30-Sept-2021

Before you to get too upset, the only thing that is shutting down is the WMCInfo.com web site. This site is not operated by, sponsored by, endorsed by, or affiliated with the official organizers of Winter Music Conference, Ultra Music Festival, or Miami Music Week. If you're looking for the official site, please head over to https://wintermusicconference.com/.

I started this site in the fall of 2010 ahead of the 2011 Winter Music Conference. I was involved with nightlife promotions as a side hobby and saw the need for a website focused on providing information for WMC guests, especially those travelling internationally. The site offered information on air travel, lodging, rental cars, and sold tickets to most of the events happening during WMC.

At the time, the Winter Music Conference site was only promoting their "official" events, leaving a big void for the hundreds of other parties happening in the days before, during, and after WMC. Plus, they were not selling tickets on their site, so even if you knew about an event, you'd have to find someone locally to buy tickets from or try to find them online.

After setting up the site, a friend helped me with marketing. We had a few great years where the site was consistently ranking in the number 2 or number 3 spot for many popular WMC searches. This resulted in tens of thousands of event tickets sales and a good amount of hotel and airline bookings, all of which we earned a small commission on.

After several successful years, the landscape started changing. The ticket broker we were using went out of business, resulting in a huge drop of traffic and search engine rankings. Then the vendor we partnered with for hotel bookings decided we weren't selling enough to keep supporting us, so we lost that piece of business too.

Interest in the industry side of WMC began fading with younger audiences more focused on Ultra Music Festival and Miami Music Week than WMC proper. Then in 2018, Ultra Music Festival purchased Winter Music Conference and further blurred the lines between the various events. Although there still are insider Winter Music Conference events and seminars, they have sadly lost some of the popularity they once had.

Given all these circumstances, I don't feel there's currently a need for a site like this, so I'm putting it on hold for now.

I've had a lot of fun running the site and have attended several Winter Music Conferences. I've met a lot of great people and am proud of what we accomplished. I still have a passion for nightlife, music, and dancing that is not going anywhere anytime soon!

Thank you to everyone that has supported the site over the years.

–Ryan Smith