In May 2018, Bill Sutton - founding Director of the Sport and Entertainment Business Management MBA at University Central Florida - published an article for Sports Business Journal on full menu selling. In this article, Sutton argues that full menu season ticket selling is not only the future of ticketing, but the new best practice.
While offering full season packages may take less effort, it can be detrimental to a team’s overall revenue stream. When forced to purchase a full season, many ticket holders will resell their unwanted tickets on the secondary market. And if the season ticket holder is desperate to move inventory, they can (and often do) price their tickets below the team’s average ticket price.
Consequently, teams that only offer full seasons are turning their season ticket holders into brokers who are competing against them on the secondary market.
Many believe offering season ticket buyers a variety of options for season tickets can be time consuming and an inefficient use of a rep’s time.. Selling a full season is one sale but a half season or other mini plans requires more effort for the same dollars. But what if you could offer a variety of season plans (including half and mini) without any additional effort? The Digideck, by Sportsdigita, offers ticketing reps a way to deliver customized packages to prospective buyers in an efficient, innovative way.
In the Digital Era, 88 percent of consumers are conducting research online before making a purchase decision.
Today’s buyers don’t necessarily want to talk to a sales rep until they are ready to make a purchase. But in order to influence their purchase decision, ticket sales teams need to also be able to provide fans with all of the relevant information available. So think about this: How are season ticket buyers learning about your season plans? How are you personalizing that information without even speaking to potential buyers? When using a full menu strategy, you need a robust platform to ensure efficiency, but also to help you deliver the right information to the right audience at the right time. This may seem daunting, but we have a solution that addresses this paradigm.
The Digideck allows ticket buyers to research all of the season ticket options available without ever having to pick up the phone. With the Digideck, teams can embed a series of simple questions to determine which package is the right one for prospects. When the short form is completed (often times in a matter of minutes), the Digideck uses that information and automatically generates a custom presentation with a personalized ticketing proposal to the buyer. But not just any proposal, a personalized, beautifully designed proposal with rich multimedia like videos and 360°panoramas of your venue. With the Digideck, your ticketing sales teams have the power to immerse potential ticket buyers in the team culture and experience, which can highly influence their purchase decision.
By allowing prospective buyers to guide and qualify themselves down the sales funnel, you are saving your sales team time while simultaneously gaining higher quality leads. With the Digideck, your sellers are notified once a ticketing proposal is generated. They will be able to see what custom plan the prospect is interested in and how long they viewed their personalized proposal. Armed with this invaluable information, your ticket sales team can have targeted, relevant, and educational conversations the first time they ever speak to potential buyers. This can be a differentiator for your team and organization’s first impression among prospects who one day could become your most loyal brand consumers.
As Eric McKenzie, Vice President of Sales and Services for the San Diego Padres explains:
“Sportsdigita takes the guesswork out of proposal drafting, which has shortened new sales cycles and given the team more time to strengthen customer relationships.” Chelsea Dill, Manager of Corporate Events and Hospitality for the Padres solidified McKenzie’s remarks when sharing, “For us time is money, and we can now get things done faster without sacrificing quality with the Digideck”
It is time to move your organization’s ticketing practices above the curve. If you are ready to take a full menu approach while saving your rep’s time and energy, leverage a free demo of the Digideck by Sportsdigita. Your full menu awaits.
