- Industry: Theatre, Community/Professional
- Area of Expertise: One, Project Management
Background
Our client is a community theatre company, who runs multiple shows a year. Their audition process involves multiple steps, including form submissions, in-person auditions and callbacks.
Problem
This client came to Nimbis needing to better streamline all aspects of their audition process, records, and communications. They lacked a centralized system for organizing their contacts, relying on Mailchimp and Google Drive. Beyond this, their audition process lacked organization, despite many days of time spent in preparation.
They were seeking a central database of the various people they’d worked with prior across actors, volunteers, production staff, attendees, donors and contractors. Furthermore, they wanted a simple tool to bring people together, making the audition process much more organized and straightforward.
Solution:
Bookings
Zoho Bookings was used for individuals booking auditions. The native ‘Services’ module was renamed to ‘Auditions’ to more accurately represent the specific sessions being scheduled. Within each Audition, a person could access the available times to audition, as well as the show they are auditioning for.
In addition, they could view the terms and conditions, as well as options to reschedule or cancel after the initial booking. Bookings was used to manage both in-person and virtual auditions. Virtual auditions, which were conducted through a video submission, used the group booking feature, as they weren’t locked into a specific timeslot.
CRM
Modules
The CRM served as this system’s home base. The “Contacts” module was primarily used for people auditioning for shows, with additional functionality to be used for volunteer and donor contacts. The “Campaigns” module was repurposed to represent each show that the theater was producing The Deals module was renamed to the “Roles” module, and served to link a Contact and a Campaign. In addition to the core CRM architecture, a “Form Submission” module was created to record submissions of the Audition Form (explained below). The “Meetings” module was linked to Zoho Bookings.
Automations
On Creation of a “Meeting” through Zoho Bookings, a workflow was triggered that created “Role” records, which corresponded to each of the different shows the auditionee was signing up for. This workflow also updated the contact record itself, and sent an email to the auditionee with the link to an Audition form. Additional workflows sent reminder emails for auditionees that did not fill out the form by the due date.
CRM Reporting
Reports in CRM were also used for targeted show analytics. They kept track of interest in particular Roles, allowing directors to easily see how many people were auditioning for each role, as well as who received a callback
Forms
Audition Forms were hosted in Zoho Forms. These included General Information and Musical Information, which synced directly to the Contact record in the CRM upon submission, as well as Show specific information, which synced to the Role record. There was also an Uploads section for headshots and resumes.
This form was linked to the CRM, and prefilled information regarding the contact and Role via a unique link in the email, reducing the burden on those going through auditions.
Workdrive
Workdrive was used to host headshots and resumes from various actors auditioning to be a part of any active shows. It also hosted Audition videos for people auditioning virtually.
Cliq
Cliq was used in conjunction with CRM to enable quick notifications between staff members in different locations during auditions. Using a workflow rule, a Cliq message would be sent upon an auditionee being marked “Arrived” at the audition venue, notifying the audition panel.
Creator
Zoho Creator was leveraged to create a custom callback tracker. The theatre staff member was able to type in an auditionee’s name, and pull information from the CRM into a subform in Creator. The subform showed the role that they were auditioning for, as well as the readings, songs, or dances that they needed to learn and perform during the day of callbacks.
Callbacks were scheduled inside the creator app, and sorted by show, making it easy to see which individuals had callbacks, as well as the location and times of each individual event. It also allowed the staff members to create easy to follow schedules of their whole day.
Outcomes
- Streamlined audition process for more efficient casting
- Organizing callbacks made a complex and time consuming process much simpler
- Schedule within the Callback App resulted in better communication and organization across coordinating teams
- Directors were able to directly input and share notes
- Digital forms created a simpler process for volunteers, who no longer had to keep track of paper forms.
This implementation completely redefined how our client managed auditions—from scattered spreadsheets and paper forms to a unified, digital experience. Audition sign-ups, callbacks, director notes, and performer data now live in one seamless ecosystem, saving significant time and reducing stress for all involved. Staff and volunteers now operate with clarity, collaboration, and confidence heading into each production.
Assets
Callbacks Structure
CRM Structure
