Event ticketing isn’t anything new for nightclubs. Yet, many venues rush through the planning process and don’t set themselves up for success, especially when it comes to selecting their ticketing vendors. It’s incorrect to assume all third-party ticketing companies are the same, and it hurts you to not do your research.
Here are three things you need to ensure your ticketing vendor is able to provide (note: most big-name ticketing vendors don’t provide any of these, which decreases your profit potential).
1. Money goes into your bank right away
Most ticketing sites collect your customers’ payments in their own banks until after the event is over. Once the day of your event has passed, they’ll cut you a check for what you earned, but not until they’ve made sure to take any fees they deem themselves worthy to collect. Then, it takes a few business days for the remaining money to appear in your account, meaning you may not actually get paid until a week after the event happened (and weeks to months since your guests even purchased their ticket).
Instead, you should look to companies that ensure payment goes directly through your own merchant services provider and into your bank account right from the get-go. That way, a guest purchasing a ticket to your event is the same process as that guest buying a drink inside your venue doors.
2. A customized event landing page
Many ticketing sites have online-hosted pages about your event to help promote it and attract buyers. Yet, some of these sites don’t have the capabilities for guests to purchase tickets directly from the site. What’s worse is your event page is chock-full of advertisements and information about “similar venues” (aka competing venues).
Confirm beforehand what’s going to be on your event page. Better yet, look for companies that 1) don’t have competing venues or advertisements, 2) allow guests to purchase tickets directly from the website, 3) have the capabilities for you to fully customize your page to your needs, and 4) are able to provide you with a white-labeled widget to embed directly on your own website.
3. You own the data
It’s sad, but most ticketing sites don’t let venues see detailed information on who bought their tickets. Rather, they leverage this data to sell tickets for other venues on their own site. This is a huge missed opportunity and something you should never let happen.
Always make sure you’re given full access to your data. After all, data is one aspect you absolutely need to make better decisions and grow your profits. Your data should be able to tell you the number of tickets sold, the amount of revenue earned, a comparison of tickets sold and sales by event, the number of parties who attended, and who bought your tickets – including their name, gender, age, zip code, email, and phone number. This information lets you know whether your event was a success, what to improve on for the next event, and toward whom your marketing should be geared.
Parag Shah is the founder and director of sales at Vēmos. Contact him at parag.shah@vemos.io.
