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The notion of selling additional tickets to your event is hard to resist. Wanting to sell more tickets is great, but many event organizers struggle just to sell enough tickets. Below are a few ideas for maximizing your ticket sales (including the strategy of selling fewer tickets to make more money). Each point is supported by additional article links expanding on the subject area. You might be just a click away from an idea that will make your event extra money.
Here we go …
Do You Have an Alluring Event People Can't Help But Attend?
A highly desired event is the single biggest factor in selling MORE tickets. Far too many event organizers think just because they have an event, people will attend. It doesn’t work that way. If you want a financially successful event … There should be little, if any, convincing to get someone to buy a ticket.
As a site note … Be extremely careful if you’re planning a “never done before” event. The risks of failure are extremely high. If you want to try brand new event, START small and test. Only go big with your NEW event concept after it’s proven in the marketplace.
Have a Marketing Campaign and Web Site that Sell!
A visually stunning marketing campaign is useless if it doesn’t drive ticket sales. Your visuals include everything from your web site to advertising design. Everything counts! Most graphic designers don’t have a clue how to PROPERLY design your event marketing pieces to boost ticket sales. The individual who designs your marketing materials should have a proven track record in direct response marketing. Direct response marketers get your event measurable results.
The Irresistible Offer
At the heart of direct response design is compelling and persuasive copy. Do the words on your promotional materials DRIVE people to purchase tickets? It isn’t enough to just slap a series of “BUY NOW” buttons on your event web site ticket page. Each word on every piece of marketing must earn its place.
If you want to sell more tickets for your event, you need to present the consumer with an irresistible ticket offer. When they see your ticket offer, they can’t help but buy. The easiest way to evoke an “I can’t help myself” buying urge is with discount pricing. Discounting your ticket prices (smartly) is an easy way to drive both advance and total ticket sales. In order for discount tickets to work, you must carefully track your sales. It’s imperative that you are driving additional revenue with discount, NOT giving it up.
Sell Fewer Tickets, Make More Money
It’s fairly easy to get caught up in the notion of selling a lot of tickets. But what if you could make more money by selling fewer tickets? What seems a bit counterintuitive can be very lucrative. Consider offering VIP or premium tickets for your event. VIP tickets are a great way to generate huge returns, while selling less tickets.
One client generates around $100,000 a year by selling just 900 VIP tickets for their FREE event! Another client sold over $175,000 of tickets for their event last year, 40% of their total revenue was premium and VIP tickets. The world is full of people who are willing to pay top dollar (in spite of economic conditions) to experience your event in an extraordinary way.
You don't have to use every idea above, but try to incorporate at least one into your next event.
Today, it's difficult not to find a good reason to sell event tickets online. While most event organizers tend to focus on the convenience factors, there is one significant advantage of online ticket sales. Hint … it has nothing to do with advance ticket sales or fraud prevention (but those are both very good reasons to sell tickets online). Any guesses?
Your Customer’s Data
What's the most important reason to sell tickets online? Customer data. When your event attendees purchase tickets online they need to fill in their contact information. It's part of the transaction processs ... and it's a HUGE marketing resource for you!
At a minimum you're collecting their name and e-mail address. For most online ticket sales you usually get much more data. This includes your attendee’s full name, mailing address, e-mail, and telephone number. Such detailed customer information is a gold mine for event promotion, ESPECIALLY if you have a recurring event. As the old marketing adage goes, “your best customer is the person who just bought from you.”
Here's a little Insider Secret … the unbelievable client advance ticket sales numbers I proudly display on the “success stories and testimonials page” are directly a result of ethically leveraging customer data.
It's Not Neccesarily What You Think
Let me throw some counter intuitive insight into the mix … Leveraging your customer data goes well beyond selling people advance tickets. You can use customer data to gain tremedous insight about your event. This includes things like pre-event and post-event surveys. You can also use customer data to give event updates, directions, and parking information. Think of it as a customer service tool. How could you ethically leverage your customer information? I've included some ideas in the links below. Use customer feedback to improve your event ... Something your competition probably isn't doing!
One Very Important Note About Customer Data
If you are using customer data for marketing purposes, let your customers know. Even in today's Facebook laden world, privacy is a very important issue and must be respected! That means letting your customers know how their contact information will be used. It's also important that you're in compliance with local and national regulations regarding marketing solicitation.
One strong recommendation ... never rent or sell your customer data to third parties. This is one of the quickest ways to upset your own customers. Remember, all it takes is one RAGING MAD Facebook or Twitter post, and you could be headed for a PR nightmare.
Don't Jump Ship Too Quickly
Some event organizers might be apprehensive about selling ticket online. That's completely understandable! If you've been selling event tickets off-line for years, I recommend easing into the online ticketing world. You might be thinking, “you just told me why I should try getting all of my tickets sold online." Yes, I'm giving you slightly conflicting advice, but give me a moment to explain ... If you’ve been selling tickets online for years, immediately jumping to an online ticket system MIGHT cost you ticket sales. You can "get your feet wet" by selling tickets both online and off. This allows you to slowly step into the world of online event ticketing. Easing to online tickets will also show you if there is a significant difference in revenue channels (offline to online.) If more than 80% of your sales come from online tickets, you can probably curtail or eliminate off-line ticket channels.
To truly financial protect yourself, you need to have an excellent understanding of all of your event revenue channels. Always take a careful look at your numbers before changing how you sell event tickets.
Again, if you’re apprehensive about selling tickets online, TEST FIRST. Sell tickets both online an off … with zero assumptions. After your event is over, consider the sales numbers. Chances are that the results will pleasantly surprise you.
Here are some additional resources regarding selling event tickets online:
by Eugene Loj
One of the most common questions event organizers ask is, "where should I advertise my event?" Instead of getting into a long protracted article about event advertising, I am going to focus on the simplest, yet most powerful, advice I could give you. The information below might seem overly obvious, yet it gets ignored all the time. In the process, thousands (sometimes hundreds of thousands) of dollars are WASTED on ineffective advertising.
Message to Market Match
Marketing great, Dan Kennedy, introduced me to the concept of “Message to Market Match.” Kennedy created a marketing triangle which focuses on the THREE critical aspects of your marketing “Message, Market, and Media.” The Media component of Kennedy’s triangle marketing involves select the right advertising medium on which to advertise. In short, regardless having the correct (possibly perfect) marketing message, you must advertise on a medium where your target market will see that message. Failure to use the right marketing media (medium) usually results in spending a ton of foolishly wasted advertising dollars. I can tell you first hand, this happens often, even with “smart” event organizers.
Don't Advertise Where Your Target Market Doesn't Look
In order for your promotional and advertising efforts to work, you must advertise were your target market is looking, listening, or watching (Print, Radio, Web, or Television). Don’t be tempted by the “too good to be true” marketing campaign. Watch out when a salesperson says things like this … “We can get you 10,000 Facebook likes for just $997.” Or, “we can get your advertising message in front of 10,000 people a day." It's not about how many people see your advertising … It's ALL about how many people see your advertising and take a desired action. Instead focus on where you will get the most bang for your buck. In short, this means advertising in places that your target market is predisposed to seeing your message.
Know Your Target Market
In order to effectively market your event on the best advertising medium, you must intimately know your target market. In this case, "where are their eyeballs spending time?" This involves doing a little market research. Below are some questions that will help you in deciding where to advertise your event …
By answering the questions above, you'll have a much better idea of where to spend your marketing dollars. There is no need to invest in advertising, if your target market isn't paying attention.
The “Repetition” Argument
As a side note, if you think that repetition can help “get your marketing message out there,” you're headed for an iceberg of disappointment. I've seen event organizers spend hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to change people’s minds, it simply doesn’t work. For more details on repetition and marketing, check out this article, “Don't Fall Prey to "Repetition" When Advertising Your Event.”
Ultimately, you want to make sure that your advertising is delivered through the right medium (media). Before you sign your next advertising contract take some time to answer the questions above. It could save you big bucks on advertising and ensure your event is successful.
Here are some additional ideas to help you determine where to advertise your event:
In the previous post, “Horrid Event Marketing Mistake: Confusing Art with Results,” I dove into the differences between graphic design and persuasive design. Originally, I was introduced to the idea of persuasive marketing by Eben Pagan. Eben used magazine covers, during a live training event, to illustrate the fundamentals of direct response marketing. Why am I writing about magazine covers on an event marketing and promotion web site? Because the same marketing fundamentals used to create a hot selling magazine cover can be used in your own event marketing.
The Magazine Cover Example
Image Sources: Women’s Health and Men’s Health
Combining Visual Appeal with Compelling Copy
How does a compelling magazine cover represent persuasive design? It targets the emotional heart-strings of a target market with visual appeal and compelling copy. Next time you see your favorite magazine, take a deeper psychological look. There is probably a person or image of interest featured on the cover. Magazine publishers use imagery to get your visual attention.
Next, you'll probably notice a series of article titles or headlines. Those catch phrases represent the information you’ll find inside the magazine. Something as simple as, “Lose Weight, Feel Better,” is amped up to say, “SLIM CALM SEXY - A Fast, Easy Plan to Drop Pounds & Beat Street! (Women’s Health Cover Above) Is that hype? Absolutely! But it works.
Those headlines and visual cues get you to pick up a magazine and read it … that’s persuasive design! You can use those same ideas to create your own event promotions such as billboards, posters, and even print advertisements.
I encourage you to look beyond your immediate market segment for event marketing ideas. Next time you’re at your local bookstore or library, spend some time in the magazine section. When you understand the fundamentals of sales and marketing, your next great event marketing idea is just around the corner.
Additional Event Promotion Resources:
There are a number of people out there who are going to take issue with my next statement, but here goes … Most graphic design for promoting an event is a complete waste of time and money. You’re probably thinking, “are you serious?!?!?” (Make sure you read on, because you're probably going to agree with my previous statement.) Yes, I am seriors and here’s why … too many graphic designers confuse creating art and getting business results when it comes to their design. Please understand, I’m not saying that your event web site or collateral materials should be without any design. What I’m saying is that any graphic design used on promotional materials for your event, should be PERSUASIVE and RESULTS ORIENTED. That means that every word and graphic element EARNS it place on your event marketing and promotions. A “gorgeous” or “beautiful” advertisement is irrelevant if it doesn’t get measurable results ... e.g. driving a tidalwave of advance ticket sales or driving a ton of people to your event web site.
Below are two great examples of PERSUASIVE design in action. The images below are from the from the Las Vegas Rock-n-Rock Marathon web site. They combine great design and verbiage with a specific (and measurable) outcome ... "READ MORE".
Persuasive Design Example #1
Persuasive Design Example #2
Images Source: http://runrocknroll.competitor.com/las-vegas/event-details.
Falling for Drop Dead Gorgeous
Over the last 10+ years, I’ve seen event organizers fall in love with a visually stunning design. Unfortunately, for all the fantastic design work … results were almost impossible to quantify. Is this all the graphic designers fault? No! But the simple fact of the matter is great design shouldn’t deviate from the fundamentals of classic salesmanship and marketing ... Your advertising must get you measureable results. Let’s look at a case study …
The Digital Billboard
Last year, a client designed a digital billboard to promote their event. Visually the design looked decent. Their digital billboard design resulted in an extra 5 visitors a day to their event web site. Was 5 extra visitors worth the cost?!?! That could be debated. Consider this … The digital billboard cost was between $1,000 per day or $6,000 for the month. The billboard company states in their promotional materials that you receive approximately 1,600+ spots per day. One could argue against using digital billboards, but I don’t blame the billboard company. Simply put, the billboard wasn’t persuasive enough to get people to take action.
Leverage the Fundamentals of Direct Response Advertising
What can you do? Make sure that every promotion and marketing piece for your event is results oriented. Here’s how you can do that … Find a graphic design who understands and uses the fundamentals of direct response advertising in everything they create. Here’s a video link by the late David Ogilvy to bring you up to speed on direct response marketing, David Ogilvy's "Secret Weapon" for Advertising Success(LINK). Ogilvy was considered by many to be "The Father of Advertising." Yet, most advertising agencies and graphic designers completely ignore his fundamental strategies. Please don’t make the same mistake.
Additional Event Marketing and Advertising Resources:
