What really drives audiences to buy tickets: your purchase page or someone else’s site?

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David Loehr caught a little tweet of mine today and @’d me asking if I’d join 2amtheatre and write a 140+ character post about my observation. Note how quickly that communication turned into an action. Here is my inaugural post:

This morning I was putting together a training guide for the patron service representatives who work at the TKTS booth in Times Square. They are a rad bunch who need to know almost everything about every show running on Broadway (and off…). (Think of them as ambassadors for NYC theatre.) While making this guide I cross-reference multiple websites to make sure the team has all the accurate information they need.

While researching the upcoming Broadway play Red (which I have heard little about), I started my search at Playbill.com and was less than impressed with the show description on the site. Then I crossed-referenced the information at Telecharge.com, the site from which one would purchase tickets to the show. The Telecharge show blurb was enormously more exciting and helpful, which led to this question (and double Tweet):

“Show info on Telecharge is much more useful than show blurbs on Playbill. More useful, info site or point of purchase sites? #opinionFriday”

“Playbill blurb on Red is totes boring but the info on Telecharge made me want to buy a ticket right away. Do ppl browse Telecharge? #doubtit”

I’d be curious to know the actual stats, but I would bet more people go to Playbill.com to seek general show information than going to Telecharge.com to browse show info. (A large reason for my assumption is that Telecharge is very difficult to browse… more on that later.)

So – which is more important: making sure all show info and listing sites have enough pizzazz to drive people to the site from which they actually buy tickets, or spending the time on the ticket purchase page to tip the customer into buying?

Today I’d like to argue that the sites that drive people to your purchasing page might just be more important than the purchase page itself. Yes, of course, ideally we want everything to be the best and most awesome ever, but what do you think?

  • March 5, 2010
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