This is for all the choruses out there that successfully sell tickets to their concerts but don't currently store their ticket buyer data in one centralized location online.
Today, we'll discuss why it's important to collect ticket buyer data and store it online.
Here are nine reasons why:
1. So you can send important concert information to attendees.
If you have your ticket buyers' email addresses, then you can send important information to your full list of attendees prior to the concert. Send "know before you go" emails that include parking details, recommended times to arrive at the venue, check-in process, concert length, nearby restaurants, and other information that can help your ticket buyers have a great experience on concert day.
2. So you can gather feedback after the concert.
Your audience's feedback matters. If you collect and store the email addresses of your ticket buyers, you can send them surveys after the concert asking for their feedback. Use this data to help you improve your future performances.
Download our post-concert survey template for a great starting point!
3. So you can learn who your target market is.
On your online ticket buyer forms or with a post-concert survey, you can collect demographic data of your audience. This will help you learn the makeup of your audience and will help you better market your performances to these types of people in the future. This data can also help you identify new markets to target as well.
4. So you can grow your subscriber list.
Email marketing could be one of the best tools we have to successfully market our choruses. But, often times, choruses collect data and either don't store it or they don't push the data over to their email marketing platform. This keeps email subscriber lists pretty stagnant.
But, if you collect and store ticket buyer email addresses, you can easily migrate this data to your email marketing system for use in future marketing efforts. This will allow you to communicate with your audiences year-round!
5. So you can gather historical data about your ticket buyers.
Wouldn't it be nice to know if your ticket buyer has purchased tickets before? How many tickets have they bought over the years? How much revenue have they given the organization through ticket purchases? Is that ticket buyer also a member or donor? Which concerts does this ticket buyer prefer to attend?
By storing both the ticket buyer's contact information and the ticket data itself, you can begin to answer these types of questions. This can help influence your marketing and concert planning efforts moving forward.
6. So you can identify your top ticket buyers.
If you could identify your top ticket buyers, what might you do with that information? Perhaps you would invest more time nurturing those relationships. Perhaps you might find more ways to thank the ticket buyer. Or perhaps you might try to get those ticket buyers more invested in the organization by encouraging them to become a donor, volunteer, or singer.
If you know who your top ticket buyers are, you can focus on building relationships with them and utilizing them to help the chorus thrive.
7. So you can identify your unengaged ticket buyers.
Let's say someone has notoriously bought tickets from you over the years and all of a sudden, they've stopped buying. Wouldn't you want to know why?
By identifying your former ticket buyers who have disengaged recently, you'll have the opportunity to identify why you are losing ticket buyers and address potential issues as they arise.
8. So you can see where your ticket buyers are coming from.
When you collect ticket buyer data, you can also collect data about where that ticket buyer came from - also known as acquisition analysis. This can help you save money on ineffective marketing efforts and invest in the ones that are working.
9. So your box office can be managed effectively.
When managing our box offices, it's easy to get stuck with the status quo and "the way we've always done it." It's often hard to recognize when something isn't working.
With box offices that are managed offline, ticket buyer information is typically mismanaged in some way. This can sometimes mean more staff time is spent trying to organize the information, a higher likelihood of human error, a greater risk with mismanaging money or credit card information, longer wait times for audiences as the door, and, ultimately, frustrated buyers, staff, and volunteers.
By collecting and storing this information online, it keeps all of your ticket buyer data in one centralized location that helps minimize these risks and frustrations, while also saving you time.
If you're not yet collecting and storing your ticket buyer data, now's the time to get started. Look for online ticketing solutions for your chorus today!
Tori Cook is the former Director of Sales & Marketing at Chorus Connection, an active board member of the Greater Boston Choral Consortium, and a soprano with the Tanglewood Festival Chorus. In a past life, she was the Music Director of the Harborlight Show Chorus and President of Chorus pro-Musica. When not making music, she daydreams about adopting a golden retriever puppy and scuba diving to exotic locations around the world.