Distribute me if you can!

Why would a ticket distributor intentionally bypass its own clients?

• To prove its value: acquiring an event’s natural audience is a low-cost way distributors can prove their network’s performance or their leadership position towards a specific audience (e.g. electro). It also justifies the communication plan and sales targets promised at negotiation stage. This schizophrenic behaviour can sometimes go very far, including placing auctions on your brand’s keywords even though the same network also provided you with a white label ticketing system.
• To feed the beast: by purchasing clients, some distributors build or renew their own database to then offer it to your potential competitors.

Example of aggressive Google Search Ads for 2017 We Love Green’s edition in Paris.

• Because you let them: if these practices spread so much, it is also the fault of promoters who fail to pay attention to them. Sometimes, they do so because they are understaffed, sometimes due to a lack of attention…but mostly this area is not considered strategic.
• Because they work with a short term view: they are not looking to build long term relationships but rather take part in a race to gain market share, at the expense of their clients.
• And sometimes because of a questionable business model: this refusal to take the future into consideration is also the short-term consequence of an unprofitable business model fueled by successive rounds of fundraising. In return, investors demand growth. Yet a Ponzi scheme always ends up crumbling but as long as undiscerning investors are willing to get involved, promoters and consumers will always pay the final bill.

To sum up, while the main value proposition of distributors is to provide you with the audience in their portfolio, it is surprising to see some of them jeopardising their business by ticket-jacking their own clients.

- Sure, drawing, he can do! (Credits — Voutch)

Selection of shady excuses and justifications for ticket-jacking

• UNCONTROLLABLE ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: “Oh no, it’s automatic”. As if Google Ads campaigns were not manually programmed…
• IT’S THE INTERN’S FAULT: “Our customer service forgot, I’ll let them know”. A classic excuse, it provides a perfect scapegoat.
• THE CHEEKY EXCUSE: “It’s legal, we can do it”. While this is technically true, this is still diversion. And some of the more cunning players trick you with small print in their contracts to make this legal.
• IT’S BECAUSE OF THE FOREIGNERS: “We do this to reach foreign audiences”. So then it’s normal that it appears on my local Google search?
• HAVE ANOTHER SLICE OF CAMPING : “We only sell in packages”. Sure, this is the original promise but then why do package sales make up for such a small proportion of the final sales and why are dry tickets promoted?
• WE HAVE MORE EXPERTISE THAN YOU DO: “Customers are still undecided, we will contribute to convincing them”. Excuse me, but are you telling me that an unofficial site has better information than we do?
• WE ARE NOT THE ONLY ONES: “Others do it too”. In this case, anything can be justified…
• THE ONE THAT TOPS IT ALL: “This is justified because we need to make up for the ads published everywhere else”. In other words, this practice is due to the fact that other ads (posters in the tube, in-store presence…) fail to achieve their targets or objectives.
• ABSOLUTE NONSENSE: “You need me to sell”. Of course, if you prevent the promoter to self-distribute his tickets, then he has to deal with a distributor. This is even more true when ticket-jacking has been going on for a few editions and the promoter has not cultivated direct sales and/or has not collected a database to maintain control over his event. Look at what Booking did for hospitality…
• WE PAY FOR THESE COSTS: “This is part of the communication/awareness plan included in our service…”, sometimes the cost of Google Ads is even quantified to increase the value of said communication plan.
• HANDS UP: “If we cannot make any easy sales to your loyal customers, we will stop helping you out with your up and coming artists”. Yeah, but what do they really do to increase awareness about your rising talents?

Caught in the act of ticket-jacking by event planners, explanations and excuses are often juicy and hilarious, and as a final bonus: they are sometimes directly written in the sales brochure.

- I have been a writer who didn’t write. Then a composer who didn’t compose. But I said “no more” to all that: I am now a distributor who doesn’t sell (Credits — Voutch).

Credits — kronik

Pierre-Henri DEBALLON

CEO & co-founder at Weezevent

Organiser of the Velotour event and co-founder of a ticketing and cashless software used by over 180,000 event planners across Europe, I have been advocating direct sales for 10+ years.