Posts filed under ‘Web 2.0’
Mobile Apps – How do you butter your bread on both sides?
Live Nation (owner of Ticketmaster) has just announced that it has launched an iPhone app for the Apple OS. Ticketmaster parent Live Nation drives ticket sales via mobile commerce platform
Live Nation has previouslyl become involved with Apple in providing concert listings for iTunes 10.
But back in 2009, Ticketmaster launched Ticketmaster for Blackberry (albeit described as “a glorified browser shortcut/plugin“) and has since stated that Blackberry is the “Official Smartphone of Ticketmaster“. Although the page on the Ticketmaster site does confuse the issue with the tag line “love seeing it live”
Is this an example of how a monopoly vertically integrated company just tries to ensure that it is all things to all people?
13 December, 2010 at 11:11 am Tim Roberts ARTS Australia Leave a comment
Sustainable Growth needs Customer Focus = People and Leadership
An interesting post from Adrian Swinscoe on MyCustomer.com: Customer strategy: How to cure ‘hole in my bucket’ syndrome
It discusses Reichheld and the foundations of his Net Promoter work and then refers to Chris Anderson and the Long Tail and how technology is “fundamentally changing the way companies do business and how they are viewed by their customers.“
However, it is the simple model supported by the stool image (right) that I find most interesting. He suggests that “sustainable and customer focused growth strategies are enabled by two things: people and leadership.
- Customer focus is all about ideas and strategies that will help companies build customer retention, loyalty, service, experience and their brand. I believe that if you do these things correctly, referrals and great word of mouth will flow naturally.
- People is about ways to help build the team and culture, develop innovation, improve communication and increase engagement with employees.
- Leadership is about how to develop the vision, strategy, and leadership style, whilst also cultivating innovation and managing the change that you will need, to create the sustainable business that you want.“
Guess what – there is no mention of technology! This seeming CRM contradiction was put well by Dr Adrian Payne at the NARPACA Ticketing Professionals Conference in Melbourne in 2008.
“About 92% of CRM costs go towards the technology but … only 25% of CRM success is attributable to technology.“
Similarly it is often said that about 2/3 of CRM projects will fail or fail to deliver on expectations, therefore we need to be addressing a lot more than just buying new software. It ain’t a Field of Dreams.
15 November, 2010 at 11:27 am Tim Roberts ARTS Australia Leave a comment
Is it Ticketing Going Viral or are Ticket Company Startups Going Viral?
Another day, another article about a new ticketing option. This is great for innovation, but is it sustainable?
One such new entrant is Amiando with the aim “to harness the cost benefits and reach of the internet, as well as social media networks such as Facebook and Twitter, to offer event organisers on demand invitation management, promotion and attendee registration, as well as integrated billing.“
Ticket sales attract a charge of $0.99 (£0.79) per attendee plus 5.9% of the attendance fee. So on a US$30 ticket that is US$0.99 plus US$1.77 = US$2.76 or 9.2% on a $10 ticket it grows to 15.8% of ticket price. While it compares well for higher priced tickets, it is a pricey option for lower priced tickets like children’s events etc.
However, price may not be the issue … for long. The article then discusses other numerous similar online options like: Etouches, TicketBiscuit and Fatsoma. These are just a few of the options in this rapidly growing area and the common trend in a market as more entrants are attacted is the shift to price competition, with the eventual result of commodity pricing when there is little differentiation left amongst competitors as they compete for market share. It is early days but the accelerated product lifecycle of such Internet offerings makes one wonder how long till these companies are cannibalising each other’s market share? Afterall, a SaaS solution based in the UK available on the Internet can compete just as easily as a service in Australia or Singapore. The barriers of payment gateways and the like are less and less of an issue, particularly with global solutions like PayPal.
The article then discusses the dominant agency model and opportunity that these new players may present.
Neil Saunders, senior analyst with Verdict Research suggests that in comparison to the newer leaner distribution options, ”companies like Ticketmaster don’t really add a significant amount of value.“
However, this ignores one important issue, whether traditional ‘middlemen’ add value or not, when it comes to venues – the agencies like Ticketmaster have venue exclusive ticketing contracts that preclude competition.
Until venue exclusive ticketing contracts or similar handicaps to competition are discouraged, agencies like Ticketmaster will preclude these numerous new ticketing options from moving beyond small venues and events.
With the recent launch of Foxtix in Australia, going head to head with both the current dominant agencies: Ticketmaster and Ticketek, one has to wonder how much money Rupert Murdoch is prepared to throw into the bidding war to assert control with exclusive ticketing contracts. I suspect the result will be a leap in the quantum of ‘key money’, and unfortunately reducing the options for a change in these contracts that maintain the current duopoly. But is there room for three agencies in Australia? Time will tell.
1 November, 2010 at 10:10 am Tim Roberts ARTS Australia 2 comments
What is a tweet worth in ticket sales? 43c?
A colleague Steven Roth pointed out this research Social Commerce: A First Look at the Numbers:
“one share on Facebook equals $2.52, a share on Twitter equals $0.43, a share on LinkedIn equals $0.90, and a share through our ”email friends” application equals $2.34. On an aggregate level across Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, and our email share tool, each share equals $1.78 in ticket sales.“
Eventbrite has taken a similar approach as mentioned in a previous FULL HOUSES post Building “Real World” Relationships Online and offers an integration with Sales Force CRM software. The Eventbrite Connector makes easy work of the API and allows the export of ticket purchasers to Sales Force to build a prospect database. The issue that is not clear is whether full purchase history is taken across to Sales Force and if the API is two- way. But it is FREE and it is a good start and I suggest that we will see more of this sort of integration with existing standards and less reinventing of the wheel.
18 October, 2010 at 9:29 am Tim Roberts ARTS Australia Leave a comment
Which way are you leaning – Mobile Web or an App?
Technology in the Arts has an interesting post as part of the Arts Marketing Blog Salon hosted by Americans for the Arts on the topic of whether arts organisations should be developing mobile websites or mobile applications to take advantage of the explosive growth in mobile device use for Internet access.
There are two posts referrred to:
- Technology in the Arts on Facebook – Going Mobile – Websites vs Apps
- ARTSBlog - Going Mobile: Website vs. App
Dave Dombrowsky offers some valid points to consider:
- User base: Mobile phone penetration is approaching 100%, BUT 62% of mobiles can not download mobile apps.
- Connectivity: Mobile websites require a live Internet connection, many mobile apps do not.
- Platforms: Mobile websites are accessible from all types of mobile devices, Mobile apps are device specific.
- Price: Mobile websites are cheaper to build than mobile apps.
- Expectations: It all depends on what do your patrons want from a mobile experience?
I would suggest adding another consideration:
Does your organisation wish to facilitate customer transactions i.e. sell tickets etc.?
It appears that the Mobile Web fits the bill for commerce sites better as it is always online and ubiquitous and supports open payment methods.
According to the Taptu report ‘The State of the Mobile Touch Web’, “19% of the mobile sites measured were Shopping & Services sites; compared to 3.6% in the same category in the App Store.“
Read the FULL HOUSES post on this topic back in March – Will the iPhone and App be replaced by the more open Mobile Touch Web?
13 October, 2010 at 3:11 pm Tim Roberts ARTS Australia Leave a comment
This is your mobile ticket
We have heard of a fair few different mobile ticket options now using different methodologies from 2D to 3D and so-on.
What I find really interesting is how many are coming into the market and the best bit of all is that they are all adding their own unique features. From that will spring all sorts of unique innovation!
By way of example, I was intrigued by some fatures that San Francisco start-up MogoTix offers:
“The system can let multiple organizers see who’s checked in, broadcast the names of guests as they arrive and send out alerts to guests a few hours before the event.“
These sort of things may not appeal to everyone, but I love the fresh thinking and the application of the technology in new ways.
In actual fact, announcing guests “on arrival at the Ball” may have been around for centuries, but who is to say that in a social media world with its ever connected constituents that this may be as relevant today to Lady Gaga’s Little Monsters as to … the court in other fairytales like Cinderella?
Sending out alerts to guests a few hours before the event, why stop there? Send them out warnings about car park capacity, or a special offer at the in-house bar or restaurant or a special deal after the show and so-on. I know that some organisations have requested functionality to warn subscribers so they don’t forget that they have seats for a show the following week. Maybe the secret of good service is timely, relevant communication, whatever the medium.
24 September, 2010 at 5:28 pm Tim Roberts ARTS Australia 1 comment
Proof: How social media sold a theatre ticket on Facebook
A great blog article about monitoring social media and quantifying RoI from San Francisco colleague Ron (Big Game Hunter) Evans of GroupOfMinds.
Ron explores a case of virtual Word of Mouth first hand and then discusses the difficulties of identifying the sources and results of the diversity of conversations Social media may inspire. Ron then suggests some good ways to track the results of social media out in the wild.
“Not only is the conversation itself good, as it leads us to discover more about ourselves and the work, but those conversations can lead to real results at the box office.“
READ FULL ARTICLE ON GROUPOFMINDS Proof: How social media sold a theatre ticket on Facebook>>
17 September, 2010 at 2:10 am Tim Roberts ARTS Australia 1 comment
Mobilising & Learning About More Than Just The Ticket Purchaser
As Forrester Research says “more and more companies are embracing social media networking under their marketing strategy to boost e-commerce”.
BookMyShow in India is at the lead embracing this with a Facebook application to allow FB Friends to “share details of movies playing in the neighborhood and allow each of them to pay for his own ticket, without even leaving the site’s page. Now, BookMyShow is about to release its Facebook ticketing application in the next few weeks.“
We all appreciate the potential value of Word of Mouth, personal recommendations and social networking and media, and we are now starting to see some of this potential unleashed.
With greater accessibility of purchase channels, more payment methods and more fluid regular communication between social groups, it looks like there may be less reliance upon the single event attendance organiser and most commonly purchaser of tickets. I believe that many of these initiator developments (invitations, RSVPs and more transaction options) facilitate greater accessibility and remove barriers that demanded a ‘social organiser’. Hopefully many of these social network developments will facilitate easier social organisation that encourages attendance and grows demand accordingly.
One of the greatest stumbling blocks to CRM and Direct Marketing, built upon the source of ticketing transaction data, is that only the purchaser is identified. What I also find exciting in such social networking developments is that there will be a potential to disaggregate transaction data below the level of the single ‘group’ purchaser of x tickets to the individual consumption level.
READ FULL ARTICLE ONLINE Time for ‘social’ shopping>>
15 September, 2010 at 12:42 pm Tim Roberts ARTS Australia Leave a comment
Cheaper Tickets and Cheaper Fees Seem Back to Front?
The mistaken commodity emphasis of much of the discussion regarding ticketing and its inherent preoccupation with ticket price and fees ignores the rest of the marketing tools available to artists. But more importantly, to presume price is the one and only variable is to diminish their creative asset and discount their other great asset their relationship with fans and the impact of loyalty.
A case in point is this article: Artists Realizing It’s Time To Offer Cheaper Concert Tickets Directly, And To Get Rid Of Annoying Fees
Again as stated previously, I am all for artists and event owners dealing directly with the fans that they have a relationship with, rather than being forced to use third party agents. It is not great lightbulb moment as these articles seem to present. Other industries have been leading the way for a while now with disaggregation and removing middlemen from the equation by opening the channels for customers to deal directly with them.
The growth and widespread adoption of the Internet has enabled a great variety of online channels and this is only growing all the time with the current blooms in the mobile and social media areas. All these developments are doing the same thing, increasing availability and access.
So we need to move on from a preoccupation with price and, yes, get rid of fees for the inconvenience of dealing through an agent and open up channels direct to the artist and event owner. We need to focus upon maximising the benefit of these technological enhancements and develop relationships directly with consumers and fans. we now have the tools, capacity and we just have to add the capability and intent to develop one to one relationships with our constituents.
Lets look at the larger demand equation, rather just focussing on price and arguing over the efficiency of using agents to deal with your customers and fans.
As Drucker said “Efficiency is doing things right; effectiveness is doing the right things.”
Paraphrasing Drucker, no amount of efficiency will make up for a lack of effectiveness. So no surprise it is more important to be doing the right thing . “There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all.”
Venue Exclusive Ticketing Contracts that force the outsourcing customer contact to third party agencies is no longer the right thing to do.
23 August, 2010 at 11:33 am Tim Roberts ARTS Australia Leave a comment
Apple Adds to Future Ticketing Potential of the iPhone
Adding weight to a previous posting Apple is patently on the move into ticketing comes the announcement that Apple has hired an expert in NFC or described as “one of the big go-to guys if you’re interested in cell phone payment systems“.
Near-Field Communications (NFC) has been applied to public transport for contact free ticketing amongst other things. Qantas is trialling it at Perth Airport currently. “ NFC uses very short-range radio signals to send data between two system, typically with a flat spiral metal antenna–this is concealed inside those smart train tickets (or member card), since it’s both cheap and flexible.“
The difference is that developing this for iPhones may offer greater functionality and new service levels and services: “In high-tech NFC implementations, the antenna is hooked up to something much more powerful like a smartphone. When the phone is placed on or over an NFC sensor pad, much more complicated data can then be sent between the two systems, with data going to and from the phone.“
“NFC tech has been available for years, but it’s only really taken off in a few markets–like Japan–since the benefits have been pretty much limited to its contact-free nature. But now, with smartphones becoming the norm, the cleverer uses of NFC could mean the tech is about to explode into usefulness …“
Apple Hire Wireless Payment Guru, Prepare for iPhone Credit Cards
18 August, 2010 at 10:10 am Tim Roberts ARTS Australia 2 comments
