1Sign in & dashboard
Log in, land on your dashboard.
Sign in with email & password (or continue with Google). A fresh account opens on the dashboard with a “Get set up” checklist walking you through the four things left to do.
The complete walkthrough · Voting & competitions
A real, end-to-end run-through of setting up a paid voting competition on GateOne — account, payouts, competition, categories, contestants, branding, going live, casting real votes, and reading the money. Built from actual screens of City Music Awards 2026.
The route
Sign in with email & password (or continue with Google). A fresh account opens on the dashboard with a “Get set up” checklist walking you through the four things left to do.
The organization holds everything you run. The country sets your currency and payment provider; the sender slug becomes your email-from address so receipts look like you.
Credits fund free/community voting (5 per vote). For a paid competition — where voters pay you — you connect a payout account next.
Open Payouts. There are two lanes, one per tab: Next-day payouts (your provider settles you directly) and After-event settlement (we collect, then wire a verified bank destination). Set up whichever country you'll run from.
This is the lane our City Music Awards uses. We collect the money, then wire your takings a few days after voting ends — to a bank destination you add and we verify.
A pending destination lets you build a paid competition, but you can't take payments until it's Verified. You'll see this enforced on the next step.
From Voting, hit New competition and pick a mode. We're doing the paid route, so a short wizard settles the money side before the form.
A summary chip (Paid competition · 7-day hold · Ghana) sits at the top with a Change link. Below it, three cards.
Creating lands the competition in Draft on its Overview, with a share QR and an “awaiting platform approval” banner. Head to Categories to build the ballot.
Now drop contestants into each — a name, an optional short bio, and a photo. Their code/number is assigned automatically; rows rank themselves by votes.
The Branding tab controls the whole public look — theme palette, an optional custom accent, a background texture, and a cover image + logo — with a live preview beside the controls.
New competitions are reviewed by the platform. Until then the Overview says awaiting approval. When it clears, an email arrives and the Overview hands you the Open voting button.
Before you open, it's worth seeing what visitors get. Since voting hasn't started, anyone opening the link sees a “Voting isn't open yet” holding page — themed, in light and dark.
Share the link and anyone can vote — no account. With more than one category, they start on a categories grid, then drop into a category to see its contestants.
The Ads tab drops a sponsor banner — or a message of your own — onto the public pages. And back in Branding, a texture adds depth to the background.
Add more than one banner and they'll rotate between themselves on the pages you assigned. Design them at exactly 1200×300px (4:1) so nothing is cropped.
Open a contestant and the voter gets the quantity picker: a stepper, your quick-pick buttons, and a live total. Let's cast two real votes and watch the board move.
Now the same for a second contestant, to see the flow repeat and the ranking flip.
Back in the organizer view, the Overview, Analytics and Finance tabs all light up with the two real votes — including exactly what you keep.
If you build this for someone, you can give them a no-login link that shows results and earnings live — from Settings → Organizer link.
The standings stay open to anyone with the link; only the earnings panel asks for the PIN if you set one. Perfect for letting an organizer watch their competition without touching your dashboard.
The portal is its own read-only mini-dashboard — an Organizer view header, days left, a link to the public page, and six tabs. A footer everywhere reads “This is a live view for the organizer. To change anything, contact whoever runs the competition.”
Build the competition, generate this link, and hand it over. The organizer watches results and money roll in live, without a login — and can't change a thing, so your setup stays intact.
Also in Settings: a daily results summary, emailed every morning at 6am (in the event's timezone) while voting is open, plus a final summary after it closes.
Price the vote, brand it, fill the ballot, get approved, open, share — then watch the board and the money move. Everything after setup is just sharing the link and reading results.
End to end
Everything above is a one-time build. Once it's live, it runs itself — voters pay, the board updates, and your wire is scheduled for after it closes. The Events guide follows the same shape for ticketing.