How to Leverage User Feedback to Enhance Online Ticket Sales

User feedback can be a valuable asset for promoting your event, increasing sales and driving event-related revenue.

In fact, according to research from Barclays, 85 percent of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) say that online feedback from customers has been beneficial to their business.

Whether you’re promoting your very first event and want to make sure it’s a success, or aiming to build upon your previous successes for more sales, making user feedback a key part of your strategy can give you a significant competitive edge.

Luckily, harnessing the power of user feedback isn’t difficult. In fact, it’s often possible to make it a core part of your event planning process with just a few small changes.

Below, we’ve shared five actionable strategies that you can use to leverage feedback from your users to make your event a success, from deploying surveys to developing a continuous loop of helpful feedback and implementation.

Make it Easy for Your Users to Give You Feedback

First of all, it’s important to make it as easy as possible for your customers to communicate with you.

As an event organizer, you want to be as approachable as possible. You can do this by creating a simple, intuitive feedback form that your users can fill in to share their thoughts, feedback and frustrations with you.

If you’re reaching an audience that prefers verbal communication or has immediate queries that need to be resolved, consider setting up a dedicated phone line for your event.

This lets your customers express their feedback in their own words and get a prompt response to their concerns.

Being accessible to your customers isn’t merely a nicety — it’s a necessity in the world of event planning and ticket sales. Not only does it make it easier for you to get feedback — it also shows your customers that they’re valued, which can increase loyalty and drive ticket sales.

Engage With Your Users Directly Using Social Media

Social media can be a goldmine for spreading the word about your event. It’s also an excellent place to gather feedback from attendees, both before your event takes place and after, when it’s fresh in your audience’s mind.

If you’ve previously hosted events, your users are likely already on social media sharing their thoughts and experiences. Jumping into the conversation can give you valuable insight on the steps you can take to provide a better experience and boost sales in the future.

You can leverage feedback on social media for better ticket sales by:

• Responding to comments and direct messages. This may seem like a no-brainer, but responding to comments and messages from your users can be really impactful and give your event a more personalized feel.When you respond to comments and messages, it shows that you value your attendees’ opinions. Writing a quick response — even to middling or negative comments — lets your audience know that you’re listening and shows that their experience matters to you.

• Monitoring posts mentioning your event or brand. Analyzing conversations related to your brand — known as social listening — can help you spot branded event hashtags and other feedback that doesn’t appear on your own social media pages.Tools like HootSuite and Sprout Social let you easily track conversations on social media about your event and brand. Try using these tools to monitor and save insights related to your brand before, during and after your next event.

• Amplifying positive feedback. If someone had an incredible time at your event, let the world know. Amplify their post on your page, or reach out to them to invite them to leave a review of your event, company or brand using Google or Facebook.Most importantly, thank the user for sharing their positive experience. Showing that you value your happy attendees can turn them into evangelists for your future events.
• Addressing negative feedback from users. If a user had a bad experience, reach out to them directly and see if you can address their issue. A prompt, public response shows people that you care, and can often turn a negative experience into a positive one.

Deploy Surveys to Get Deeper Insights From Your Users

Let’s dive into another powerful tool in your feedback arsenal: surveys. As an event host, a good survey can provide you with a wealth of actionable insights about your attendees’ experience at your event, including specific issues that you can improve for better results in the future.

Send Your Users a Post-Event Survey

One of the easiest, most effective ways to generate valuable feedback from your attendees is by sending a post-event survey.

After your event concludes, it’s prime time to capture your attendees’ thoughts and feelings. The experience is fresh in their minds, meaning you’ll receive raw, actionable feedback that you can often use to make meaningful improvements.

Design a post-event surgery and send it out within 24 hours of your event’s conclusion. Ask your attendees about their overall experience, the quality of the event, any logistical issues they may have encountered, and if they have any suggestions for improvement.

This feedback can help you make your next event even better and strengthen your reputation as an event organizer people can rely on.

For deeper insights, you can also send attendees a more comprehensive survey via email a few days after your event. This gives your attendees extra time to digest their experience and offer a more objective take on what they liked and disliked about your event.

Incentivize Survey Participation

We all need a little nudge sometimes. One simple but effective way to guide your users towards sharing their feedback is to offer a small incentive to complete your post-event survey.

This could be a discount on future event tickets, early bird access to your next event, or a small giveaway to encourage participation.

The aim is to show appreciation for your attendees’ time and feedback. After all, it’s their insight that’s helping you elevate the quality of your events.

Rank Feedback by Frequency, Urgency and Potential Impact

You’ve started to receive feedback from your attendees — that’s excellent. But with all this new information pouring in, how do you decide what to focus on first? More importantly, how do you translate this feedback into real improvements that drive ticket sales?

This is where ranking attendee feedback by its frequency, urgency and potential impact on your sales comes into play.

Identify Recurring Feedback From Your Attendees

Start by identifying recurring feedback — ideas, complaints and insights that come up in lots of attendee comments.

If multiple attendees all point out the same problems, such as difficulty using your ticket widget or challenges related to finding your event, it’s a clear indication that these problems need to be addressed.

By responding to frequently mentioned feedback, you not only improve the experience for your attendees — you also increase the chance of repeat ticket purchases and good word-of-mouth.

Address Urgent Feedback First

Some feedback points are more urgent than others. Say, for instance, there’s a technical issue that prevents would-be attendees from completing their ticket purchase — that’s urgent. On the other hand, suggestions for more diverse food options, while important, aren’t as immediate.

As you go over feedback from attendees, rank it by urgency. Prioritize critical tasks that need to be done now, then move on to less urgent tasks that, while important, don’t have such an acute impact on your event.

Evaluate the Potential Impact of Feedback

Consider the potential impact of implementing certain suggestions. For example, if your events only provide physical tickets and your users often suggest adding an option for mobile ticketing, think about the impact this feedback could have.

Could it have a measurable effect on your sales and user experience? If so, what costs does it have? While some potential improvements come with a significant price tag, others are cheap, easy wins that you can often implement through your existing ticketing software.

If the benefits outweigh the cost of implementing the user feedback, it’s a clear signal to move forward with those improvements.

Build a Continuous ‘Feedback-Implementation’ Loop

Collecting and implementing user feedback isn’t a one-time deal. It’s an ongoing process that helps your events constantly improve and grow.

Make it a point to regularly review and analyze fresh feedback from your event attendees. For even better results, develop a clearly defined process that your team can follow to review user feedback, implement necessary changes, then let users know that they’ve been listened to.

Letting attendees know that you’ve acted on their feedback closes the loop and lets them know that they’ve been heard. It also encourages them to provide more feedback in the future, giving you ongoing insights that you can use to keep improving and growing your events.

Each iteration of this loop can lead to better events, happier attendees and a continual increase in your online ticket sales.

Wrapping Up: Using Feedback to Enhance Online Ticket Sales

Leveraging user feedback can be a powerful strategy for enhancing your online ticket sales. Not only can it help you uncover areas of improvement, but it also strengthens your connection with your audience, showing them that you value their opinions and experiences.

Remember, user feedback isn’t criticism — it’s a roadmap that points you towards changes you can make to create a better experience and improve your events.

By making it easy for users to share their thoughts, actively engaging on social media, making use of insightful surveys, prioritizing feedback, and building a continuous loop of feedback and implementation, you can host events that create happier, more loyal attendees.

Finally, you’ll get the best results by combining effective feedback with a ticketing platform that’s built to serve your business.

TicketsCandy is a free ticketing solution that lets you sell tickets anywhere, start your campaign right away, and access expert assistance to help you promote your event. You can get started today or learn more about the advanced features that make TicketsCandy the best solution for selling tickets and maximizing your event’s revenue.