Running active social media accounts is now deemed to be the most effective form of cheap marketing for business. Selling tickets to your social media followers isn’t easy and it’s not always obvious how to do it.
Here are 5 Ticket Tailor tips on how to sell tickets by converting your social media following:
1. Engage Your Followers
Don’t focus on the hard sell. Engage your followers by sharing news, relevant information and by asking questions. Just who would they like to see at your venue? What’s the best gig they’ve ever been to? Who would be their ultimate dinner party guest? Strike up a conversation. Show there’s a human behind your brand.
Conversion is the name of the game here. Think about what it is that you want your audience to actually do. Whether it’s “share this tweet”, “click here to buy”, “sign-up here for regular updates”, etc, all of these are valid calls to action. After reading an engaging piece of content, your audience needs to know what to do next. Tell them.
Use great visuals and easy to share content and you’ll find that loyal followers will promote your business for you
2. Make It Easy To Buy
Don’t have your followers chasing their tails to buy tickets. Make it as simple and as obvious as possible. How? Use a widget on your website or even a WordPress Plugin. If you’re selling on Facebook, use an app to sell directly.
Social media updates should enable the reader to click right through to the point of sale. They shouldn’t have to trawl through your website once they’ve decided to buy.
3. Soft Conversion
You know what it’s like. You see an event advertised for next year but you’ve neither the funds nor the motivation to buy just yet. Don’t let these potential sales go to waste. Take the soft conversion method and offer to remind your followers at a later date.
When you announce an event, give your audience the opportunity to be reminded later. Let them provide their email to you. Invite them to subscribe. Open-up that sales process that should lead to a conversion at a later date. Plus, you’ve secured their email address for future marketing.
4. Incentives
Consider running an incentive campaign for your social media followers. They get a discount, or a chance to win tickets in exchange for raising your profile; they become brand ambassadors essentially.
This works well with Facebook. Invite followers to like and share a status, in exchange for the chance to win free tickets and your event will then be publicised in their friends’ timelines. You’ll get more “likes” and more ticket sales.
Offer an exclusive discount code to Twitter followers, or on Instagram. Everyone wants to get a good deal. Let your followers know that you understand that.
5. Quality, Regular Content
The key to attracting and keeping social media followers and therefore converting to ticket sales is quality, regular content:
- Use a blog to drive traffic to your website and to engage your audience.
- Blog regularly (at least once a week), use original, relevant content and focus it on your target audience.
- Update your social media at least 3 times a week. More for Twitter.
- Remember that it’s ok to sell via social media but don’t make that the only focus. Share stories, information and the odd bit of humour goes a long way. Just be careful though. Nothing controversial!
- Respond to your followers. Answer any queries, in a timely manner.
- Deal with complaints via social media swiftly. Invite the complainant immediately to connect via email or phone. Don’t play out your drama in public!
- Use your social media to create a buzz before the event and after. Once the event’s over, you’d be surprised how much the audience still wants to connect, with you and with other attendees. Remember, you don’t just want your followers to come to one event. Remind them that you’ve plenty more to offer.
It’s not about attracting 1’000s and 1’000s of random social media followers. You want engaged followers to share your content and you want to sell tickets. Use our 5 tips to get ahead and to get the results that you need.
Find out how to use the Ticket Tailor ticketing system, our widgets and WordPress Plugin to increase your ticket sales.
