To organize an event involves a great deal of effort and planning, so if you are an event promoter, you probably want to know if after so much work the numbers will add up and your festival will be really profitable.
Just like any event, festivals can reach quite high costs, so it is normal that you wonder how you can increase the revenue of your festival and that the ROI (return on investment) is positive, and even exceeds what you had originally planned.
This is how to increase the revenue of a festival
These four ideas we are going to give you to increase your festival’s revenue are not the definitive answer, since there are hundreds of ways to stimulate revenue at a festival. But keep in mind that none of these tips will be viable if you have not previously planned your festival in a coherent way. If you are not sure about it, we recommend you our post where we tell you the keys to make the organization of your festival a success.
And even though there is no absolute truth, there is a previous experience that allows us to talk about the subject and tell you about the actions carried out by the most profitable and well-known festivals in the market. Let’s start!
Exclusivity
The scarcity sells, it is one of the main pillars of the law of supply and demand, and if you add a touch of exclusivity, the demand is able to grow a little more.
The way to generate exclusivity within a festival is with VIP access tickets. Tickets with advantages compared to general tickets. This type of ticket has a somewhat higher cost and provides its buyers with certain benefits, such as VIP area inside the enclosure (both in concerts and camping), drink passes, gifts and a long list of actions that are only possible if the user is willing to pay extra.
The exclusivity is not only in the VIP, but also in the scarcity of availability. Create different groups of tickets at different prices: start the event with a small batch of tickets at a relatively low price, thus creating expectation and activating demand, after which you can release other batches of tickets at higher prices.
Cashless payments
One of the main channels of income within a festival is the consumption that takes place during its celebration. For this reason, it is worth mentioning that it is one of the key points that we must take care of and pamper if we want to make our event profitable.
Both recent studies and our own experience as servers of solutions for events have shown us that the implementation of Cashless technology is able to increase consumption within the festival by almost 40%. This is quite a high figure, which can represent a large percentage of the ROI we are trying to achieve.
This percentage is produced for different reasons resulting from incorporating Cashless and Contactless payments within the festival. Cashless technology increases consumption because:
- It inhibits the sensation of spending by the user: as with the use of credit cards, when cash is eliminated, the sensation of spending by consumers is lower. In other words, at a mental level, there is not the same feeling of waste that occurs when paying with cash. This inhibition increases spending!
- Speed up purchases: Gofun’s cashless solutions are powered by both the payment system (which usually resides in a smart wristband) and a smart POS (point of sale), which streamline the order reception, purchase and payment processes. This translates into a reduction of waiting times within the festival’s points of sale and with it, a more agile service that encourages a more fluid consumption by attendees.
- It reduces staff costs: by streamlining the purchasing processes, each waiter can handle more orders in the same amount of time, so you will need fewer staff to handle the same number of orders.
There is a trick that few promoters apply and yet it is a way to encourage consumption through cashless payment. We are talking about brand activation at the point of sale. This is a strategy that encourages the user to consume in exchange for a benefit. For example, if you use the cashless payment system in the purchase of X product, you enter the draw for a double ticket to another festival or you have the chance to access the Meet & Greet of the headliner artist.
These are ways to promote partner brands within the festival and encourage people to continue consuming. Have you ever used this strategy before?
Big Data
Socrates said that knowledge will set us free, a phrase in which the philosopher tried to synthesize that only through knowledge we can evolve. And you may ask yourself, how will this phrase help you to increase your festival’s revenue? Very simply, through the data that Big Data can provide you with.
Yes, Big Data and Business Intelligence are not the absolute property of large financial companies, in the entertainment sector can also be applied. In fact, it will make your event more profitable.
You can get Big Data not only through cashless payment solutions, but also through solutions for capacity control, access control or ticketing.
With Big Data you will obtain an exhaustive analysis of the profitability of your festival, for example: the hours of highest consumption, the average ticket per person, the time slots with the highest access peaks, stock management and which products have been the most demanded.
With this data you can create strategic alliances for future festivals, for example, if the X brand of drinks has been the most sold and coveted by the public of your festival, why not propose an alliance with that brand in the next edition?
In short, Big Data provides us with an infinite amount of data and knowledge. Using the data generated by our Gofun technology will allow you to optimize an endless number of processes, and most importantly… Be more profitable!
Sponsors
A basic element in any type of event that seeks funding… Sponsors. Take advantage of the venue where your festival will take place and sell advertising space to potential sponsors: bars, posters, VIP area, cashless payment terminals, stages and even in the accreditation systems.
The point is to find sponsors who are in tune with your festival and your audience. Perhaps you can ask a certain beverage brand that is a hit with your audience to be the sponsor of the event. With the use of sponsorships you will get both extra income and reduce other types of costs.
It’s time to make your festival profitable and get that ROI as high as possible. Did you know these four revenue generation strategies? The key is not only to apply them, but also to analyze them after their application and evaluate if they have been really profitable or if otherwise we should give a twist to the strategy.
