How to Sell Tickets To Fans You Didn’t Know You Had

Marketing for shows and gigs has a simple goal: sell tickets to anyone that doesn’t have them. But that approach is expensive. The more you can focus on people who are ready to buy, the better. 

That’s where remarketing comes in. That is, sending targeted ads to people who have already engaged with your brand. Maybe they have visited your website in the past, or thought about buying a ticket but never pulled the trigger. Remarketing programs get your existing fans to re-engage with you as an artist/venue/event, or even buy that ticket. 

And then there’s the ticket holders you didn’t know you had. 20% of all event tickets are resold to another person, which means you don’t know who as many as 1 in 5 of your attendees are. Yep, even though they showed up on the night, your eDMs are still going to the original purchaser. That’s a big gaping hole in your data. 

This guide will show you how to use retargeting to hit both of these audiences — the lurker fans almost ready to buy a ticket and your previous attendees (including the ones you didn’t know you had). 

How to use retargeting on Facebook to sell more tickets

First things first, you need to know what a Facebook Pixel is. It’s a small snippet of code that lives on your website or ticketing page to track people and their actions. You can use this information to serve Facebook ads to people who have visited your website or Instagram profile, for example. You can ask your web designer to install one, or check out the Facebook Help Centre to do it yourself. 

Once installed, you can create custom Facebook ad campaigns based on the data collected. For example, if someone added a ticket to their cart but never purchased, you could give them ads about discounted ticket options or alternate dates. If you drop a new show in November, you could target people who were browsing your site in the months prior who may have missed the on sale announcement. 

Even if someone has already bought a ticket, Facebook Pixels can identify them as a potential market and increase your revenue. You could create targeted ads to promote upgrades and add-ons like VIP extras and after party tickets. 

How to target your resale market with Tixel

The resale market for event tickets is incredibly fractured. If you don’t have an official resale market, tickets get sold on social media or platforms like Gumtree and ebay. This gives you no visibility on who is really coming to your events — and leaves a market of fans unreachable.

If your event is connected to Tixel, you can place your Facebook Pixel on your Tixel event page and capture this market. Along with having the correct details for fans when tickets are transferred, you can use remarketing to:

• Market to fans who have bought a ticket on Tixel: Add these fans to your database of primary ticket holders and use the combined data to better target audiences for future events. You can also target resale buyers for early bird specials to try and lock them in early next time (and sell out sooner). 
• Market to fans on your Tixel wait list: These fans don’t have a ticket yet or missed out on a sold-out show, so they’re the ideal fans to advertise to next time. Notify them of new release tickets, extra shows, or discount releases. 

Please note that when Buyers are willing to pay with the use of the pre-authorisation function, Tixel obtains express consent to share that price with [only] event organisers.

Start retargeting fans in 3 simple steps

To get started on retargeting for your next event, follow these three steps:

Step 1: Get your event set up on Tixel by getting in touch with us here. Existing customers can simply login!

Step 2: Create a Facebook Pixel using these instructions.

Step 3: Login to your Tixel account and paste your Pixel ID under ‘Facebook Pixel’. 

Now you’re ready to find the fans you didn’t know existed — and sell them more tickets.