This is a case study from Sean Burke, Head of Marketing at Ticketbud. More information about Event Manager Blog’s case studies.
The Event
The Get Fit and Thick tour, “The 1, 2, 3s of Counting Macros” is a two-day event helping women learn more about nutrition, happening in multiple locations across the U.S.A.
The Fit and Thick (F+T) team practice and preach counting macros, so it made sense to create a program to teach it to everyone, to build on their fitness messaging. The brand was established in 2013 by Nicole Mejia. The audience profile is mainly Latin women ranging from 18-45 years of age and 35 – 90 people attend each event.
Each stop on the tour is a 2-day nutrition seminar. The 1st day is a 3-hour seminar which all ticket holders attend. When guests arrive, they take place in a scavenger hunt to help guests feel more comfortable and serve as an icebreaker.
The 2nd day is a 2-hour workshop in which all ticket holders choose which time slot they would like to attend. Splitting them up allows each person to get one on one attention to all of their questions and concerns. The workshop has a total of 3 groups, each one part of the 1, 2, 3s of counting macros.
Quick Facts
- 2-day nutrition seminar
- 35-90 attendees per event
- Ticketed event with a charge to attend and different packages available
- 6 event locations across the U.S. for the tour 2016
The Issue
The Get Fit and Thick team faced a series of challenges when launching this event. The biggest challenge was how to condense all the information they have on the complex subject of counting macros into just two 3-hour sessions. They refined the content to make sure that everyone who attends will be able to apply this knowledge into their lifestyle.
Why Online Ticketing?
The Get Fit and Thick company is based in Miami and hosts the tours nationwide so they knew they needed an online platform to streamline the event bookings, otherwise it would be impossible to manage.The ability to customize the platform was also essential to match their strong brand design, embed within their own website and also to sell the different packages they wanted to offer.
F+T chose Ticketbud, an online event registration platform that helps event organizers sell tickets, promote their event, and manage attendees. F+T are not professional event planners, they are a brand that runs events, so they wanted to find a software with support available for them if they needed it.
The Objectives
The objective of Get Fit and Thick’s The 1, 2, 3s Of Counting Macros is to introduce the concept and technique of counting macronutrients (also known as macros) to women. The founders believe that nutrition is the most important aspect of a lifestyle change. F+T wanted to focus on the learning and delivery of the events and it was important not be tied down in administration.
How Were the Objectives Achieved?
A major obstacle initially to get the event up and running was getting used to the different customization options to make the best use out of the platform. Chabelys, the event organizer, also ran into some issues with copying events and the discount codes for events which Ticketbud customer service assisted with.
Get Fit and Thick needed to ask a series of questions to all ticket purchasers to calculate the attendee’s custom macronutrients. Ticketbud’s custom question feature enabled them to ask these questions as they booked their tickets via text responses, drop down menus and radio buttons, instead of emailing each person one by one. The responses were then available in real time.
There were also options for multiple ticket packages and times to be selected. Customer service from Ticketbud was available to respond to any questions people raised about using the platform.
A big time saver was the ability to clone events to expedite the process for creating events across multiple venues and cities. Even before Get Fit and Thick had chosen the final venue locations they were able to open bookings and put the venue details as TBD. This was extremely helpful to gauge initial audience reaction.
For Get Fit and Thick, these events can be very expensive to put on. They do not currently have any cash sponsors, so it can be quite difficult to book venues for 2 days in advance, in addition to having to ship all the needed equipment. Ticketbud offers daily payouts for clients using its internal processor, and this cash flow was beneficial for the team to help offset expenses and more quickly realize revenue and profit.
The Results
Overall, it was significantly easier getting the events set up, and created to start selling tickets faster with Ticketbud. It also opened up a whole new avenue of marketing opportunities, resulting in increased sales and more sold out time slots and events.
The F+T team really appreciated how much easier it was to use an online registration platform, rather than writing everything down and keeping track of an Excel file and will now definitely be sticking with an online ticketing solution.
Tickets could be booked from any platform – mobile, tablet, and desktop. The system gave data about where ticket purchasers were coming in from, as well as giving them their name, emails, and of course the custom question information. This meant that F+T were able to exactly pinpoint what marketing was succeeding, as well as further crystallize their target audience and create more content to bring in more of that same kind of customer.
In particular they saw spikes in ticket purchases when they posted about the tour on their Instagram page, with a link to the event to buy tickets, something they were not able to do in previous years. Social media, in particular Instagram, is where a lot of their audience is active and was very helpful in boosting ticket sales.
At the events they could check in people via the Ticketbud mobile app, so this was helpful to quickly see how many people were actually there, no counting or guesswork required. F+T saw more sold out events this year than in previous years, probably due to the ease of booking for their customers. In addition, they were better able to help their attendees and personalize the content at the event, thanks to the custom questions that had been answered ahead of the event.
The events were so successful that the tour is being repeated for 2017 but will expand to visit 9 locations.
Takeaways for Event Planners
- Don’t Forget the Follow Up
Following up with attendees afterward is extremely important, particularly on events such as this focused on lifestyle changes. F+T uses ambassadors to help keep attendees in the loop, not just for sales but for well-being and training purposes.
- Chose Tech That Will Save You Time
For F+T they saved a lot of time with the ability to duplicate events and to set bespoke questions which had to be completed at time of booking. Chose eventtech to save you time in the areas where it matters most.
- Choose Tech with the Right Level of Support
Having support available to help you set up and manage event software is vital, particularly when using a new product. It is also wise and peace of mind to know that anyone completing the online booking process has customer service support available to guide them through the purchase if they need it.
- Think About Cashflow
Check the payout schedule of your registration provider. Some providers, like Ticketbud, pay out funds immediately. Others will not pay out until after the event, which could cause headaches in terms of cashflow and event expenditure.
In Conclusion
If you are running a tour with multiple event locations you need a registration platform to save you time, streamline administration and pay out promptly. Through Ticketbud F+T were able to focus on the important stuff, the delivery of the event content and messaging. As well as saving time it was great not having to worry about cashflow and to be reassured that support was freely available to the organizers and their attendees.
December 15th, 2016 at 10:00 AM EST
