How to manage your events and sell tickets
Hosting an event involves meticulous planning, attention to detail, and efficient ticket sales. You’ve sorted the ‘what’, ‘where’, ‘when’, and ‘how’, and your promotional strategies are well-defined. Now comes the crucial question – how to manage ticket sales most effectively? With a plethora of online resources offering advice, we want to share our perspective, enriched by seven years of organizing countless events.
Why a ticketing platform?
In the pre-digital era, event details would be shared via a Facebook event, with payment details for attendees to follow. A spreadsheet would meticulously record each payment, which was then printed out for manual guest check-in at the event – a task fraught with potential errors.
Today, thanks to technological advancements, you don’t need to undergo this strenuous process. Numerous online ticketing platforms offer efficient event management, saving you both time and money.
What to look for in a ticketing platform
The effectiveness of a ticketing platform largely depends on its functionalities and the costs involved in leveraging those features. It should serve as a comprehensive event landing page, a platform to sell tickets, a communication channel to attendees, and a hub to transfer money directly to suppliers. Avoid platforms that have a complex user interface, limited payment options, or lack flexibility in fund transfers.
- Serve as a landing page for your event with all the information: Nobody uses Facebook anymore. Choose a platform that is easy to share and where you can put all the details of your event. This will save you time with promotion.
- Sell your tickets and collect money: The platform should be user-friendly and give as many options to buyers as possible. Shy away from websites that don’t have a good user interface, have too many steps to buy or don’t have a strong enough payment platform with different options to pay.
- Send messages to attendees: You definitely want to have an easy to use and effective way to communicate with attendees. Deadline approaching? A change in venue? A satisfaction survey? Find a platform that gives you an effective option to communicate with your customers.
- Transfer money directly to suppliers: Most ticketing platforms allow you to do only one transfer, after the event, and only to your own account. This means that you don’t have access to your funds until after the event, and you need to transfer everything to yourself in order to pay suppliers afterwards. This adds an unnecessary step. You want to find a platform that is as flexible as possible with your funds.
Facilitate check-in the day of the event
A ticketing platform should also facilitate check-in on the day of the event. No more printing out long lists of attendees and checking them in manually. Look for a platform that provides QR codes for attendees and a scanner for organizers to facilitate a fast and seamless check-in process.
Making the choice
When functionalities are similar across platforms, how to decide which one to use? Begin by identifying your needs and then weigh the functionalities of each platform. Complexity is not always a good thing; often, simplicity trumps overcomplicated features. Once you’ve understood your functional requirements, it’s time to consider the pricing.
There are two aspects to consider – the processing fee (charged by the payment supplier) and the ticketing platform’s own fee. Add both to calculate the total cost.
When it comes to pricing there are a lot of different options. From cheaper platforms that focus on keeping it simple at a lower price, to much more expensive platforms with a lot of advanced functionalities. Most of the platforms charge you two different concepts.
- Processing fee: this is usually what the payment supplier charges. For example, if you use PayPal, PayPal charges you a fee.
- Ticketing Platform: this is what the ticketing platform actually earns.
Therefore, in order to calculate total costs you need you add Processing Fee + Ticketing Platform.
| Platform | Processing fee | Ticketing platform |
|---|---|---|
| Ticket Tailor | 3.4% + 0.20€ | 0,60€ per ticket |
| Eventbrite | 0% | 8-13% |
| Eventzilla | 0 - 2.9% | 1.5€ |
| SimpleTix | 2% | 0.79€ |
| TicketSource | 0% | 4.5% - 7% |
| TicketBud | 2.9% | 2% + 2.99€ |
| Billetto | From 3% | 0.60€ per ticket |
| Studentfy | 0 | 0% to 4.9% |
Conclusion: so which one is the best ticketing platform?
Just like food preferences vary, the best ticketing platform for you depends on the type and scale of your event. For large-scale events requiring advanced functionalities and dedicated customer support, pricier options might be the way to go. For smaller or more straightforward events, simpler and cheaper platforms may suffice.
How well does Studentfy do in the race?
Studentfy stands out as one of the most affordable ticketing platforms on the market, offering the possibility of zero costs when Verse is selected as the payment method. It’s more than just a ticketing platform; we host our own events and developed this platform to meet our needs. We now offer it to others to benefit from its streamlined capabilities.
Studentfy allows you to create, sell, and promote events; track sales; and communicate with attendees through push notifications. Importantly, it provides access to your funds before the event date, enabling you to pay your suppliers in a timely manner. As for the check-in process, forget about the hassle of printed lists; we offer free access to our check-in app to speed up the process.
Still have doubts?
Get in contact with us and we’ll walk you through the platform and solve your doubts.
Are you a student?
Download the Studentfy mobile app to get access to our student discounts, trips, events and services like health insurance and legal assistance.
