Saffire Blog

Ticketing Solutions for Your Haunting Adventure

Don’t frighten away guests with long lines or slow entry! With the right ticketing partner by your side, you can deliver a haunting experience for all.

With Halloween right around the corner, we enter the season of spooky hayrides, haunted houses, frightening corn mazes and other spine-chilling haunts! But what’s actually scarier than a headless man running after you with a chainsaw? A ticketing company that doesn’t have everything you need to run a smooth event.

So, let’s explore the features your haunted attraction should look for in a ticketing partner so you can deliver a horrifying (but efficient) experience to all your guests.

A Hauntingly Effortless Ticketing Process

First and foremost, you want to make sure people can actually buy your tickets! Look for a partner with an intuitive interface that’s easy to manage–and bonus points for integration! Plus, Most folks are buying their tickets on their smartphones nowadays, so you’ll want to double-check they offer a mobile optimized platform.

Next thing to consider is can you offer the types of tickets you want? From general admission and VIP tickets to group discounts and promo codes, the more ticketing options you have, the better you can meet the needs of your audience.

Making Entry Management Scary Fast

Don’t let long, slow-moving lines frighten away your guests! Instead, use a ticketing system that delivers their tickets directly into their mobile wallet. With a QR code on their smartphone, it only takes a couple seconds (and less gate attendants) to scan tickets and let folks in. You’ll also want to keep people moving once they’ve entered the attraction, so find a platform with real-time capacity monitoring to avoid overcrowding and ensure safety. Additionally, a robust system should allow you to effectively manage re-entry and prevent unauthorized individuals from entering. Access control is crucial to maintaining order and the spooky experience for guests.

Frighteningly Good Reporting

Improving your haunt and its operations should be driven by data! By having access to real-time reports and data collected from customers, you can tailor your marketing efforts to different audiences and optimize pricing strategy based on sales trends. You can also use the data to make your haunted attraction even better for next year–see what specific haunts are most popular and allocate resources during peak times to keep guests enjoying their spine-tingling adventure without long waits or empty scares.

Scream-Worthy Service

You might be running a haunted attraction, but that doesn’t mean you want to be ghosted by your ticketing partner! Whether it’s the haunting season or not, you’ll want to find a ticketing partner that is available year round by chat, email or phone. The ideal ticketing partner will be one of your best allies! So be on the lookout for one with a smart and dedicated team to answer your questions quickly, offer emergency support and promptly offer any assistance. With the peace of mind of a support team that always has your back, you can focus on making the spookiest, scariest haunt possible!

As Halloween approaches, it’s hard to overstate the importance of finding the perfect ticketing partner for your haunted attraction! Look for a partner that can facilitate a seamless ticketing process, keep the lines flowing, collect the right kind of data, and prioritize responsive customer support. With the right partner, you can create bone-chilling experiences that will haunt them long after they leave!

Expert Tips for Managing Staff Shortages

One of Saffire’s Core Values is “We Are Dedicated Team Players.” If you’ve worked with us on a project, we hope you’d agree we are outstanding partners!

Staffing any event can be a challenge, but we’ve noticed a trend with partner events across the country recently: Gate staff challenges, shortages and no-shows.

Is there anything worse than that feeling on opening day or night, when the months of planning and operational work have all built up to that moment when you are about to open the gate and welcome an adoring crowd into your event, only to realize there just aren’t enough people helping get them in? Ticket sellers, ticket scanners, line barkers, security and bag checkers, greeters… each of these staff members matter when you need to get folks into your event, and if you are short or unprepared with any one of the critical staffing areas, your guest experience can really suffer.

Saffire has developed so many software and product solutions to address ticket selling and scanning staffing needs, like our unmanned self-serve ticketing kiosks, iPhone/hip-printer mobile selling stations and line busters, QR code-based signage directing customers to buy their tickets online and come right up to scanning lines, and more. Although we’ve been able to help so many of our partners reduce their reliance on ticketing and gate staff, there are still several crucial roles that must be planned and staffed appropriately for your event’s admission process to succeed.

Planning a reliable staff for your admission is so important. If you are hiring a staffing agency, be sure you communicate your event requirements and ask them about their own backup plans! Relying on volunteers to staff your gates? Engage in constant and consistent communication with your team(s) about expectations and be prepared to provide a good experience for them too. Make it easy on them by making sure your volunteers know where to park, what to wear, what their hours will be and most importantly, THANK them often and in big ways.

Signage!

So much of an event’s success relies on the tiny details, so never underestimate the power of clear signage to help folks identify what line they should be in to buy a ticket onsite, or where they can go if they’ve pre-printed or brought a ticket on their device! If you are using self-service ticketing kiosks, make sure to clearly identify them with signs too, so people use them! If you have a bag-check process, use a sign to tell people in line what to expect to help you make the process efficient!

Conclusion

No matter how prepared you are with a ticketing system, technology and structure, if you don’t have the RIGHT people in place to execute your plan, you’ll be unable to get tickets into customers hands, through the gate, checked by security and scanned for entrance. Plan for your people and be ready with a backup plan so you have a solution if and when you need one in the moment. In the face of staffing challenges, do your very best to provide adequate signage and gate structure to eliminate as much confusion as you can for your customers.

Sell More Tickets With Influencer Marketing

With 61% of consumers trusting influencers’ recommendations, it’s not hard to understand why influencer marketing has quickly become an essential part of many brands’ marketing strategies. And it just could be the ticket (pun intended) to boost your ticket sales.

By partnering with local influencers who have a relevant and engaged audience, you can leverage their reach and credibility to promote and drive interest in your event.

It’s easier than you might think! Here’s some easy steps you can to get started with influencer marketing:

Identify relevant influencers

The first step in any influencer marketing campaign is to identify relevant influencers who can help you promote your event. Tasha Hyder from Clay County Fair actually invited two different influencers to this year, a “mommy blogger” appealing to families and a food blogger with a large audience in the area.

Set clear objectives

Before you launch your influencer marketing campaign, it’s essential to set clear objectives for what you want to achieve. Do you want to increase brand awareness, drive ticket sales, or both? Be specific about your goals, and make sure they are measurable so you can track your progress.

Create engaging content

Once you’ve identified your influencers, you’ll need to work with them to create engaging content that promotes your event. Consider giving influencers creative freedom to come up with their own ideas for promoting your event. Authenticity is key to their audience.

Provide incentives

Influencers are often motivated by incentives like free tickets or access to VIP areas. In exchange for creating and posting content to promote your event, consider sending admission tickets, drink tickets, parking passes, food vouchers, or other goodies along with their invitation. Ideally, you would want to provide everything necessary for the influencer to attend, like tickets and parking, then add additional incentives to try and get them to come.

Track your results

Finally, it’s essential to track your results and measure the success of your influencer marketing campaign. Use tracking tools on social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram to gather metrics including likes, comments, and shares. And take a look at sales reports in your Spark dashboard to see if any boosts in sales could be attributed to their content. This will help you determine what worked well and what needs improvement for future campaigns.

Spend some time exploring who’s influential in your area—did you know almost half (47%) of influencers are considered to be ‘micro-influencers’ with 5,000-20,000 followers? With higher engagement rates and many accounts meeting this threshold, there may be way more influencers around your event than you realize, and much more budget-friendly than you had considered. You can easily find influencers by searching relevant hashtags or nearby locations in your area!

Alerting Customers to Fraudulent Tickets

Our top priority at Saffire is providing a secure and reliable platform for customers to purchase tickets to their favorite events. Unfortunately over the past couple years, the rise of fraud has made it increasingly difficult for folks to trust the ticketing industry. We’ll look at some of the common tactics used to swindle ticket sales and discuss how you can best protect your customers from falling victim to ticket scams.

So, what should you be on the lookout for?

Fraudulent ticketing sites: These are websites that claim to sell tickets to events, but are not authorized by the event organizers as the official ticketing platform. These fake sites look legitimate and often use aggressive marketing tactics to lure unsuspecting customers into making a purchase. Once someone has paid for the tickets (typically at a price significantly higher than face value), they are sent either fake tickets or no tickets at all.
Ticket scams: Similar to fraudulent ticketing sites, these scams also involve the sale of fake tickets or tickets that do not exist. However, it can also involve the sale of legitimate tickets that have already been sold to someone else. This can happen when a scammer purchases tickets to an event and then sells them to people, pocketing the money without delivering any actual tickets.
Unauthorized ticket resellers: This constitutes any individuals or companies that buy tickets to events and resell them at a markup. While this is not inherently fraudulent, it can lead to fake tickets that can’t scan, overpriced tickets and other issues. In some cases, these resellers will use deceptive tactics to make it look like they are the official ticketing platform or that they are a legitimate secondary reseller.

Helping Customers Avoid Scams

Be sure to remind customers the only way to protect themselves from ticket scams is to only purchase tickets from authorized sources. Warn folks to be wary of sites that offer tickets at prices that seem too good to be true, as these offers are often fraudulent.

Some of our clients are adding messaging to their homepage or posting reminders on their social media to alert fans of potential scams, and remind customers that their site is the only place to purchase guaranteed tickets. We love how these clients are using the tools at their fingertips to get the message out! Check out the examples from Fond Du Lac County Fair and Cody Stampede Rodeo.

Fraudulent ticketing sites, ticket scams, and unauthorized ticket resellers can be a major problem for customers who are looking to purchase tickets to their favorite events. By reminding folks to be cautious and only purchase tickets from authorized sources, you can protect your guests from falling victim to these scams. And with a trusted ticketing platform, you can guarantee attendees safe and secure tickets!

Mapping the Ticket-Buying Customer Journey

Understanding the journey your customer takes to purchasing tickets will help you find opportunities for improvement!

A customer journey map is a visual representation of the process a customer takes with a company. For the purpose of ticketing, the map begins when a person is initially made aware of available tickets and concludes after the ticket has been used for entry. All the steps in between are interactions or experiences that make up a customer journey map.

The Purpose of a Customer Journey Map

If everyone who had heard of tickets bought one, you wouldn’t need to worry about the customer journey! Since this isn’t the case, mapping out the customer journey and gathering feedback on the different touchpoints to better understand guest behavior. A customer journey map is also key for your marketing team to identify the tone and content that should be communicated depending on the stage of the journey.

Customer journeys are specific and based on actual experience, so take the time to collect feedback from guests to have a clear grasp on the patron’s journey to purchasing tickets. Is the customer journey too long? Is it too confusing? You may be surprised why people are abandoning their carts early

What are the stages of a customer journey?

There are five defined states of your customers’ buying journey: awareness, consideration, purchase, retention and advocacy.

Awareness: The first touchpoint of a journey! The customer is looking for a fun event to attend themselves or with their family and becomes aware of your brand, typically on social media or through an online search. Once awareness has been reached, it’s time to nurture that in the next phase.
Consideration: During the consideration phase, the customer will evaluate your offerings to competitors. Perhaps they’re considering your event, a nearby concert, a street festival and a fair for their day of fun. Highlight why they should attend your event (show pictures of families having fun or the delicious food they might find) while addressing potential pain points (tickets can be bought in advance or in a bundle for a discounted price).
Purchase/Decision: With all the info gathered from the previous two phases, the customer makes their decision and purchases their ticket.
Retention: Now that this potential customer has become an official patron of your event, it’s important to keep them engaged through email marketing, loyalty programs, special promotions, etc. throughout the year so when your event rolls around again, they are ready to buy tickets!
Advocacy: If a customer has an easy time purchasing tickets to your event, they can turn into some of your biggest advocates! They’ll tell their family and friends how simple it was to purchase in advanced, skip the line and get into the event in a just a few minutes.

Mapping the Customer Journey

One of the first steps to mapping and evaluating the customer journey is by gathering feedback on how their ticket-buying experience went. This could be done by talking to guests in-person at your event, leaving out comment cards for patrons to fill out, or sending a post-event survey to gauge satisfaction.

You should also consider going on the journey of buying your tickets yourself! Google your event and navigate to the page to purchase tickets. Could you easily find it if you didn’t know where to look? Once you selected the ticket, was the purchase easy to complete? And how was the ticket delivered to you? Just like the customer, your next step will be getting to the front gate with your ticket. Were there extremely long lines to enter? Were attendants able to scan your ticket? How quickly were you able to enter the event?

Answering these questions, collecting feedback from guests and mopping out the customer journey will help you identify pain points, improve communication and sell more tickets.

Recession-Proof Your 2023 Event

Whether or not we enter a full-blown recession next year, your event should be selling advanced tickets.

Rising inflation, high gas prices and a slowing housing market and a potential recession have been dominating the headlines recently–but what could that mean for you? A major way your fair, festival or event can hedge against a possible recession hurting ticket sales is by putting tickets on sale earlier! Why wait?!

Advanced tickets sales are trending

Fairs, festivals, events and concerts have been pushing ticket sales earlier and earlier. Buying a ticket to a concert that’s over a year out doesn’t seem so unreasonable anymore! Many attendees look online for early-bird deals or want to ensure they have a spot reserved by the time their favorite event rolls around.

Why sell in advance?

Offering tickets in advance, potential recession or not, is a worthwhile effort for your event. Here are our top five reasons to start selling earlier:

It’s money in the bank: Every ticket sold before the gate opens puts money in your account. This can help with your budget or expensenses even before a single guest arrives!
Data, data and more data: There is so much data that can be collected from early ticket sales–valuable data you can use to create a marketing campaign that resonates with your target audience.
Spread out the paycheck: A major reason event-goers purchase their tickets in advance actually has to do with budgeting. When folks are looking at their entertainment budget before coming to your event, they don’t really consider money spent in advance as part of what they will spend once they are at your event.
Breakage: As we all know, not everyone who purchases a ticket to your event is actually going to redeem that ticket. But that’s still extra money in your account! The earlier tickets are put on sale, the higher your breakage will be.
Better planning: Knowing in advance how many people are planning to attend your event, you can make better revenue projections and ensure you have enough volunteers or staff on hand.

Sell Advance Tickets Successfully!

When posting tickets in advance, there are a few key steps you can take to ensure you’re getting the most revenue from your efforts. It’s important to make advance tickets desirable so people actually make purchases.

One way is by offering discounted prices for tickets that are purchased in advance and online. Even after realizing advance sales discounts, you can essentially have much of your event paid for before an attendee walks through the gate. Offering group or family packages is another great way to offer value to guests, getting them into the event ready to purchase food, beverages and shows. And don’t forget to highlight the biggest advantage of advance purchasing: skipping the line at the box office or gates!

With so many creative solutions for maximizing revenue from your ticket sales, our top recommendation is always selling tickets early and online!

8 Steps to a More Sustainable Venue

With the effects of climate change continuing to appear worldwide, it’s important for organizations to evaluate their impact on the environment–and how it could be improved.

Whether it’s a one-time large-scale event or a series of smaller events that add up over time, don’t let hosting your events be wasteful. In 2022 we can all pledge to do our part in being a bit more eco-friendly.

Not sure where to start with sustainability? Here are 8 manageable ways your event or venue can become more green:

Establish an environmental policy: As an organization, company or association, draft a policy outlining your sustainability efforts and commitment to protecting the environment.
Reduce single-waste plastic: A growing number of states have banned the use of single-waste items like cups, straws, plates or cutlery. If these items aren’t recycled properly, they can end up in the oceans. Start small by ditching straws and work towards a totally plastic-free event.
Go digital: You can also reduce the use of paper by going digital whenever possible! This could be anything from sending out invitations via email or offering mobile-friendly tickets.
Choose LED for lighting: Still using fluorescent lighting? It’s time to switch to LED lights! These lights consume less power, thus saving energy and reducing carbon emissions.
Offer water bottle refill stations: From crew to attendees, think about the hundreds of empty plastic water bottles that just one event can make. Instead, encourage attendees to bring in their own reusable water bottles and install refill stations around the venue.
Don’t forget about recycling: Make sure there are multiple receptacles for people to recycle any plastic, glass or paper into. These should be easy to find and stationed by food areas, entrances, exits and along pathways.
Cut food waste: Depending on the type of venue or event, reducing food waste can be achieved in a multitude of ways such as serving locally-sourced produce, sustainably-sourced seafood, requesting biodegradable containers, or donating any surplus food.
Encourage more eco-friendly transportation: Your sustainable event will still leave a significant carbon footprint if everyone is driving their own cars in. Think about your venue and what could be feasible–is there public transportation people can use? Are there chargers for people driving an electric vehicle?
Be flexible: Many organizers, artists and performers are also looking for ways to make their events more eco-friendly whether that’s through vendor partnerships or requesting venues to be plastic-free. Be open to hearing new ideas and adapting for greener event.

Making small, positive changes to your venue will limit your organization’s environmental impact, and your attendees will thank you for it.

Have any creative ways your fair, venue or festival went a little more green? We’d love to hear them!

How a Cashless System Can Upgrade Your Event

Putting on a successful event can be one of the most fun and rewarding experiences. There is nothing better than seeing the smiles on eager event-goers faces, but they can also be difficult and tiring. The never-ending job as an event manager is to make everyone happy: customers, vendors, and acts are all counting on … Continue reading “How a Cashless System Can Upgrade Your Event”

Putting on a successful event can be one of the most fun and rewarding experiences. There is nothing better than seeing the smiles on eager event-goers faces, but they can also be difficult and tiring. The never-ending job as an event manager is to make everyone happy: customers, vendors, and acts are all counting on you to keep things organized and running smoothly. Dealing with long lines, long transaction times, rowdy attendees and piles of cash going through the hands of many different vendors can make an event needlessly stressful.

The good news? Cashless systems are taking over the event, fair and festival space, and they’re making demands easier to handle. Not only does a cashless system make lines and transaction times shorter, but it has been proven to increase revenue at events by up to 30%!

Saffire has seen cashless systems in action (and we have launched our own system, BlastPass, in the process!) and we’re 100% on board with the new technology. The trend is spreading like wildfire for good reason. Huge festivals like Coachella, Austin City Limits and Lollapalooza have jumped on board, and there are no signs of it slowing down anytime soon. So, are cashless systems worth it?

Here’s why we think they are:

Increased Revenue:

Shorter lines and transaction times mean that attendees have more time to spend on food and fun. Cashless systems have proven to create more capita per customer, and in the end that often means more revenue for your event. Money is easily trackable at any time through real-time reporting, making it easier to keep track of than ever.

Carefree Event:

For attendees, nothing is easier than pre-purchasing a card or wristband, which they can use for all sorts of things like gate admittance and purchasing food. Reload stations throughout your event allow customers to refill when necessary and rarely have to worry about their wallets. The added security for event-goers is priceless. Combine this with a smoother running event for event managers, and it’s a win-win situation.

Real-time Reporting:

Reporting can be a real lifesaver for events. Not too long ago, managers were forced to wait until the close of the day to finalize money counts and close registers. Today, real-time reporting gives them an in-the-moment look at total earnings, what every vendor has sold, event capacity and more. It can mean the difference between chaos and nipping a fire in the bud before it ever starts.

No Internet Needed:

Some cashless systems, like Saffire’s, can be used 100% offline. Downtime is never an option, so systems that can operate without an internet connection are extremely valuable.

With a system that is so beneficial for both the event organizer and the attendee, its no wonder why cashless systems are taking over the event space. To learn more about how cashless systems can increase your revenue, read more here or reach out to us today!

How to Instantly Reply to Your Messages Using Instagram Quick Replies (With screenshots)

If you use social media to sell tickets or merch (and you should!), you know how easy it can be for your inbox to start exploding with DMs. Don’t get me wrong – a busy inbox is a good sign, but when you find yourself answering the same question over and over again, it doesn’t … Continue reading “How to Instantly Reply to Your Messages Using Instagram Quick Replies (With screenshots)”

If you use social media to sell tickets or merch (and you should!), you know how easy it can be for your inbox to start exploding with DMs. Don’t get me wrong – a busy inbox is a good sign, but when you find yourself answering the same question over and over again, it doesn’t take long to realize that your time is even more valuable. To fix this problem, Instagram rolled out the Quick Replies feature to cut down on the time it takes to respond to direct messages.

(To take advantage of the feature, make sure you are using an Instagram Business Account.)

What is Instagram Quick Replies?

Quick Replies make it easy to respond your Instagram messages in just a few taps. The feature is similar to Facebook’s Instant Replies, except the saved messages don’t send automatically. Quick Replies comes in handy when customers are most likely to start conversations, like when tickets go up for sale, an event is right around the corner or when a giveaway occurs. It can be a lifesaver when it comes to staying engaged with your followers!

Here’s how to use it:

Go to your Instagram profile page and select your direct messages in the top right corner.
Select a message.
Tap the plus button in the bottom menu.
Click on the quick reply button (a conversation bubble with three dots).
Select “New Quick Reply.”
Type your message, then click save.
To use your message, type your shortcode or tap the quick reply icon to select your message. Then click send.
You did it!

Say goodbye to hours spent replying to direct messages and answering the same questions over and over again. Quick Replies makes it easier than ever to quickly respond to direct messages – and as event planners know, in the middle of event season, every second counts!

6 Steps for Making Your Website ADA Compliant

ADA compliance is one of the most important pieces to a website in 2018. As marketers, event planners and coordinators, it’s important to make sure that EVERYONE is able to access all of the awesome things we create – both in person and online. However, accessibility isn’t just the right thing to do, it also … Continue reading “6 Steps for Making Your Website ADA Compliant”

ADA compliance is one of the most important pieces to a website in 2018. As marketers, event planners and coordinators, it’s important to make sure that EVERYONE is able to access all of the awesome things we create – both in person and online. However, accessibility isn’t just the right thing to do, it also affects your business. Over 7,500 businesses have faced ADA-related litigation, and this number is growing. Luckily, so is our understanding of what we need to do to provide great online experiences for everyone alike!

What does it mean and why do we need it?

ADA compliance is about making your website accessible to EVERYONE. In theory, this sounds simple, but in practice it can be a bit confusing. That’s why it’s best to get started with compliance before your website is even built. Here at Saffire, we keep ADA Compliance in mind from the very beginning.

Why? Think about this: Nearly 1 in 5 Americans have a disability. Since the internet is used for all kinds of important things these days, like registering for services or paying bills online, it’s important that every member of our society has the same access to things they need. Plus, it makes it much easier for them to find information about your organization!

Here are the first six steps to making your website ADA compliant:

Write Better Link Text

Each link should make sense when read by itself. Provide context and avoid using phrases like “click here” or “continue.” Instead, say things like “read the article” or “tickets here.” Avoid long URLs, and if an image is the only thing within a link, make sure it has ALT text! Which brings us to…

Use ALT Tags for Images

Add meaningful ALT tags to important images. That means images like logos (especially if they lead to your homepage), images that are links, images used as placeholders for text, or any other image that adds context to a page. The ALT tag gives context to people who can’t see the image, so make sure it makes sense! How can you tell if you have good ALT tags? Describe the image and get specific! What is happening in the photo? Who or what is in it? Where are they? Don’t repeat phrases you’ve already used in the text or caption, and don’t begin with phrases like “image of” or “in this image.” Take time to learn how to place and write good ALT tags. They’re important!

Think About the Page Structure

People use your page design as a guide to find information on your website, so build your pages in ways that make sense. Utilize headers, bullets, blockquotes, and other ways of organizing your information. Always start your page with an H1 tag and follow the hierarchy for the rest of the headers (H1 > H2 > H3 > H4, etc.)

Test Your Colors

Did you know that color blindness affects 8 percent of men and 0.5 percent of women? Together, that makes up more than 25 million people with color blindness in the U.S. alone. To make sure that color blind people can still understand everything on your website, it’s important that color is not the only tool used to organize information. Test your site using a free tool like the webAIM contrast checker to make sure your web pages are up to par.

Caption and Transcribe All Videos

Every video or audio piece must have both captions and a transcript to be ADA compliant. Luckily, many tools like YouTube and Facebook now allow users to add captions to videos. Don’t forget to include a separate area to describe what is happening in the video, and always make sure that the video is accessible by mouse, keyboard and screen readers!

Test Your Site

The best way to know for sure if your site is accessible? Test, test, test! There a few free tools online that can help you test the accessibility of each page within your site. Our favorite is WAVE. It can get a little pricey to check your whole website at once but testing sites like PowerMapper can help you get there.

Remember, accessibility is the law, but that’s not the only reason it’s important! Accessibility affects millions of people. Meeting compliance standards is a sure way to provide the best user experience for everyone.