Ltdirect
Case Study: London Theatre Direct, Tibco Mashery and the power of the API
A recent meeting I had with the theatre ticketing company London Theatre Direct (LTD) was a timely reminder that not all organisations are operating at the bleeding, or even the leading edge of technology. That’s not LTD itself, a customer of Tibco’s Mashery API management solution and therefore one already walking the walk. The theatres are a different story, however. Most still operate turnkey ticketing solutions of various flavours, making LTD’s main challenge one of creating customised connectors for each.
That work is now done, at least for London theatres, with the most obvious beneficiary being the theatre-going punter. “Customers could never find the tickets they wanted — they didn’t have much choice and there was limited flexibility on price, they could never get either cheaper tickets nor premium tickets,” explains LTD’s eCommerce head, Mark Bower. “With APIs in place, we can access millions of tickets. Every ticket is available, right up until show time.” As a result, more tickets are being sold, to the equal delight of producers and venues. Jersey Boys saw a 600% uplift in sales when LTD was plugged in, for example.
LTD haven’t just created a more straight forward booking facility however. This is the API economy, in which everything is a platform — so third parties, such as hotels and transport companies, can also plug into LTD’s service. These are early days but such tie-ups are inevitable. “30% of people coming to London will want to go to the theatre,” says Mark. “We can plug our service directly into in-room systems, avoiding the dark art of the concierge booking on a customer’s behalf.” And indeed, charging a premium to do so.
So far so good, but LTD believe that something that could be seen as simply online ticketing is actually far more profound. A theatre production is at its core a creative act, with no guarantees of success at the outset. “Theatre is not a one size fits all,” says Anne, marketing director at LTD. “You can’t walk into the industry and say, ‘I want this show to do this,’ that’s not how it works.” Rather, there needs to be a balance between the aspirations of the producer and the hard-nosed realities of getting punters in through the door and taking their money in return for their entertainment.
The world of theatre is not very forgiving. “Venue owners want bar sales and rent, and the minute the rent falls below a certain level, or that the owner sees bar sales dropping below a certain level, they will give two weeks notice to a show and and they are out,” says Mark. Such was the case for the feted, but short-run Made In Dagenham. The ability, therefore to generate higher demand for tickets is of huge importance, as is reaching out to previously untapped demographics such as younger audiences who would tend to purchase the less accessible, cheaper tickets.
Better ticketing doesn’t just mean an uplift in sales therefore, it also means that producers and venues are able to put on shows that might previously be seen as higher-risk. This is all before even thinking about the nuggets of insight that will lie inside the ticketing data itself — who is going to what kind of show, when, using what form of transport and so on. As we discussed this, I was reminded of how farmers are taking soil samples so they know how to target fertilisers more accurately — I couldn’t help wondering if the same principle applied to incentivisation of theatre goes to ensure all seats could be filled.
Perhaps the takeaway is that the ticket itself is a consequence of past models, which worked as well as they could in the analogue world. Even as our interactions become more digital, we have an opportunity to make them more about the very human relationship between producer, customer and venue, all of whom are looking to gain from the deal. The opportunity exists to move beyond the blunt instrument of the paper ticket and towards deepened relationship, manifested for example as event-led packages, loyalty programmes or even patronage models.
In the world of theatre and in many other sectors, technology enables us to move above and beyond the dark arts. Of course, the opportunity for abusing such tools also exists — there we face an ancient choice. But the stage is set (oh, yes) for a more direct, transparent relationships between participants. Cue applause.
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With APIs we can access millions of tickets.
Customers could never find the tickets they wanted — they didn’t have much choice, and there was limited flexibility on price, they could never get the cheaper tickets and they could never get the premium tickets.
[With API connectivity all that has changed.]
Every ticket is available, right up until show time.
Basket value up - people are spending more
Getting new, younger audiences that would purchase cheaper tickets
And tickets available until last minute - Anne - Marketing Director
Looking for partner opportunity - could be a train or an air company. 30% of people coming to London will want to go to the theatre.
Concierge is all a bit of a dark art - phones an agent, who phones the box office
In-room iPad - GLH - great little hotel
Can of course add it to their profile
Anne - Theatre is not a one size fits all - you can’t walk into the industry and say “I want this show to do this”, that’s not how it works.
[So above all it brings flexibility. ]
Create an event-led package, talk to producer - hotels’ getting the room etc.
Technical challenges?
With the venues - a bit control freaky
Three relationships - the producer - the vision of how it’s going to look,… they are expecting to sell every ticket! They think they have the best idea…
Venue owners want bar sales and rent - the minute the rent falls below a certain level, bar sales dropping, they give two weeks notice and they are out
Owners sell venue to producer like they can sell tickets
Jersey Boys - uplift of 600% when plugged into system.
[Get uplift once start collating data - cf Farming]
Every theatre ticket sold by ticketmaster will be going through LTD - we coudlnt’ have done it without Tibco Mashery.
We have to work with multiple venues - with multiple versions. We had to do the integration with each.
[Data brokerage?]