Business Best Practices

Conferences are essential to career development and business networking for all industries. Bringing together people from all over the world in the same industry to learn and share is crucial to innovation. And a dedicated event management integrated ticketing system helps you keep the event in sync throughout the process as a central hub that can control various aspects of the event and provide directions and everything needed in one place. 

And a right set of event ticketing strategies is essential when you want to boost ticket sales online for your upcoming conference planning project, whether in-person or virtual. Conference ticketing should be at the forefront of all event planning efforts:

• Design your perfect event ticket.
• Decide on a pricing strategy.
• Ensure a seamless check-in process for all your essential attendees.

All of which should be essential aspects of your event marketing strategy.

This guide will discuss everything you need to know about some of the fundamental steps of event ticketing strategies for corporate events like conferences.

Understand how your event meets a key need?

In a conference setting- people will be willing to pay for an experience that helps them overcome challenges, widen their knowledge about a particular field and build powerful networking. You can learn what matters most to your audience through conversations with past attendees, researching hot topics for potential attendees through tactics like social listening, sending surveys to your target audience, and more.

Then leverage your insights by offering different items and event experiences priced based on what your audience thinks is worth buying. And don’t forget to make leveraging audience interest a quick win for all participants.

Choose the right ticketing platform

Depending on the nature of your event, you may be able to use a virtual event platform. Try to find a complete event ticketing platform that includes registration and conference ticketing tools in addition to event organization features. Each platform you explore may have different features that can benefit you in different ways. 

In addition to powerful event capabilities, your event platform must enable ticket classes, streamline event registration and improve data collection, integrate with marketing platforms such as social media and email campaign manager, offer donation options upon sign-up, and provide in-depth analytics.

By providing value for your ticket prices, offering free options, and choosing the right event platform, you can sell tickets for your conference event and keep everyone happy in the process!

Optimize your registration page

Your registration page should be part of your website domain, even if you use a third-party event registration platform. This is important because potential registrants may feel that the registration and payment process is unsafe if they should switch to a different URL. Also, make sure your sign-up page is mobile-friendly and loads quickly to optimize the user experience.

The rule of thumb is to only ask for the information you really need in your registration form. If you are using an online ticketing platform, the system may provide a set of form templates that you can use, but consider checking whether you can customize these to exclude or add more fields or not.

When your form asks for too much information, it can lengthen attendees’ registration time, negatively impacting the user experience and causing them to cancel the ticket purchase process.

Implement Tiered Pricing

Once you’ve set your base price, you can start working from there to figure out what, more or less, you can offer to attract attendees. Half-day passes, Early Bird promotions, and VIP tickets are all great examples of rates that can work well to attract individuals to buy tickets quickly.

In a nutshell, it comes down to offering a wide variety of tickets at different prices depending on what guests are willing to pay. Let’s say an expensive VIP attendee’s ticket that lets people skip the queues and a ticket with no privileges for those who want an affordable option.

Get creative and define relevant rewards for your conference event. If a popular band performs at your event, you may be charged extra for front-row seats.

If this is your first time hosting a conference, these strategies, especially the drop levels, can be essential for engaging your first attendees when they don’t know what to expect. 

If you’ve been hosting business or educational conferences for several years, building a price for your current sales strategy is as simple as asking when previous attendees purchased their tickets in previous years. By looking at past patterns, you can tell if there’s a lull between your conference ticketing promotions and if you’ve had a particularly good week each year. It might be a good idea to introduce a promotion to increase sales during these times.

Trigger FOMO by ticket scarcity

No one likes the feeling of being left behind after a sold-out experience. FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) kicks in when consumers feel they might miss a ticket. Scarcity marketing can increase event ticket sales by a significantly bigger margin. Ticket classes, as discussed above, are an excellent scarcity tactic and reward those who buy tickets in advance. Another strategy is to display a countdown timer. 

The countdown timer can show how long it takes to complete the transaction before the attendee’s cart expires.

The countdown will motivate potential participants to buy those who are still hesitant. They are less likely to buy in advance if they have all the time in the world. Below is a chart showing how long it takes customers to purchase event tickets on popular ticketing platforms.

Launch a referral program

If your ticket sales are poor, it could mean that you, like the majority of sellers, aren’t getting enough leads. And while there’s no hard and fast rule about the average number of leads to make a sale, it’s a numbers game. This is one of the many reasons why referral programs are great for selling conference event tickets online. 

In fact, as much as 90% of population online trust customer recommendations if they come from people they know personally. And those who received that personal referral were four times more likely to purchase it after receiving the referral than if they had discovered it organically elsewhere. So not only will conference ticketing referral programs connect you to more leads, but those leads will also be more likely to convert! You can even give your speakers or special guests their own referral code while you’re there.

Contact industry organizations to help promote

You can leverage industry professionals and organizations to help promote your event. Reach out to them, tell them about your conference event, give them an email copy, and make it easy for them to advertise on your behalf. This will help showcase your event in front of thousands of more qualified people you wouldn’t usually have access to.

Other organizations to consider are regional, national, and international associations focusing on a particular aspect of your vertical.

Every organization will be different. Some will agree to publish about your upcoming conference event for free, while others may require you to become a member. 

Others may not be scheduled at all and will instead encourage your conference to become a sponsor of their organization. It’s a great way to promote the event to a wide range of professionals. It will also help you build backlinks to your event website, improving your SEO.

Leverage the brand value of your event?

If you’ve already built a strong event brand reputation and a number of loyal attendees, you can increase the perceived value of your top experiences by using a pay-as-you-go booking structure. This may include charging a nominal subscription fee for general admission, as well as premium and VIP tickets to show potential registrants that they want a rich experience with content, results- connections and valuable communities.

By taking advantage of premium tickets, you not only increase the perceived value of your entire event but also help offset the cost of creating the experience. As the perceived value of your event grows and people start buying paid tickets, that no-show rate will drop dramatically, and the total number of sign-ups for your shared experience will increase.

Final Words

Business models are driven by positive attendee experiences. However, with the breakneck pace of today’s event marketing industry, every business is having difficulty maintaining a viable clientele of happy and satisfied attendees. But with an integrated ticketing platform, every attendee touchpoint with your brand can be managed through the ticketing app. 

Author Bio: 

I am Rebekah Murray. I am working as a content strategist at EventBookings. I have 12+years of experience in the field of content writing. I am passionate about exploring and writing about events, technology, marketing, and education-related content. Find me on Twitter.

Running a restaurant is a lot of work that takes a big investment of time and money to be successful. Once your restaurant is up and running, however, you should always look for ways to boost your profits. The restaurant industry is always changing, so it’s important to stay up-to-date on the latest trends and customer expectations. Let’s take a look at a few profitable additions to consider for your restaurant.

Unique Food Offerings

When considering additions to your restaurant to improve your profitability, you might consider adding some unique food items. For example, many people love pizza, but it’s mostly available in Italian restaurants and pizza places. If you have a sports bar-type restaurant or another establishment, you might consider adding pizza as a special menu item. You will need to invest in a pizza prep table and maybe a pizza oven. However, once you add some basic commercial kitchen equipment, you can serve pizza. Adding unique or special food items to your menu can add a surprise element to your menu and boost your profits.

Bar Service

There are a few profitable additions that you can consider for your restaurant in order to increase profits. One such addition is to add a bar with a bartender. Bartenders can help increase drink sales, which account for a large percentage of restaurant profits. They can also provide added customer service and create an enjoyable atmosphere for customers. In order to become a successful bartender, it is important to have good customer service skills and be able to make mixed drinks. You may have to train a staff member or learn yourself how to become a bartender, but it will be worth it for your bottom line.

Delivery Options

There are many trends in the restaurant industry that can help a business be more profitable. One trend is to offer delivery service. This can be done through third-party services such as Grubhub or DoorDash, or by using a service like UberEats that allows customers to order food from local restaurants through their app. Offering delivery can help a restaurant reach new customers who may not have otherwise visited the establishment.

Healthy Menu Items

A very popular trend in many restaurants today is healthier menu items. Many people are looking for healthier dining options, and adding dishes that fit these criteria can attract new customers. It might cost more initially, however, you could see an uptick in business in people looking for healthier dishes. Additionally, offering healthy menu items can help boost a restaurant’s image and set it apart from its competitors.

Marketing and Advertising

Marketing and advertising are important aspects of any business, but especially for restaurants. Restaurants rely on word-of-mouth and repeat customers to keep them afloat, so it’s important to make a good impression with potential and current guests. There are many ways to increase your marketing and advertise your restaurant.

One way to market your restaurant is through online platforms like Yelp, Google Maps, or TripAdvisor. These sites allow you to create a free business listing that includes your hours, location, menu items, and photos. You can also pay for advertising features on these sites that will help you stand out from the competition.

Another great way to market your restaurant online is through social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram. You can create pages or profiles for your restaurant and post photos and updates about special events, new menu items, etc. You can also run ads on these platforms to target specific demographics of people who might be interested in visiting your restaurant.

Another popular way to market restaurants is through print media like newspapers and magazines. You can place ads in these publications or even submit articles about your restaurant as a PR move. Radio and TV commercials are other options for marketing your restaurant; however, they tend to be more expensive than other methods.

No matter what method of marketing you choose, it’s important to make sure that your message is clear and consistent across all platforms. Be sure to track the results of your marketing efforts so that you can determine which strategies are most effective in bringing in new guests.

Adding new, profitable additions to your restaurant can help increase sales and improve the overall profitability of your business. It’s important to note that any additions should be carefully planned and evaluated to ensure that they are both profitable and appealing to your customers.

It’s a tough time to run a business after a global pandemic and increased demand on household budgets. Profit margins are tighter than ever in the commercial world, so how do you survive in turbulent times? We review some of the best things you can do to keep your business successful.

Value Your Staff

One of your most essential assets in the business is your employees, primarily if you rely on specialist workers or shift coverage. Treat them well, and make your organization a pleasant place to work. Look at how you can offer incentives to encourage good employees to stay. It costs significant time and resources to recruit workers, so retaining the ones you have is critical.

Outsource Administrative Tasks

Outsourcing administrative tasks is a highly cost-effective strategy for a business, especially for small companies. Many business-critical tasks can be outsourced, from invoice factoring to human resources and payroll. When you outsource to other organizations such as remote access administrators or a factoring company, you save valuable time that allows you to focus on growing the business. Another cost-saving opportunity for you when outsourcing tasks is that you do not employ the staff, which means that you do not have to pay benefits, wages, and other expenses as this is covered within the outsourcing company.

Focus on Finances

As a business owner, you must oversee your finances and ensure people pay bills on time. A slow or deferred payment has all kinds of consequences for your company. So, how do you stay ahead of the payments and chase bills when you have a business to run? Invoice factoring enables you to raise cash quickly by selling your outstanding payments for a proportion of what is due. The factoring company will chase up debts and recover the money, but you get the funds to pay staff and keep your business solvent. In addition, if you can allocate your default payments to a factoring company, you will recover your cash flow and free up time to do other business-critical work.

Track Your Invoices

It is easy to forget to invoice promptly or to chase up a payment, and before you realize it, the time has sped by, but your business has not received the money. Set up a process so you invoice as soon as a job is complete. You can outsource invoicing or set up reminders on your desktop. Allocating a specific time in the week for invoicing also works. If you stay ahead of the game with your finances, your cash flow will improve, and you will get paid on time. If you need to use invoice factoring for payment defaults, it saves you critical time chasing people for money.

Look for Cutback Opportunities

If your business is starting to feel the effects of cost pressures, start looking for ways to cut back on unnecessary expenses. Start by looking at where your outgoings are and possible areas for cutting back. For example, is your electricity with the best provider? Do you need to cut the photocopying and use more digital products? Don’t forget to ask the staff for ideas; they will have valuable insights into areas that can save the company money.

You should also review what your workers are doing and whether they should focus on other areas. If you have employees with a poor performance record, it may be time to dismiss them, so you are only working with effective and productive people. Some of the work your teams are doing could be outsourced. Bad debts, for example, can be outsourced to a factoring company which frees up your workers to do more productive things.

Always Look for New Business.

If you lose a large client, it seriously impacts your business. Always look out for new opportunities and clients, even if you have a complete order book. You mustn’t be reliant on one funding stream or customer. If they default on payments and you have to use invoice factoring or debt recovery, your company’s finances are in a challenging position. Your business model is more robust when you attract new opportunities and can be more resilient to a sudden change.

The business world is challenging now due to the global economic position and the cost of living. As a business owner, your job is difficult, but you can remain resilient with your business by looking at how to keep your finances in order and your cash flow working. Using resources such as invoice factoring and outsourcing will help you remain efficient in a challenging financial climate. By taking steps to look at everything in your business and make efficiencies, you will survive a turbulent ride with the economic challenges ahead.

Effective project management can be a great way to achieve your company’s goals. Businesses need efficient project managers to push out new products or catch up to major stakeholders in their industries. Here are a few tips to help you stay on top of your company’s projects.

Understand your project’s beneficiaries and requirements.

Every project focuses on a specific objective and audience. It’s essential to prioritize your beneficiaries’ needs every step of the way through the project management journey. However, keeping up with changing customer details is easier said than done. What’s worse is that 89 percent of U.S. customers feel frustrated when a company doesn’t personalize its project outcomes to their peculiar needs, as revealed by a Forbes personalization survey. That’s why it’s essential to leverage your project’s end users’ data to tune your project’s solutions toward customers’ major challenges.

Another challenge is that businesses today source large volumes of data from disparate systems. Often, managing independent data silos collected from disparate data sources can be challenging. Data virtualization trends can be the best option if you want instant access to effective analytics across various data types and formats. The increasing need for data virtualization over traditional technologies rests on operational efficiency and the many use case benefits. Data virtualization can be a great way to access your project’s best insights while keeping costs at a bare minimum.

Get a qualified project manager.

Project management is a specialized business function that requires highly technical knowledge to manage project risks and achieve specific project outcomes. Therefore, ensure your project manager is PMP certified with significant project management knowledge to play the part. If you’re a do-it-all business manager with the basics of project management, you can opt to lead your company’s project.

Luckily, today’s digital transformation has made learning time management and other critical project management-related concepts easier. A quick Google query for “PMP class in Houston” can bring up several results to select the best person. Project management can be time-consuming and daunting, and a qualified project manager leading your efforts can guarantee positive project outcomes and peace of mind.

Clearly define your milestones.

Project management experts advise PMP teams to be crystal clear about their objectives and milestones. It can be new product launches, market growth, brand reliability, scalability, profitability, and more. The standard practice is to transform these milestones into key performance indicators to help you measure every input invested into your company’s project, but the cold truth is that not everything happens the way you want on your project management journey. You can prioritize your milestones, putting the most important ones first. It helps to assess your chances of success based on your anticipated project risks.

Use an effective PMP tool.

No project management team is immune to the field’s common challenges. Thankfully, digitalization has afforded project managers several PMP tools to make project management a little less stressful. Many of these tools run on cloud services and the SaaS model so that you can enlist your entire team on the app with no hassle. Using these virtual tools has become more crucial in today’s COVID-19 era, where many team members opt to work remotely. Note that some PMP platforms may be rooted in agile methodologies and thus work best for agile project management proponents.

Always communicate on progress.

A huge part of staying on top of your company’s projects depends on progress communication. It pays to report every recent development and regularly evaluate the performance of your team members. Communicating progress often can be a great way to ensure project tailoring and keep your team members on their toes.

All in all, project management can be an exciting yet difficult task, but it’s essential to learn and focus on incremental results using good data management tactics to get yourself through successive projects.