Pirates Senior Dir of Ticket Sales & Service Chris Zaber yesterday said that all teams want to have some say in how their tickets are sold in secondary markets, but finding the correct balance is difficult. "From what we've been able to see, 10% of our seats are being moved in the secondary market," Zaber told Falcons VP/Sales & Service Dave Cohen, Veritix CEO Sam Gerace and StubHub President Chris Tsakalakis during the “Examining Ticket Resale Opportunities” panel that concluded the inaugural SBJ/SBD Ticketing Symposium at the W Hoboken in New Jersey, part of this week's AT&T Sports Facilities & Franchises conference. Cohen said teams should try and mine data from the secondary market to better position their own sales, but that secondary sellers "take away [tickets] from the guy on the street selling a ticket that you don't know is legit." Tsakalakis said StubHub has a major leg up on teams who try to oversee secondary sales themselves, and that StubHub has increased sales after taking over team-run secondary ticket operations. "We already have a bigger book of business than teams," Tsakalakis said. "We drive demand. For Florida State [University] we increased ticket sales 600 percent." Gerace said the popularity of secondary ticket sales is driving dynamic pricing for franchises because of the secondary market's natural fluctuations. "The sports industry is beginning to apply science that other industries have relied on for a while," Gerace said. The crowd reacted with applause and laughter after Tsakalakis and Gerace squared off over restrictions and fees on electronic tickets purchased in the secondary market. Gerace argued that Veritix's systems operated like an electronic stock market which charges a fee for ensuring the tickets are authentic. "This is not stock, it's a paper ticket that you can sell to a friend or to someone on craigslist," Tsakalakis said. "You're not Nasdaq."
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Lazerow cautions teams against oversaturating
social media with too much ticketing noise |
SOCIAL LIFE: Earlier yesterday afternoon, Buddy Media Chair & CEO Michael Lazerow cautioned teams against flooding Facebook and Twitter with too much ticketing "noise," and offered advice for helping reach fans via social media. “Respond to every comment on your Facebook wall. It will increase your edgerank [in the Facebook news feed] and help your information get through,” said Lazerow, who participated in the “Using Social Media to Sell Tickets” panel alongside Digital Royalty Manager of Sports & Entertainment Kristin Adams, Indians Dir of Communications & Creative Services Curtis Danburg and Flyers Senior VP/Business Operations Shawn Tilger. The panel agreed that teams should first use social media to create personal fan relationships, and that ticket sales and sponsorship dollars will follow. Tilger cautioned against discounting ticket prices too drastically over Facebook and Twitter, because the reach of social media can upset season ticket holders. “We’ll do a group discount and mask it behind a sponsorship rather than dynamic pricing,” he said. “We’re very careful about how frequent and often we bastardize any season ticket or partial plan price.” Danburg discussed the team’s “Social Suite” program at Progressive Field. The team invites fans into a converted suite where they can blog, tweet and lead social media discussions during the game. “We launched it at a time when we knew there was negativity in the market, and we wanted to be part of the conversation,” Danburg said. Danburg said the team also offers ticketing discounts via social media on Tuesdays and Fridays. The panel agreed that teams need at least one full-time staffer for social media. Tilger said sales representatives retain autonomy in their social media habits. “How much autonomy do we give them? Probably too much,” Tilger said. “Sometimes I get a letter [about social media conduct] and get yelled at, but we get through it.
