You can create the most beautiful, boundary-pushing, technically perfect piece of theatre worldwide. Still, without a full and engaged audience, it won’t receive the attention or flowers it deserves. Whether it’s a giveaway, VIP experience, or some other creative game, it’s important to get everyone excited before the curtain even rises.
That said, you should always look for ways to boost attendance at your shows and engage audience members once they’ve arrived. After all, an engaged audience is far more likely to discuss your works long after the curtain closes and return for more. On The Stage presents a few creative games and other offerings that are sure to engage and excite patrons.
A surefire way to ensure attendance at an event? Tempting audience members with the chance of free stuff. The best way to do this is through a raffle drawing.
Say a ticket purchase enters an audience member into a raffle for items or experiences within your theatre. Get creative with your raffle items such as tickets to your next production, a talkback with the cast after the show, branded merch…you name it! You can pull all ticket holders’ names into a raffle and draw at the start of every show. Not only does this encourage attendance, but it also encourages timeliness! So it’s a win-win – you will see more tickets sold, and you’ll also see more people arriving on time or early to your showcases.
Similar to raffles, creative games like giveaways allow you to incentivize attendance to your shows with the ticket holders. Even better, make it clear that prizes can only be claimed in person.
Giveaways can range from merchandise like hats and mugs to tickets to an additional show, a backstage tour, VIP experiences, or something similar. Just make sure your giveaways positively contribute to your bottom line and are worth the effort and investment it takes to produce them.
Offering ticket bundles to your patrons can encourage attendance at more of your shows. Bundled packages tie together tickets with other products or services, adding more value for your patrons and increasing your bottom line.
Examples of ticket bundles include a discount off the total purchase if more than a certain number of tickets are bought at once or enacting add-ons — like pre-ordering concessions to increase your Average Order Value. Overall, ticket bundles offer many benefits, including adding value to your patrons, increasing sales, encouraging attendance, and diversifying income flows.
Everyone wants to feel like a Very Important Person from time to time. Why not harness that energy to attract more patrons to your theatre?
Creating VIP experiences for particular patrons has a variety of benefits. Perhaps the greatest of all is curating a renewed sense of loyalty to your theatre. You will also see a higher engagement rate among your patrons who have VIP experiences, as they’re more excited than ever to be a valued member of a specific performing arts company. Additionally, you’ll see improved patient retention, increased revenue, and a spike in community awareness of your theatre. All in all, offering these VIP experiences is a home run every time.
One tried-and-true strategy to generate more sales while increasing customer retention is to offer a loyalty program, reward cards, or punch cards. Did you know a recent study showed that 52% of consumers who were surveyed said that having a loyalty punch card encouraged them to make another purchase from the company?
By giving your community a punch card, where after they purchase 10 tickets, they will get the next ticket for free, your patrons have a visible goal to achieve and an incentive to reach that goal. Everyone wants to feel accomplished so give them an opportunity to do just that while increasing engagement and revenue for your organization!
You might be thinking, “If I offer discounts, how will my theatre stay afloat?” That’s a fair question, but the key here is to offer strategic discounts only to key audience segments or groups.
These can include younger audience members who have a foothold on social media, alongside bulk ticket buyers, prominent businesses in your area, influencers, or other people you want to see your work.
Speaking of community awareness, why not offer more community events and happenings at your theatre to boost attendance and engagement? Most cities’ local and community theatre scene is full of passion and excitement. Why not gather together with like-minded creatives to host theatre-centric awards to honor and celebrate the artists in your community?
While this idea surely increases attendance, engagement, revenue, and community awareness, it also does something truly good for creatives: celebrates them as they deserve!
You can also boost attendance at your show by creating and sending out personalized invitations to certain community members.
These can be business sponsors or community partners, other regional creatives, donors and season ticket holders, or other groups you want to visit your theatre and see your showcase. This will encourage attendance while creating or strengthening relationships with community members.
Engaging your patrons is important – but ensuring those creative games and engagements lead to meaningful experiences is even more crucial. While your goal may be to increase attendance and engagement at all costs, make sure there is meaning behind what you’re doing. A few ways to create meaningful experiences include:
Theatre is not a one-size-fits-all experience, so create personalized experiences for your patrons. Whether this means deploying unique marketing strategies to target specific demographics or simply greeting every patron by name at a performance, make sure your patrons feel seen, heard, known, and appreciated.
This point goes hand in hand with the suggestion of VIP experiences. Make sure that the patrons who most often frequent your theatre are being rewarded. After all, rewarding loyalty will only reap benefits. When patrons feel valued, you create a more memorable theatre experience, leading to continued purchases and reliable attendance at all your programming.
Whether this reward program offers discounts for long-time patrons or the aforementioned VIP experiences, ensure the audience members who consistently patronize your theatre are treated well.
Theatre shouldn’t be experienced in a vacuum; as a theatremaker, you should encourage dialogue and collaboration within your programming. In short, you can facilitate dialogue about your production and your theatre through online and in-person conversations. Consider adding discussion questions to your show program, posting polls online, responding to comments/questions on your social media platforms, or offering an ‘After the Performance’ Q&A with ticket holders. This way, you’ll create buzz before the performance and nurture engagement afterward.
Whether you’re looking to sell more tickets, increase your engagement, sharpen your marketing strategies, raise more funds, or something in between, On The Stage (OTS) can help.
OTS offers an all-in-one performing arts software built for every stage of theatre management. The robust offerings specialize in ticket sales, box office management, fundraising, marketing, merchandising, and digital streaming. Simply put, whatever goal you may have for your theatre, OTS can help you reach it.
So what are you waiting for? Book a personalized demo with On The Stage today.