Much more than ticketing: your box office is vital for success

There’s been great momentum in the sector this season. We’re seeing more impactful fundraising, creative collaborations and a boost for funding for arts and culture. With the wheels starting to spin and programmes turning up a gear, one of the most important things is to spend time critically reflecting on everything you’re doing. 

With the help of your box office, not only will you be able to measure the effectiveness of your efforts, but also to use these insights to inform your future planning and the next stages towards post-Covid recovery. 

Over the past two years, we’ve seen just how instrumental a unified system has been to help organisations stay informed of audience trends and to cope with the challenges that faced them. Of particular use have been ticket refund tools and producing digital on-demand programmes.

In the arts, while aims and objectives derive from common goals, we often lack a framework to deliver results. There are various strategies you could adopt but with pressures on time and resources, and with reduced team numbers, we think the Objectives Key Results (OKRs) framework will help keep you on track and in line with targets.* 

Benefits of implementing box office data 

1.    Insights generated from the box office inform the organisation what matters.
Busy, productive, and innovative teams often lack focus due to ‘shiny object syndrome’. There is always something new to be done and a lack of motivation is rarely a problem. OKRs provide a framework that doesn’t inhibit that motivation, but rather channels it towards accomplishing prioritised goals.

2.    They offer a clear path on what makes meaningful difference and which tasks and duties contribute to results. 
Somewhat related to lack of focus, is lack of accountability. It is rarely the case that your teammates deliberately sabotage business initiatives, but getting people to own and be responsible for objectives provides an all-too important accountability in all organisations. 

3.    Most importantly, they highlight what is not successful. 
In every organisation there’s a considerable amount of time wasted on tasks that don’t really matter. Sometimes they’re unavoidable, but often we’re simply unaware that they don’t make any meaningful difference. Use data as a tool to understand failure. Understanding this is often as important – if not more so – than understanding success, as it helps to eliminate activity that’s not moving you towards your goals.

Building your Organisational Goals: Ticketsolve Guide to OKRS

Is your activity iterative and impactful? 

This is the most important aspect of implementing data-driven objectives and utilising box office insights to measure key results. If you don’t track your progress, how do you know if you are going to achieve your goals? 

Impact is often intangible and something many sectors struggle to define. Measuring it can seem daunting. Luckily for the arts, culture and heritage sectors, there’s a strong understanding of the contribution an organisation makes towards creating strong societies and cohesive communities. 

It’s difficult to get something right first time. But using box office data, it’s a lot easier to ensure improvements from one iteration to the next. Setting clear goals, understanding their desired results, and challenging your assumptions through data will help your team navigate the path to success.

The box office as a driver for social benefit

Like the whole sector, Ipswich Theatre has been watching the tragic events unfold in Ukraine. They wondered what help they could offer in this time of crisis. As a Council-operated venue, Ipswich doesn’t take donations, but they are aware that Ticketsolve's donation functionality could offer a direct and powerful opportunity to prompt customers to donate while booking tickets online. In under 5 days, they had nearly 200 donations – a testament to the generosity of the audiences in Ipswich.

The donation appeal is automatically displayed during the customers online booking journey and is of course optional. The website appeal is clear, straightforward and easy to use. This simple yet impactful design is one of the most effective ways to get people to donate. Showing their motivations to create positive actions through this appeal has also allowed Ipswich to reposition their commitment to society. 

The box office offers so much more than just ticketing. So, if you thought your box office was just to get ‘bums on seats’ – think again. The box office can support your team in more ways than just ticket inventory. The learnings lie within your data but the real power lies in what you choose to do with those insights and how you act. 

Natalie Watson is a Customer Support Specialist at Ticketsolve.

 www.ticketsolve.com
 @ticketsolvers

*You can download a copy of the Ticketsolve Guide to OKRs to start measuring the performance of your organisation effectively. 

This article is part of a series of articles, case studies and industry insights looking at the power of data to inform strategic decision making.