Talking Tickets 28 January 2022: NFTs! Penn State! Sell More Tickets! Adele! And, More!
Number 120
Hey, y’all!
After about two weeks of being down due to the coronavirus, I’m finally starting to feel like myself again.
The webinar on Wednesday went off pretty well. So we will work on doing more courses, webinars, and such.
I’m going to work up the state of play piece in the secondary market for a bit further down the road. It needs a bit more attention than I can give it in one sitting.
To the Tickets!
1. The Big Story: 7 Ways To Sell More Tickets in 2022:
Big Ideas:
My voice is shot, but I can still pull off an hour presentation. The COVID hangover is real.
Experimentation and having a high business metabolism are key right now.
A+B > 2A or 2B
I hosted a webinar on Wednesday and we had a good group of people. The slides are at the link and I’m going to post the audio of the session in the podcast feed in a week or so.
Before that, I’ve got a great episode with Ruth Hartt.
Anyway, with this week’s webinar let’s get some fun stuff in here.
I’ll give you my three top takeaways from the session and you can pick out your own from the slides.
First, is the role of market research.
Second, expand your sales cadence.
Third, experimentation.
To begin, my neighbor chimed in on this on Twitter, she’s a researcher in politics. And, she’s not wrong about the signal and the noise.
My model of research is when at all possible, let’s move from small to large with individual conversations, focus groups, large things like surveys.
I also advise you to use backward market research to guide your research like Sarah said, separate the signal and the noise.
The reason I’ve been hitting on this lately is because we are seeing different things going on in the market that we need to account for:
The death of the city may have been overstated. In NYC, December saw the highest rents ever. In DC, Monumental Sports is building out an esports area adjacent to the arena despite the city losing the most population of any city in America. (2.9%)
In London, walking and cycling trips increased 10%. This change in travel patterns means that different neighborhoods and parts of the city are seeing different traffic and foot traffic than they did before the pandemic. Pauline Fallowell talks about this on our pod.
Inflation in 2021 in the US was 7%. The UK over 4%, same in Germany. Brazil seems to have hit double digits, but I didn’t see a whole lot of information that I can link to here. The key is that with rising costs, wages aren’t keeping up enough. In the US, wage rises were around 4%. Meaning folks are still down 3%. This is going to cause people to spend differently.
You need to know what is going on.
Full stop.
Second, expand your sales cadence.
I talked about folks using new or different tools, but more importantly, combining tools.
That’s where the formula A+B > 2A or 2B comes in.
You get better results combining tools than doubling down on one.
So add some mail or some text or email to your phone calls…or something.
This leads to the last point, experimentation.
You can’t trust that what got you here will make you successful in the next phase of the business.
People have changed. The economy is different. What people view as valuable is different. The pandemic is still causing folks to change their behaviors.
On and on.
You need to be flexible. You must be willing to test and move. Test and move.
This was just the first webinar that I am going to do this year. Some free and some fee. I think there is a lot of fun to be had there. I’ve also got the idea of a podcast-based conference for April that I’m hoping to share more about in the next few weeks as well.
Oh, the times to be had!
2. The Road to Recovery: Adele Postpones Her Vegas Residency:
Big Ideas:
In the past few days, maybe it was a disagreement with management or something else that drove the postponement…who knows?
Adele gets a pass because she’s a Tottenham fan!
As much as the Omicron, there is probably a hint of the reality of the current difficulties selling tickets to anything as the Omicron variant has spiked.
Adele postponed her shows at Caeser’s citing challenges with Covid for her staff and production issues.
This is understandable.
But I doubt it is the complete story.
As the week has progressed, reports have put out the number of people impacted by COVID as one. And, that the issue is more about Adele’s issues with management.
The reality is that we likely won’t know the full story for a while, if at all.
The reality is that as we’ve been dealing with the spike in Omicron cases, anyone rethinking their sales and marketing efforts, their production schedule, or their willingness to take on a new production is just acting with the proper amount of prudence because even though we’ve been in the middle of the pandemic for the last two years, we still are making up a lot of stuff as we go.
In other words, I’m giving Adele a pass because she sings a mean version of “Glory, Glory Tottenham Hotspur!”
All kidding aside, the real deal here is that the Omicron variant has caused disruption. I feel like a huge percentage of folks I know have been sick with the 19. And, as the data shows, while the virus is freely circulating, we are going to have declining demand for restaurants, games, and other crowded events.
It has been true with COVID-19 and it has been true throughout history.
3. How-To: Explain the view of the secondary market from a customer’s point of view:
Big Ideas:
There is a huge difference between the way the secondary market is viewed in the United States and everywhere else in the world.
As recovery from the pandemic starts, recognizing that there are fans involved and that just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should is probably smart business.
LOL, my inbox later.
This Jamie Webster video is pretty interesting. He drags a lot of folks on the primary side, the secondary side, and the government.
Let me run down a little on each of these.
First, is the primary side.
Back in the day, I talked with Richard Howle about the way that on-sales are operated in tickets and how it is the practice that is designed to be easy for the BO and venue, but not for the customers.
As an industry, the need to be more focused on the customer and to get into the business of being customer-focused is essential now. I don’t have the quote from Maureen Andersen in front of me, but it goes something about stopping being in the business of no.
In too many cases, we are seeing businesses re-open and try and run back to doing things the way they’ve always done.
That’s a clear sign of future failure.
The second, the secondary market.
Again, depending on where you are in the world…you’re going to see an entirely different take on the secondary market.
Let’s just take a moment and make a general statement, which is likely dumb, but I’ll do it anyway.
With the advent of so many technology platforms, there is a disconnect between customer, broker, and the transaction.
This has increased secondary market sales prices. It has increased customer dissatisfaction with the industry. And, it has led to the rise of a lot of business practices sprouting up that may eventually have unintended consequences.
I do think Jamie’s point about following the money is wise because as we’ve seen in markets of all kinds when there is consolidation and chokepoints, the money flows up and everyone that is making the market work seems to be left with the short end of the transaction through lower profits, higher prices, and less choice or innovation.
Finally, the government.
Again, Jamie does a good job dragging folks here.
The one point here is that there is a level of inconsistency in the actions and statements from our political leaders.
I’d say follow the money, but you already know that…
4. Tech/Tools/Profiles: What Will NFTs End Up Becoming?
Big Ideas:
Value is defined by the customer, not you.
Is it speculation or is it something else?
This is a bet.
How’d everyone make out in the Bitcoin crash of 2022?
This short primer on the NFT market is very helpful if you are trying to figure out what to think about the topic.
I won’t go as far as Mark Ritson, yet, and call them the latest idiot magnet. But I will say that it is odd to see so many folks go all-in on something that doesn’t have so many use cases when you can barely get them to change other business practices that are outdated and haven’t changed in decades.
So it goes!
I’m often not too hot or not too cold on anything. I’m much more of an “it depends” on most things.
Again, with NFTs, it depends.
In looking at the role that NFTs are likely to play in building audiences, growing a connection to your fans, and being a part of your business, my go-to resource is Zoe Scaman. Her work focuses on using these “Web3” technologies to build and grow fandoms. She’s been talking about some of the examples like Gronk used for quite a while.
First, you have to look at what the value is.
As Rich Klineman says, the customer defines the value…you don’t.
Some of the examples where the physical and the digital are coming together in a way that generates value can be seen with Gronk’s example of meet and greets. We also recently saw the Warrington Wolves become the first Super League team to use NFTs in their jersey launch. Then we see someone like NFT Concerts offering up what could be considered an expansion of the bootlegs that are often by artists like Pearl Jam, the Dead, and other artists.
Second, there is speculation.
Bitcoin Crash 2022 highlighted the reality in any investment, “things don’t always go up.”
You have to have a risk profile.
Do I think that a lot of these investments were bonkers?
For me, sure.
Do I know that a lot of the investments were being made with cryptocurrencies and paid for with cryptocurrencies so that no fiat currency ever changed hands?
I don’t, but I wouldn’t be surprised.
Does this mean everything is bad?
No.
It means that you have to keep an eye on these things and you should be cautious when making investments in these kinds of items the same as you would with stocks, real estate, sports cards, or tickets.
Third, this is a bet.
Like any new business opportunity, you are making a bet that you can get to the future before other folks.
Again, I’m not all or nothing on most things.
In the way that Blockchain or NFTs are offered up as additional value to sports fans, theatergoers, or audiences of the arts. Innovation hasn’t always been the strongest suit for a lot of these businesses, so I’m cautious.
And, as we are seeing in many places, the people that seem to be benefiting currently aren’t necessarily the customers that bought in early but the creators or content producers…which isn’t necessarily saying there is anything wrong, but it does highlight the need for caution.
Finally, with any emerging technology or idea, the whims of the market can shift pretty quickly.
Remember, Kozmo.com, the pet rock, or pandemic pets.
With everything, do your due diligence. Understand that there is a certain amount of risk involved in any decision. And, make certain that you recognize that value is in the eye of the customer, not in the eye of the creator.
5. Blurbs and Such:
Frederic Longatte shares his vision for 2022: I like that this has become an annual tradition with Secutix and Frederic. The new revenue stream and advances in technology are pretty spot on from where I sit because the challenge of recovery will require more creativity that has had to be mustered in the past. And, getting closer to your audience…c’mon man!
What will the unintended consequences of this strategy be? Remember the power framework? Let’s think through this as an exercise and ask ourselves where are Penn State’s power against their competition, their customers, and their suppliers? In this case, the suppliers’ would-be vendors, brokers, etc. In looking at the world of college athletics, they are still struggling to make sense of the current business environment and some of the consequences of the old way of doing business. So this will be an interesting one to follow.
Audiences Still Feel Uncertain About Going Out To Shows: The race to cut the COVID quarantine from 10 to 5 days in the US or 7 to 5 in the UK isn’t helping consumer confidence. In my own experience, I was still getting positive COVID tests after 11 days. So...it seems like the story is a little more complex than we might still believe.
MLB shuts down Rays’ attempt at hosting half their games in Montreal: Hmmm…dual cities will be the future. I’m not sure exactly what is going to happen here, but I do think that the situation in Tampa likely highlights the challenges that baseball is facing. Do I know if playing a baseball roadshow is the road forward? No. But I do think that it highlights an ongoing marketing problem in baseball.
Red61 comes to America: Welcome to America, y’all!
Washington Pavilion Management is SecuTix’s first non-profit arts client in the US: I will celebrate with Eric in Boca over cigars and cocktails! Congratulations!
True Tickets wins some investment: Dranks on Matt and Steve!
I was on the ‘Strategy Sprints’ podcast last week to talk about strategy, marketing, and profitability. Give it a listen.
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Check out my friends at Booking Protect! Customers have been taking up refund protection at a rate that is double what it was before the pandemic began. This is a great opportunity for you to offer more value to your customers in a way that they want while also creating a new revenue stream for your organization.
I did an awesome podcast with Hannah Grannemann this week about marketing for the arts, awareness from the digital expansion in the pandemic, and market orientation. Check it out!