A Year in Review: The State of Live 2017

The State of Live industry benchmark report was an opportunity for us to share what we’ve been working on at Intellitix as a sprint for the last few months, but it encapsulates what we’ve been working toward for the last few years.

Below is a copy of the presentation and presentation notes that I gave at the State of Live briefing at XLive Conference in Las Vegas, December 2017:

WHY did we do this?

Firstly, we did it to offer a perspective. We have the distinct pleasure of working with some of the largest and most prestigious live events in the world on an annual basis. We’ve seen many of the ups and downs, highs and lows, and we know incredibly well what makes the good ones great, and the bad ones go away forever. 

The goal of most events we work with is to become the coveted ‘tradition’. If you’ve been successful in your first year, they'll call you an 'accident' (despite how hard you worked). If you’ve been successful a second consecutive year they'll say it's a coincidence. But if you make it to the coveted third year, you’ve become a tradition. 

To start, who are these events that we spoke with?

Through surveys, and interviews, candid conversations and relationships forged in the field, as well as data pulled from our platform, we’ve got a fairly diverse representation of the industry, drawing on music festivals, sporting events, food wine and beer festivals, and several others like e-sports. The events were located primarily in North America, with significant input from Europe, and others from South America, Africa and Australia.

So, what did we learn?

What we learned can be condensed down into three key themes that are on everyone’s minds: Safety, Patron Experience, and Data.

First, and foremost we learned that we're bullish on live events. Despite the fact that patrons are generally cheap, and very discerning, they are still willing to spend money in order to escape their normal, everyday lives. 

We learned that 69% of organizers saw their attendance increase in 2017, 38% increased their event budget, and 30% are planning to run more events in 2018. The industry as a whole is healthy.

But, mostly what we learned can be boiled down into three key themes that are on everyone’s minds: Safety, Patron Experience, and Data.

Safety

Safety and Security is an incredibly important topic for the entire industry. I had the pleasure of spending time with organizers of all types at the Event Safety Alliance Safety Summit in December, and experts highlighted that it is the event organizers obligation to do reasonable things to ensure that your guests are reasonably safe. 

What we uncovered in our research though is that while security is a top priority for organizers, it’s an expectation of the guests. Just like choosing an airline: you don't base your decision solely on the safety/security ratings of the airline - you have other criteria - and you assume that the airline you chose was taking all measures to ensure that the plane was tested, and that you are going to be safe while on board.

We had an interesting run-in this year with a man by the name of Zac Alsop, an 18-year old living in London, England. Zac lives his life by the motto of: “Do things that will make great stories for your grand children one day.” On a dare from a friend, Zac got persuaded to try to sneak into a major event taking place at Wembley Stadium in the UK. In the run-up to the Mayweather-McGregor fight, the two fighters were conducting a press tour, and visited London to generate some buzz. Zac bought a cheap suit, and a fake earpiece, and spent some time on Instagram, where Floyd Mayweather’s driver had posted a picture of his Artist credential on his account. Zac quickly took a screenshot, Photoshopped it, and within 15 minutes had a laminate copy that looked damn-well like the real thing. When Zac arrived at the door, he cooly walked past security gate after security gate until his final destination when he literally walked out into the arena with Connor McGregor.

Might I also add that he filmed the entire thing, posted it on Youtube, and freaked everyone in the industry out. It was cute because he had no ill-intent but what if he had wanted to harm one of the athletes or the fans? Quickly taking action, we worked with the local team in Vegas to implement an Access Control solution for their ‘inner circle’ of promoters, artists, media, vips, etc., and guess what?

WE CAUGHT HIM and about 50 others trying to do the same thing. I couldn’t help myself, and tweeted at Zac - poking the bear and starting a side-dialogue with Zac.

Zac has since snuck into many other events, which he films and posts on YouTube. 

To prevent getting 'Alsopp'ed', we recommend the following:

1. Do a risk assessment. The holes that are obvious to Zac, are not obvious to all organizers. A trained eye can help you identify these risks and take reasonable steps to mitigate them. (Consider Jeff Miller from Jeffrey Miller Consulting).

2. Improve training at all levels. Technology isn’t a cure-all. Great tech without a proper training and implementation plan will fail. Training and communication plans need to touch all front-line, and behind-the-scenes staff.

3. Consider mandatory registration. By 2020 we believe every event will require registration in the same way that airlines ask you to register for flights.

4. You can’t do it all alone. Organizers should seek out government support - it is available. (A great resource here is Russ Simons from Venue Solutions Group).

Data

For years, all organizers have wanted to 'own' the data, but the reality is that very few know what to do with it once they have it. There continues to be an arms race to be able to capture the data they want, but in the near future, the game will quickly become about INSIGHTS, not data. 

2015-2018 was a race for data. 2019-2020 will be a race for insights.

How are the best in the world actually using their data? 

Most of the world's best events are learning who their audience is. Not just who bought the ticket, but who actually comes to the event.

What we’ve found in our research is that your best customer actually isn't just one person, it’s actually a group of people - often three or more that buy tickets together and move together on-site. 

Insight: When selling your tickets, you're not selling to 60,000 individuals, but rather 10,000 groups of six.

These groups are frustrated by (no surprise): high ticket prices, long lines, travelling to and from the event, and finding their friends on-site.

The best organizers in the world are using data to understand their customer’s journey to ticket purchase, top-up, or on-site purchases. 

We've learned that your best customers find out about new events from social media, word-of-mouth and e-mail and that they purchase their tickets when they know who’s performing, when early-bird sales are announced, and when they know friends are going to be buying them.

But the most successful organizers are actually ‘Connecting the Dots’ by linking their best customers with specific offers that drive purchase and action primarily through e-mail marketing channels.

E-mail marketing is massively under-utilized in the live event space, but those that are utilizing e-mail and investing in it are seeing phenomenal results. In fact, 40% of those organizers who are increasing budgets overall are increasing their digital marketing/e-mail marketing budget - effectively doubling down on what is working for them. 

Despite the effectiveness of e-mail marketing, 31% of organizers are lacking an e-mail marketing program altogether. 

Guest Experience

Every organizer is thinking about how to give a better experience to their guests.

We were surprised to learn that just over 25% of people have purchased a VIP ticket in the past, and that one-third of those said it was not worth it.  It may also surprise you to find out that for many of our partners, they find that the spend per head is actually higher among GA patrons than among the VIP guests.

Which for us begs the question: who is your real VIP guest?  Is it the fan who buys the higher-priced ticket, or the one who shows up early, takes part in the chicken run (if you're not familiar with the term 'Chicken Run' see below), and actually ends up spending more at the show?

We get excited at the opportunity to deliver the real VIP guests an elevated experience by plucking them out of the crowd and giving them special offers, discounts, and real-time upgrades.

We're seeing more events invest in technology to elevate the fan experience. Festivals are starting to come around to virtual and augmented reality (thanks to people like my friend Alan Smithson; see Groove Cruise), realizing now that it’s not going to replace attending an event but can enhance it.  Coachella used VR in 2016 as a way to do a pre-site tour before fans arrived on site: a sort of ‘pre-flight’ safety video to show guests where bathrooms, exits, and emergency areas were.

On the opposite end of the spectrum we’re seeing artists like Chris Rock use ‘anti-technology’ whereby guests put their phones in bags by companies like Yondr and cannot use them while at the show.

Overall, we're bullish on the 2018 event season and excited to share more of our insights in our free copy of the State of Live 2017/2018 at StateofLive.com.