dancecommand.com · built in Grand Rapids for the scenes that dance