e-Tickets – a ticketing website for small eventsasmeaton/MECPracticums2005/e... · 2005-08-05 · e-Tickets – a ticketing website for small events Group Members: Peter Kelly

eTickets Business Plan 1

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e-Tickets – a ticketing website for small events

Group Members:

Peter Kelly

Tinu George

Micheál Glennon

Mark Coleman


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TABLE OF CONTENTS

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY .................................................................................5

The motivation behind eTickets............................................................................6

BACKGROUND SECTION..............................................................................7

Key Statistics: ............................................................................................................7 Small Events taking place in Ireland ....................................................................7 Credit Cards usage in Ireland ...............................................................................7 Internet Penetration in Ireland...............................................................................8

International Scope: .................................................................................................9

Competition: ...............................................................................................................9

Porter’s Five Forces:..............................................................................................10 Threat of substitute products or services ..........................................................10 Bargaining Power of End Users..........................................................................10 Bargaining Power of Suppliers............................................................................10 Rivalry among existing competitors ...................................................................11 Threat of New Entrants ........................................................................................11

Survey Analysis.......................................................................................................12

Personnel ..................................................................................................................12 Management Structure.........................................................................................12 Individual Roles .....................................................................................................13

THE MARKETING REPORT .........................................................................15

Marketing Mix...........................................................................................................15 Promotion ...............................................................................................................15

- Online Advertising and Promotion ...............................................................15 - Other Advertising ............................................................................................15 - Direct Marketing ..............................................................................................15

Product....................................................................................................................16 Price ........................................................................................................................16

Importance of a good pricing structure ..........................................................17 Place........................................................................................................................18

Value Chain...............................................................................................................19 Attract Customers: ................................................................................................19 Interact with Customers: ......................................................................................20 Act on Customer Instructions: .............................................................................20 React on Customer Inquiries:..............................................................................21


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Problems with existing process .........................................................................21

Future Development ...............................................................................................21

Target Market Channels ........................................................................................23

SWOT Analysis ........................................................................................................23 Strengths ................................................................................................................23 Weakness...............................................................................................................24 Opportunities..........................................................................................................25 Threats ....................................................................................................................25

Sustainable Competitive Advantage..................................................................27

FINANCIAL ANALYSIS ................................................................................28

Start –Up....................................................................................................................28 Source of Funding.................................................................................................28 Use of Funding ......................................................................................................28 Expenses ................................................................................................................28 Start Up Finances..................................................................................................29

Operational Finances.............................................................................................29 Income: ...................................................................................................................29

Sales....................................................................................................................29 Advertising..........................................................................................................30

Expenditure: ...........................................................................................................30 Payroll .................................................................................................................31 Advertising..........................................................................................................31 Office Expenses ................................................................................................31 Rent .....................................................................................................................31 Utilities.................................................................................................................31 Credit Card Services.........................................................................................32 Taxes...................................................................................................................32

Cash Flow A/C..........................................................................................................33 Total Income ..........................................................................................................33 Operating Expenses .............................................................................................33 Total Operating Expenses ...................................................................................33 Net Profit/Loss .......................................................................................................33

Break Even Analysis ..............................................................................................34

TECHNICAL REPORT ..................................................................................35

Introduction ..............................................................................................................35 Tickets.....................................................................................................................35

Web Site.....................................................................................................................35


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Client Side Technologies .....................................................................................35 Server Side Technologies....................................................................................36

Database Design...............................................................................................37 Barcode / Serial Number Generation.............................................................38

Site Map..................................................................................................................40 Sample Walkthrough ............................................................................................41 Credit Card Verification ........................................................................................44 Security ...................................................................................................................45

Verification Software..............................................................................................46 Architecture ............................................................................................................47 File Format .............................................................................................................48 Security ...................................................................................................................48

APPENDIX: ...................................................................................................49

Appendix I: Assumptions For Break-Even Analysis .....................................49

Appendix II: Survey and Analysis ......................................................................49

Appendix III: Database Structure........................................................................57

Appendix IV: Verification Software File Format..............................................59

Appendix V: Ticketmaster report........................................................................59

Appendix VI: Advertising rates and demographics.......................................60

Appendix VII: Financial Sources.........................................................................63

Appendix VIII: Correspondence with promoters ............................................63


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Executive Summary

Internet or 'online' ticketing is all about providing a useful and efficient service

to clients and customers. The aim is to make the purchase or reservation of

tickets easier. Naturally, this will encourage sales. The use of the Internet

makes buying a ticket more convenient since the service is available at any

geographical location, including home (or even remotely via a laptop and

cellular phone) and at any time of the day, any day of the year. Online ticket

services, particularly those based on the World Wide Web, have a further

advantage by providing relevant information alongside the service. This can

aid purchasing decisions and may encourage future usage.

Despite these advantages, many customers refrain from using these services

because they believe them to be unsafe. In reality, it is often a more secure

transaction than 'normal' credit card purchases. Giving your credit card to a

waiter or reading it over the phone are two examples of 'insecure' practices.

Fears are largely based on media hype resulting from isolated cases of

electronic fraud. These fears are often unfounded and should fade as Internet

commerce becomes more widely accepted. There are also benefits for those

providing the service. New markets are being created and ticket sales are

increased. Apart from maintenance and data updates, no manpower is

required to provide the service once it has been established. The process of

recording the transactions is more automated and overhead is reduced. An

important point is that ticket providers are also providing a convenient service

to customers and are thereby improving public image and encouraging return

customers.

The information gathered from surveys conducted showed that more than 95

million tickets valued at more than $4 billion were sold in 2002 (see appendix

V), through www.Ticketmaster.com, one of the largest e-commerce sites on

the Internet. However, much more events take place on a daily basis on a

much smaller scale that have no viable way of offering tickets for sale over the


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internet. Much of the promotion and discussion of events such as smaller

gigs, clubs, etc, takes place over the Internet, so it seems only natural that

there should be a realistic option for purchasing tickets there also.

The motivation behind eTickets

Currently, the most significant drawbacks for entertainment firms when selling

tickets offline are:

• Clogging - Queuing for tickets, which leads to customer frustration.

• Inadequacy – There are significant costs involved in selling tickets

offline. It requires large numbers of staff to process ticket transactions.

• Lack of knowledge about customers & personalized customer Service

- This is one of the main areas eTickets hopes to exploit. There is a

considerable marketing opportunity for entertainment firms to gain

valuable knowledge about who their customers are and what their

entertainment preferences are as well as other important customer

data which would increase advertising revenue through targeted

marketing.

The most important aspect of eTickets will be that a trustworthy, proficiency

and competitive service will be available to our customers, which will be a vast

improvement. We have the advantage over our competitors of being a

‘dotcom’ and are guaranteeing a professional service to the customer that will

meet and exceed their current demands, which are currently being unfulfilled.

We will be basing our service on the Ryanair style low cost service where

customers print their own tickets, saving on mailing costs.


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Background Section

Key Statistics:

Small Events taking place in Ireland

It is quite difficult to calculate the number of events taking place in Ireland

each year, as there are currently no national statistics for small gigs recorded.

Each organisation only keeps records of their own particular events (for

example, 250 in the Temple Bar Music Centre).

So the best way to get an approximation of the number of small events is to

use “The Event Guide” publication, which has listings for the vast majority of

small events held in Ireland. The official website of “The Event Guide” has

331 listings for 2 weeks (29th June-12th July 2005).

So taking this as an average for a fortnight, 331* 26 (52 weeks in the year) =

8606. Therefore approximately 8,500 small events take place in Ireland every

year.

Credit Cards usage in Ireland

Mintel, in the "Credit Cards- Ireland, October 2002 report”, last examined the

market for credit cards in Ireland. Since then, the market has continued to

grow considerably in terms of value and in terms of the number of consumers

with a credit card.

The number of credit cards in Ireland is increasing all the time. In the table

below, it shows that in 1999 there were 1.5 million credit cards in circulation,

which had increased to 2.4 million by 2002. This was an increase of almost a

million in 3 years.

This is good news for our service since the purchasing of tickets and payment

to organisers is all provided through the use of credit cards.


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1999 2000 2001

2002

Source: Central Statistics Office

http://www.cso.ie/releasespublications/documents/statisticalyearbook/2003/fin

ance&banking.pdf

Internet Penetration in Ireland

“In June 2004, an estimated 649,400 households in Ireland had a home

computer, an increase of about 67,000 households since June 2003. This

means that 46.2% of households had a home computer in 2004, compared

with 42.2% in 2003. Internet access also increased over the same period,

with 537,000 households (or 38.2% of the total) having access to the Internet

in June 2004” (Information Society Statistics 2004).

Source: Central Statistics Office

http://www.cso.ie/newsevents/documents/ictireland2004.pdf

So the number of people with access to the Internet is increasing all the time.

This is important for our business since our service is only provided online.


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International Scope:

If our service is successful in Ireland then it could easily expanded to other

countries. Since the service is web based it would be possible to expand the

service as long as the country in question had relatively high Internet

penetration. Promoters would only be willing to put tickets on-line if there are

enough people with Internet access and credit cards willing to buy them.

Hence, countries in the European Union along with North America and

Australia would be suitable candidates for future international expansion.

Ticketmaster operates in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Denmark, Finland,

Ireland, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, United Kingdom and United

States. So, our service could be expanded into many of these countries over

time, provided there are no existing companies already delivering the service

we are offering.

One point of consideration would be the language barrier. Dedicated

websites would be required in each of the specified counties. These websites

would need to be written in the main language spoken in that particular, and

would also take into account local preferences and culture.

Competition:

There are no known competitors in the Irish market. Ticket Master only deals

with large events and concerts. Tickets.ie also doesn’t deal with selling tickets

for smaller events on-line.

Tickets.ie is owned and operated by Push Promotion Limited, which is

registered in the Republic of Ireland. They charge for booking, which is the

commission charged to promoters for selling their tickets. Some promoters

choose to include this fee in the ticket price. In some ways this is a similar

service to the one we intend to supply. They have the same ethos but

tickets.ie is really the website of just one promoter. We intend to open up our

service to any and every promoter who wishes to sell tickets online.


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Obviously, if our service is successful then we may have to deal with a lot of

potential competitors in the future. These would include companies would

attempt to replicate our service and improve upon it in some way e.g. charge

Promoters less for listing events.

Porter’s Five Forces:

Threat of substitute products or services

Examples of substitutes are people deciding to go to the cinema, holiday and

weekends away instead of small events/concerts.

From a product perspective, music tends to create a unique emotional

attachment for an individual that cannot be replaced by other activities. For

example, if an individual really wants to see a band they are unlikely to spend

that money on the cinema instead.

From a services perspective, Promoters of the event/concert may decide to

continue to sell the tickets from the box-office at the event location instead of

using our service.

Bargaining Power of End Users

Initially this will be high, as it will be still be possible to buy tickets directly from

the box-office. However as more and more event Promoters start to use our

service instead of the traditional means, then the bargaining power of end

users will be weakened.

If the organiser decides to sell all the tickets for the event on-line then the end

user will have little bargaining power.

Bargaining Power of Suppliers

When Promoters realise the advantages of using our service then their

bargaining power will be relatively weak.


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These advantages include our service dealing with much of the business and

marketing for the event. The event will be advertised on our website along

with a profile of each band. The only other way would be to advertise through

traditional media (e.g. an advertisement in Hot Press) which would be much

more expensive.

Moreover, it gives the event national coverage. For example, someone in

Cork could buy tickets for an event in Dublin, without having to

• Travel the long journey to collect the tickets

• Or travel the day of the event in the hope that there might still be tickets

available.

Rivalry among existing competitors

As discussed in the previous section, we currently have little rivalry in the Irish

market for the service that we are offering. Ticketmaster basically has a

monopoly on large events in Ireland but has stayed clear of smaller events.

We believe that we have found an untapped market and will benefit from first

mover advantage.

Threat of New Entrants

There is a high level of threat from new entrants particularly in the early

stages if our business is successful.

We aim to overcome this by creating a quality service that we prove is

trustworthy for both event Promoters and customers. Trust can only be built

up as a result of a series of actions over time. So we need to have

continuous communication and feedback with the users, in order to discover

what aspects of our service could be improved (“The price of freedom is

eternal vigilance” – Thomas Jefferson).


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By establishing a good reputation among Promoters and customers as soon

as possible, then we can lessen the threat of new entrants. New entrants will

only enter the market if they see some deficiency in our service that they can

improve upon.

Survey Analysis

As part of our research we created a survey that was distributed to friends,

family etc. as well as being posted on various message boards and websites.

We got a very good response that gave us a lot of positive feedback. We

found that most people surveyed (73%) attend at least one event a month.

We also found that people use Ticketmaster to buy tickets but are generally

not happy with their service (68%) and find them too expensive (92%). The

full survey and the results to each question can be found in appendix II.

The survey supported most of the assumptions we made when thinking of the

eTickets concept. These include the fact that people are comfortable and

confident when it comes to purchasing concert tickets online. They also

believe that booking fees are too high and worry about events getting sold out

(73%). With eTickets we intend to reduce booking fees to a much smaller rate

as we operate purely online and do not print out tickets. We also believe that

given the choice, most concertgoers would prefer to pre-buy their ticket so as

to avoid the disappointment of not getting in to an event.

Personnel

Management Structure

The management of eTickets comprise of two directors. The decisions with

respect to the development of the business will be undertaken in close co-

ordination and consultation between the members of management. All

directors are equally involved in the establishment, planning and operational

process of the company, while each specializes in his/her area of expertise.


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Individual Roles

There will be two main roles at the company. They are the Marketing manager

and the IT manager. The marketing manager will be in charge of attracting

customers and promoters, as well as promoting our business. He is also in

charge of all financial issues within the business. These involve keeping the

books up to date, and dealing with issues such as taxes, profits/losses, wages

etc.

The IT manager will be ensuring it is both usable and secure. Creating and

maintaining current and accurate web content items by systematic and timely

writing, reviewing and publishing ensuring it is both usable and secure.

It can be summarized as follows

• Specifying an online system, designing a web application to meet the

specifications, coding the application, testing the application

• Updating/maintaining web

Marketing Manager is one with full Marketing responsibility, with a good

understanding of the entire marketing mix. He/she is responsible for the

marketing plan and tactical marketing communications, managing the brand

and company website and supporting sales and new indirect channels.

He/she is the leading advocate for eTickets’ customers.

In a nutshell the main roles played by Marketing manager

• Define and deliver the Marketing Plan.

• Plan and manage Marketing programs (awareness, acquisition and

retention)

• Develop & implement the communication strategy to include printed

material,

• Exhibitions, advertising, direct marketing, public relations and e-

marketing.


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• Create demand for Eticket’s website through advertising and case

studies.

• Identify best opportunities for lead generation.

• Support to identify and establish indirect sales channels/ distributors

and provide marketing support for key distributors.

• Create company presentations and product demonstrations.

• Conduct competitive scanning and communicate the opportunities &

threats to the business.

• Communicate key internal marketing communications.

• Execute marketing research on a planned and ad-hoc basis.

• Developing campaigns to increase the customer size, frequency and

value of customer expenditure.

• Manage online marketing budget, including continuous improvement of

eTickets.

• Ensuring all marketing activities are in keeping with eTickets’ brand

values and guidelines.


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The Marketing Report

Marketing Mix

Promotion

- Online Advertising and Promotion

As our business is solely based online, this is where we would focus the

promotion of our product. We would spend the majority of our marketing

budget on online advertising and promotions. We would find sites that attract

our target audience and use them to promote our site through banner

advertising and potentially links that offer discounts on signing up to our site.

To initially attract customers we would forgo service charges on tickets

purchased by new customers, and offer discounts to customers who get a

friend(s) to sign up.

- Other Advertising

Our advertising will be aimed at attracting the interest of both customers and

promoters, as they are equally important to the success of our business. We

want to get our target audience to visit our site, browse available events and

potentially buy tickets. We intend to advertise in suitable media and locations,

such as print media e.g. music magazines like Hotpress, distributing flyers at

relevant locations e.g. large music events and festivals, as well as joint

advertising ventures with promoters.

An example of a joint venture with promoters is posters for the event with a

caption stating that you can buy tickets for that particular event at eTickets.ie

- Direct Marketing

Before we can start to sell tickets we need promoters to subscribe to our

service and place their events online. This means that attracting promoters is

a vital aspect of the business start-up. Although we intend to attract some

promoters through advertising and word of mouth, we also intend to directly


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approach them about using our service. We intend to find promoters by

attending events, contacting venues and cold calling.

Product

Electronic ticketing over the Internet is a good example of Internet commerce

at work.

The brand name chosen for our product is eTickets and was decided through

its meaning towards our service. The aim of eTickets is to facilitate the buying

or reservation of tickets online, thereby making the process more easily

accessible and convenient. Through these services tickets may be purchased

from any location and at any time, provided an Internet connection exists. The

tickets are ordered from web site http://magluby.com/eTickets/ that provides

both ticket information and the purchasing or reservation service. Being a

ticketless system the customer gets a confirmation number (ala Ryanair). The

event manager can log in and retrieve all confirmation numbers and customer

details for use at the door of their event.

The user creates their own account when they sign up to our website by

providing their personal information and credit card number. So each

customer will have their own unique identity when they login on our website.

Once they have logged in, they can simply purchase and reserve tickets as

they so wish, and we fulfil their requests. If they have not logged in then they

can still browse eTickets to view which events we are currently hosting tickets

for, but they will not be able to purchase them.

We want the customer to have a place where they can go to get the best

value for money for their inputs without spending hours of time ringing around

suppliers or waiting to get the ticket looking for different prices. Our service

will accomplish this for them. Also we will enable online ordering for

customers to increase convenience and efficiency.

Price

As we are the first company in Ireland to offer such a service for gigs, clubs

etc, we can set our sales price at a high profitable margin. However in the


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beginning we want to attract customers, so for new customers there will be no

service charge for their first few transactions. Nevertheless, after this initial

period customers will be charged a service charge based on the face value of

the ticket.

The promoter, venue, or artist determines the face value of a ticket. We do not

determine the face value of tickets. The pricing system that we propose is as

follows:

• 10% of the face value for tickets €30 or less

• 12.5% of the face value for tickets €31-€60

• 15% of the face value for tickets €61 or more

The price of tickets for small events will typically be less than €30, so in the

vast majority of cases we will be making 10% commission. Small events that

charge more than €60 for tickets will be few and far between.

Example:

An organiser/promoter registers an event with us, and offers tickets for €10. In

this case our service charge would be 10% of the face value (€10), so €1.

Therefore charge the customer €11, €10 of which goes to the promoter and

the remaining €1 goes to the account of eTickets.

Importance of a good pricing structure

- Pricing is obviously a very important consideration for both profitability

and popularity.

- We know there is a very negative attitude among the concert going

public towards Ticketmaster due to their large service charges and

booking fees. In fact, our survey showed (see survey section in

Appendices) that 68% of people were not happy with the service

offered by Ticketmaster. By charging lower service charges we hope

to avoid creating for ourselves the negative attitude many people have

towards Ticketmaster.


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- We aim to take a smaller percentage of ticket prices due to the fact we

are working on a smaller scale, and have fewer overheads as we do

not offer telephone bookings or have ticket offices.

- We limit the maximum we will take (15% for high price tickets)

Place

As eTickets’ major operation is online (there is no posting of tickets),

distribution channels are not a major aspect of our marketing strategy. We do

not need a system for delivery of merchandise to customers or wholesalers or

be concerned with decisions involving retailers, brokers, and shipping

companies.


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Value Chain

Attract Customers:

In order to draw customers to our web site we need to:

1. Advertise on other web sites, especially websites whose users are

regular concert goers. Examples of such websites include those with

forums for discussing bands and music (e.g. entertainment.ie) as well

as sites that allow the legal downloading of music.


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2. Advertise using the print media. This includes taking out ads that will

clearly be seen by our target market. Examples of this includes

• College newspapers and magazines

• Magazines that deal with music and concerts (e.g. Hot Press)

• Handing out information (leaflets, flyers) about our service at

concerts and gigs

3. E-mailing/phoning concert organisers to make them aware of our

service

4. Actually going to venues/promoters to tell them about our service and

the benefits that we are offering.

Interact with Customers:

When an event manager registers with the website, they can create and close

events.

A potential ticket buyer can browse and search the database through the

website in an attempt the find tickets for a specific event.

Our website is content oriented, with detailed information about the event in

question. Moreover, information is provided about the musician/artist

performing at the gig.

Act on Customer Instructions:

When the customer has finished browsing the site and decided what tickets

they want, then the customer’s order has to be dealt with.

The customer will be required to enter their credit card number and expiry

date, as well as their e-mail address. The amount for the tickets will be

debited from their account and credited to our account (the service charge on

the ticket) and that of the event organiser (the remainder).


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This is done in a secure manner, using encryption, so that there is practically

zero chance of anyone else gaining knowledge of this sensitive information.

The details of the event, including the all important confirmation number will

be e-mailed to the customer’s e-mail address. The events in question will

also be updated to indicate that there are now fewer tickets available.

React on Customer Inquiries:

A section of the website will be dedicated to frequently asked question (FAQ),

so that most of the users inquiries can be processed automatically. An e-mail

address is also provided so that a person can answer any questions that are

not dealt with in the FAQ page.

An event organiser can log in to check how many tickets have been sold for

the event(s) that they are promoting.

A feedback forum will be set up so that users can express their views on the

website/service and how it could be improved. Constant feedback from users

is very important so that we maintain our quality of service and stay ahead of

the competition.

Problems with existing process

Ticketmaster is the largest ticket distributor all over the world. They have

contracts with venues that allow them to be the original distributor of tickets.

But its main cons are

• Waiting in long lines for tickets

• Premium seats are difficult to find

• Popular events sell out quickly

• Only sells tickets for large concerts and events

Future Development

Online ticketing systems have several advantages including increased ticket

sales for the ticket provider and greater convenience for the customer. It also


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automates the selling process and allows for more efficient transaction

handling. Very often, using the Internet to buy tickets with your credit card is

also far safer than ordinary purchases. If done properly, there is no need for

anyone besides the customer and her bank to have access to the credit card

number.

Future advances in this field include the development of:

• Methods to store customer details that will still ensure their privacy.

Customers may want their purchases to remain private but still have

the option to review previous transactions.

• Technology that allows the downloading of ‘electronic tickets’ onto

smart cards. These smart cards can then be used to verify that a

customer has purchased the ticket.

• Methods to allow multiple tickets to be stored onto one smart card

• Inexpensive equipment that can be connected to a PC and

communicate with a smart card. This will ensure the viability of

‘electronic tickets’.

• Technical development of mobile commerce has now reached a

stage where merchants can easily widen their business to mobile

environment.

The growth of online ticketing is limited only by customer confidence. Once

potential customers begin to realise the convenience and safety of these

systems, there should be nothing holding back the explosive growth of this

industry. With these and many more advances to Internet commerce and

online ticketing, the public can look forward to improvements in existing

systems and the establishment of many more.


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Target Market Channels

eTickets’ primary market will be people are interested in going to clubs, gigs

etc. These will consist of people from different walks of life. Initially, we will

promote the eTickets service through advertising and demonstrating our

solution to some selected owners of the clubs, gigs and of course customers.

The first point of contact for the eTickets user will be our website. The aim of

the website is to give the public information about who we are and what we

do. It also illustrates that we have an easy to use, user-friendly interface,

have a prompt customer service help line and have a medium through which

users can air their views (feedback forum). In the long-term, eTickets would

hope to expand their service to bigger events like concerts, sporting events

etc. eTickets short-term view is to concentrate on a smaller market to begin

with. We want the user to become familiar with who we are and what our

service is.

SWOT Analysis

Strengths

At present, there is only one company (tickets.ie) offering the online ticket

sales similar to that which eTickets offers. However tickets.ie only appears to

have an agreement with certain venues and only doesn’t deal with small

events. Therefore, currently we are enjoying first mover advantage in a

unique market, which as of yet has not been exploited.

eTickets’ user friendly and simplistic website ensures that all users from

novice to expert can navigate through our website with the greatest of ease.

Benefits

• Handling of inquiries and reservations is more efficient

• Reduced administration time for online registrations, as details are

entered by registrant

• Improved service to registrants


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• Real-time registration data is available to organizers

• Reports, badges etc. are produced more efficiently

• More reservations are paid in advance

• Additional, cost-effective marketing channels through the web and

email

• Reduced print advertising costs

• More opportunities for pre-event and post-event promotions

• Opportunity for feedback and post sales

• The email list is available for future related events

Weakness

• As with all companies who benefit from first mover advantage, there is

the imminent danger of ‘copy-cat’ companies or companies who are

already in the online ticket sale industry imitating eTickets’ product

offering. We need to ensure that our brand is synonymous with security

and reliability.

• eTickets’ team of workers is quite small at present. With demand

increasing, eTickets needs to ensure that they address any issues

regarding being under-staffed or in recruiting expert personnel. This

would obviously increase eTickets’ overheads and running costs in

future.

• Even though computer literacy is on the increase, there is still a large

proportion of the Irish population who are not computer literate.

Coupled with that there are also a proportion of computer users who do

not carry out any transactions online. Although eTickets website is

simple and easy to use, eTickets needs to address this ‘un-served’

portion of the population.

• As beginners/ new entrant to the market eTickets has no established

connection with customers (promoters and venues) and to achieve this

it will take time.


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Opportunities

• Growing trend towards online business transactions.

• eTickets is currently benefiting from first mover advantage. They need

to utilize this clearly beneficial opportunity to the maximum early on in

their product life cycle. eTickets must build a reputable and trusted

brand name that will give customers a sense of security and

confidence and hopefully loyalty.

• Currently, tickets for sale over the Internet are for large events such as

concerts, big sporting events etc. But eTickets is entirely dedicated to

events such as smaller gigs, clubs, etc. So it is crystal clear that it

attracts people who have interest in the events in gigs, clubs and so

on.

• After establishing a strong market position and good reputation within

Ireland, we will have the opportunity to exploit similar markets within

Europe.

Threats

• www.Ticketmaster.ie and www.tickets.ie are an impediment to a great

extend as they provide ticket sales for events in gigs, clubs. They

could decide to move into the arena of small events.

• Competition of course will be a huge threat for eTickets. eTickets

needs to be constantly improving and innovating its product offering

whilst offering a competitive rate for the customer.

• Existing competitors may imitate our additional service stealing our

market share.

• New technologies like the tickets are downloaded in electronic format

onto a smart card would make our technology obsolete


_____________________________________________________________________ 26

• In most of the gigs and pubs, the tickets can be booked by credit card

or purchased in the respective organization where customer don’t have

to pay extra charges for Internet. (http://www.dolans-pub.ie/news.html)

Strengths - We will offer a service that is not already available - Completely web based, keeping costs to a minimum and appealing to a young, concert-going public. - Strong indication from market analysis that such a service would be popular with both customers and promoters

Weaknesses - We are dependant on promoters deciding to use our service. - Some people are still not comfortable purchasing online - Checking tickets at the door may be difficult.

Opportunities - We are the first business of this type in Ireland. First Entry - Hundreds of events occur each week that have no pre-purchasing service

Threats - Copycat companies - Ticketmaster are already very dominant in this market, and may see us as a potential threat. - Promoters may try to set up their own sites


_____________________________________________________________________ 27

Sustainable Competitive Advantage

• Good market as the Internet is becoming the predominant way to buy

tickets. Online ticket sellers, for example, sold nearly $1 billion worth of

concert tickets in 2001, or about 14 percent of the total U.S. market,

according to Jupiter Media Metrix. The research company expects that

amount to grow to $2.48 billion in 2006, or about 29 percent of the total

market.

• It can generate additional opportunities revenue through advertising.


_____________________________________________________________________ 28

Financial Analysis

Start –Up

The following section gives details of the financial assumptions, projections

and estimations we made for eTickets.ie for the first three years of operations.

We intend the company to be ready for business from 1st January 2006.

Source of Funding

The start-up costs associated with eTickets.ie are quite low. Our service is

100% web based so our funding is not very complicated. We have decided to

each invest €5,000 of personal finances. Therefore our target for personal

funding is €20,000. The option of acquiring further funds through borrowing

from a bank has been considered and decided upon as the best source of

additional funding. We predict that sales will start slowly as we try to promote

our service and acquire customers so we will need to borrow €20,000 to cover

costs for the initial period of operation. We intend to repay this loan over a

period of 4 years from operational profits.

Use of Funding

The Initial funds of €40,000 will be used to cover the start-up costs associated

with the set up of our offices and web site. It will also be used to cover

operational costs for the first few months of operations. We need to purchase

office furniture, equipment, computers etc as well as paying our rent, wages

and advertising costs for the period until sales can pay for these expenses.

We hope that after the initial three months, sales will be able to cover the

operational costs as well as the loan repayments to the bank.

Expenses

Our initial expenditure will be on items necessary for the start-up of

eTickets.ie. This will include office furniture such as desks, tables, filing

cabinets etc. It will also involve registering our domain name and paying a

hosting service. Other expenses are legal fees related with registering the

company, computer equipment; office supplies e.g. pens, paper etc as well as


_____________________________________________________________________ 29

other unforeseeable ‘miscellaneous’ expenses. The cost of the computer

equipment, stationary, office furniture, legal fees, domain registry etc was all

calculated from sources listed in appendix VII

Start Up Finances

Start Up Expenses

Legal €60

Domain Registry/Hosting €162

Computer Equipment €4,500

Furnishing €2,500

Stationary, Office Supplies etc €500

Miscellaneous €500

Total Expenses €8,222

Funding

Investment

Mark €5,000

Micheál €5,000

Peter €5000

Tinu €5000

Bank Loan €20,000

Total Investment €40,000

Operational Finances

Income:

Sales

As stated in the key statistics we estimate that there are approximately 8,500

small events held in Ireland each year. Our aim is to get 3,500 events to sell

tickets through eTickets each year, about 40% of the market. This means that

we would have to deal with 10 events a day.


_____________________________________________________________________ 30

We estimate that the average number of tickets available for a small event is

150. So, the total number of tickets for all the events would be 525,000

(3,500*150). If we can get 20% of customers to buy their tickets for the event

through our service, then that translates into 105,000 tickets sold using

eTickets.

By charging 10% of the face value of the ticket as our commission, we would

receive €1 for each ticket (assuming the average price of a ticket for a small

event is €10). Therefore we estimate that we can generate approximately

€110,000 through ticket sales. It is expected that sales will start slowly as we

try to promote our service to both customers and promoters. Optimistically we

hope for €60,150 in sales in our first year. There will hopefully increase in

2007 and 2008 by increasing awareness. We also hope that we can increase

our market share and popularity so that the total sales we can potentially

make will also increase.

Advertising

We can also generate revenue through charging promoters to advertise on

our website (depending on where on our website they want their ad placed).

For example, a banner ad on the home page would be more expensive than

an ad on any of the other pages of our website.

Each event will have its own personal page on eTickets, but this service is for

organisers who want their event to get more publicity by placing an ad, that

will clearly be seen by visitors to our website.

We estimate that we could generate in the region of €20,000 per annum by

charging for additional advertising.

Expenditure:


_____________________________________________________________________ 31

Payroll

The main expenditure would be in the form of salaries to the 2 members of

the team. They would be working for the modest sum of €20,000 each for the

first year, which would increase to €25,000 each in year 2. So the total would

be €40,000 in 2006, €46,000 in 2007 and $50,000 in 2008.

Advertising

This is very important, especially in the initial stages in order to get our service

well known among our target market (promoters and ticket buying customers).

This will involve considerable expense, such as quarter page advertisements

in Hot Press. Moreover, we would need to advertise on Irish websites that

review and discuss music and events. A sample document of the costs of

advertising with Hotpress and Hotpress.ie is enclosed in the appendices

(appendix VI). It also includes demographics of their readers that closely

match those of our target audience.

So we estimate that we would need to spend approximately €20,000 in order

to establish and maintain our market presence.

Office Expenses

This heading includes mainly stationary and office equipment, as well as food,

tea, coffee etc for staff. Approximately €7,000 per annum.

Rent

The standard rate for occupying an incubation cell at the Invent Centre in

DCU is €301 per month (Appendix VII). Therefore rent is €3,600 per annum.

Utilities

This covers miscellaneous costs such as phone bills, electricity bills, Internet

connection etc. Approximately €1,000 per annum.


_____________________________________________________________________ 32

Credit Card Services

To accept credit card payments online we need to use a merchant banking

service. Due to the fact that we will be making small commissions off each

sale, we had to carefully research these services, as some services would

take almost half of our commission. We found a company called Protx

(www.protx.com) that offer these services at a much more suitable rate. We

would subscribe to their corporate service as we hope to have more than

1,000 transactions per quarter. It would cost 14.3 cents (VAT exclusive) per

transaction with no additional costs. This amount will be taken out of our

service charge. So for example, if we receive €1 in a transaction, eTickets will

actually make 85 cents.

Taxes

We will be subject to the normal taxes such as PRSI, VAT and corporation

tax. Out of each ticket sale we are only taking a small amount of the total

transaction amount. VAT will be added to this amount at the time of purchase.

Corporation tax is currently 12.5% and will be paid annually. Employer PRSI

will also be paid in line with current regulations


_____________________________________________________________________ 33

Cash Flow A/C Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

Gross Sales €78,831.5 €108,900 €127,050 Less VAT @ 21% €13,681.5 €18,900 €22,050 Net Sales €65,150 €90,000 €105,000 Advertising €15,000 €16,000 €18,000 Total Income €80,150 €106,000 €123,000 Operating Expenses Wages €40,000 €46,000 €52,000 Advertising €15,000 €16,000 €16,000 Rent €3,600 €3,600 €3,600 Credit Card Services

€10,500 €13,500 €15,750

Utilities €1,500 €1,600 €1,700 Office Expenses €3,000 €3,200 €3,400 PRSI €4,200 €4,830 €5460 Loan Repayments €5,250 €5,250 €5,250 Total Operating Expenses €83,050

€93,980 €103,160

Gross Profit/Loss -€2,900 €12,020 €19,840 Less Corporation Tax @12.5%

- €1502.5 €2480

Net Profit/Loss -€2,900 €10,517.5 €17,360


_____________________________________________________________________ 34

Break Even Analysis

We have calculated that we will reach our break-even point after 8 months of

business. At this point our sales revenue will cover our basic monthly costs.

As with any break-even point projection at this stage in a project’s

development, it is only an estimate. The figures will need to be closely

monitored and updated throughout the year. (For full assumptions see

appendix)

Break Even Analysis

0100020003000400050006000700080009000

10000

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

Months

Am

ount Expenses

Revenue


_____________________________________________________________________ 35

Technical Report

Introduction

There are two aspects to the system; the web site, and the optional ticket

verification software. The web site includes the background database, which

stores all information about users and events, and the mechanism for adding,

retrieving and purchasing tickets for events. The ticket verification software

can be used at the door of an event to quickly and efficiently verify a ticket

purchased through the site.

Tickets

One of the primary ways of keeping our costs low is not mailing tickets to our

customers. We follow a Ryanair type ticketing system. When a user

purchases a ticket they will receive a confirmation number, and also a

printable ticket. The ticket will have a barcode, so if the organiser of an event

has access to a barcode scanner, the ticket verification software is designed

to work with it. The confirmation number is a unique identifying number tied to

the name of the person who bought the tickets. Security and integrity is vital to

the system to avoid counterfeit tickets being produced. At the door of the

event, the organiser will be charged with ensuring the same tickets aren’t

used twice to enter. This will mean using the barcodes, checking serial

numbers or using the ticket verification software to mark off tickets as they are

checked.

Web Site

Client Side Technologies

The web site is designed to be extremely easy to use and as such requires no

special client side software, plug-ins etc to be installed. All that is required is a

standard web browser.


_____________________________________________________________________ 36

The site has been designed so that it is usable in all browsers, including text-

only browsers, and special accessibility browsers for users with disabilities.

This is achieved by complying strictly with XHTML and CSS specifications,

and accessibility guidelines set out by the World Wide Web Consortium

(W3C).

Server Side Technologies

The server side scripting language, PHP, dynamically creates all pages on the

site. The backend also consists of a MySQL database, which is manipulated

using the PHP scripts.

The MySQL database stores all event, user and ticket information. PHP is

used to generate all customer-facing content on the web site.

The entire back-end has been written from the ground up specifically for the

purpose of this site. This ensures the site runs extremely quickly and

efficiently and its design means that both the front-end and back-end can be

modified and extended with ease.


_____________________________________________________________________ 37

Database Design

The web site stores all of its information in a database consisting of the

following tables:

users

Contains information about each event manager, and registered user of the

site, such as their username, password and contact details.

events

Contains all details about each event listed on the site. This includes the

event manager of each event, along with the date, time, title, venue, category

and an associated image.

tickets

The site allows each event to sell up to 6 different types of ticket, with varying

prices and/or description. The details of these tickets, including the amount

available of each type, for each event are stored here.

tickets_sold

This table contains the details of all tickets sold. It includes the serial numbers

of each ticket, along with details of the purchaser.

A detailed overview of the database can be seen in Appendix III.


_____________________________________________________________________ 38

Barcode / Serial Number Generation

Standard barcodes consist of 13 digit numbers encoded as a series of vertical

lines. This means that for any event there is technically a pool of 10 trillion

(10,000,000,000,000) different serial numbers to pick from for every event.

For an event with, say, 400 tickets, there would be a chance of 1 in 25 billion

of successfully guessing a valid serial number.

To make for easier manual verification of the numbers, not all 13 digits are

used, however. The composition of the 13 digits is shown in the following

diagram:

This means only 9 digits are effectively used, but for a 400 ticket event, this

means there is still only a chance of 1 in 2.5 million of successfully guessing a

valid serial number, but makes for a much easier to read number consisting of

three triplets.

Serial Number Composition

The serial number has the appearance of a randomly generated number, but

it is in fact a modified cryptographic hash of the ticket information and the

promoter’s password. The following process illustrates how the number is

generated. This adds extra security and integrity to each ticket created, which

would not be possible with a mere random number.


_____________________________________________________________________ 39

A variable-length string is generated which contains various details about the

ticket. The following diagram shows an example string, with an explanation of

the information used to formulate it.

An MD5 hash of this string is then created. Despite the fact that the only the

ticket number portion of the string changes each time, the hash will be

completely different as a consequence of the strict avalanche effect exhibited

by the hash function.

The hash is converted to base10 and the first 9 digits are taken as the serial

number. By taking only the first 9 digits, there is an increased possibility of a

clash, however. In the unlikely event of a clash with an existing serial number

for the same event, the ticket number is incremented, and the process

repeated until a unique serial number is generated.


_____________________________________________________________________ 40

Site Map

The layout of the site has been designed in such a way to make it easy both

for an event manager to submit an event, and for a customer to find an event

and book tickets. The following is an outline of the structure of the site.


_____________________________________________________________________ 41

Sample Walkthrough

Purchasing online is convenient and simple. The following are step by step

the guidelines to purchase the ticket.

In order to experience eTickets to it’s full potential it is possible to create an

account with eTickets.

The User Experience

When the user looking to purchase tickets arrives at the home page of

eTickets, an interface similar to the one below is presented. The user is

presented with information about featured upcoming events and a list of event

categories that can be browsed.

STEP 1 - Log in to eTickets

While registration is not necessary to browse and purchase tickets, doing so

offers many benefits including personalised information and a much speedier

and simpler purchasing process.


_____________________________________________________________________ 42

At all points throughout the site, a user can either log in

or register as a new user. This is achieved from the Login

area, which is displayed at the top left of every page.

STEP 2 - Find an Event

Browsing: Select the event's genre at the left of any page on the site. For

example, when searching for Limp Bizkit, click on Rock/Pop. This will display

a list of all upcoming events in that genre.

Searching: The ‘Quick Search’ form on the homepage can be used to quickly

find an event by keyword. More detailed searches, such as searching by

genre, venue, date etc, can be performed from the ‘Advanced Search’ page.

STEP 3 - Check Ticket Availability

The full details of an event can be displayed by clicking on the event title from

a list of events. This information will include all tickets on sale for the event,

along with their prices and availability. If a certain type of ticket is no longer on

sale, it will be marked with a ‘Sold Out’ message.

STEP 4 - Begin Ticket Request

If tickets are available for an event, they can be requested by clicking the ‘Get

Tickets’ link on the event details page. From here, the user selects the

quantities of each type of ticket required, and fills in their billing information.

If the user is an existing eTickets member, he/she will find that some of this

information will have been completed automatically (excluding the credit card

information).


_____________________________________________________________________ 43

STEP 5 - Receive Confirmation

On successful verification of the credit card information, a page will be

presented with the details of the tickets purchased along with their serial

numbers and printable tickets with barcodes.

Within minutes of placing your ticket order on eTickets the customer will

receive a confirmation email with their event and billing information.

The Promoter Experience

Promoters have to register before he/she can start selling tickets. The

registration process also requires one to accept the terms and conditions for

selling tickets on-line. The registration process is the same as for a normal

user, with the exception that the event manager account type is selected.

STEP 1 – Create event

Promoters can post events on the website and they can set how many tickets

they want to sell online. Promoters can also set how many are sold at different

prices, such as for children, students or members seats as well as

differentiating between premium and normal seating. The promoter also has

the option of including it in the public listing on eTickets.ie. If they choose to

not have the event listed, they will receive a direct link to purchase tickets for

the event, which their potential customers can use if they wish to purchase

tickets. Initially, an event will have the status ‘Pending’ until eTickets

moderators approve it. This is to prevent against spam or bogus events being

posted.

STEP 2 – Modify event

Promoters can modify the details of an event posted at any time. When they

wish to put tickets off sale, they can do so and receive either a list of all tickets


_____________________________________________________________________ 44

sold with the corresponding serial numbers and customer details, or a file with

all this information, which can be read by the ticket verification software.

Credit Card Verification

As mentioned earlier, eTickets services are based entirely on the Web. This

allows information to be presented alongside any functionality. Once the user

has browsed the eTickets page and has decided to purchase or reserve a

ticket, they go to the ticketing page. Here, there are usually a number of

options that have to be decided upon. Once the plethora of ticket options have

been decided, the customer's details need to be entered. These details will

often include things such as:

• Credit card number and expiry date,

• Cardholders name,

• Email address and

• Telephone number.

Not all the details are essential but some must be completed before the

transaction may take place. These critical details usually involve credit card

information. Now the authorization and confirmation process follows as shown

in figure below.

Figure 1. Online credit card transaction.


_____________________________________________________________________ 45

1. The customer's details are securely submitted to the ticketing service

provider.

2. The transaction details are then sent to the ticket provider's acquiring

bank.

3. The credit card information along with the cost is forwarded to the

customer's card issuing bank for authorisation.

4. Once authorisation is received, the customer's account is debited.

5. The ticket provider's account is then credited.

6. Finally, the customer is informed that their ticket request has been

successfully processed and completed.

The ticket provider object represents both the ticket provider and the server (a

computer) associated with the process. The server handles communication

with the acquiring bank. This is done over the standard bankcard channels

that are used for 'normal' credit card transactions. The server also stores

information about the transaction including the customer and transaction

details.

Security

Without strong server authentication, users of your public Web server are not

able to determine if they have connected to an authentic Web server or a

bogus version operated by an intruder. In such cases, the user may receive

false information and act upon it based on the assumption that it originated

from our Web server. The user may also provide sensitive information such as

a credit card number.

Encryption can be used to protect information traversing the connection

between a Web browser client and a public Web server. Without encryption,

anyone with access to network traffic (accomplished via the use of a sniffer)

can determine, and possibly alter, the content of sensitive and restricted

information, even if the user accessing the information has been carefully

authenticated. This may violate the confidentiality and integrity of critical

information.


_____________________________________________________________________ 46

All credit card transactions are undertaken on a third party server, as

described in the previous section. This server has security measures in place

to help protect against the loss, misuse and alteration of the information under

our control. It uses secure socket layer (SSL) technology to help protect the

security of online transactions. All financial information is encrypted as it

travels over the Internet and is stored in encrypted form.

Verification Software

• The software is downloaded from the site by the event manager and can

be used on any computer.

• When the event manager closes the event, he/she can download a file

containing all the ticket information, which can be read by the software.

• If a barcode scanner is available, the software will simply allow the printout

of the barcode to be scanned, confirming the validity of the ticket.

• Otherwise, the software provides an easy-to-use interface to enter the

confirmation number.

• The software is, of course, optional. If the necessary resources aren’t

available, the site also generates a list of sold ticket information that can

be printed out.


_____________________________________________________________________ 47

Architecture

An event manager can simply print off the details about the tickets sold for

events and use this printout for verification at the door of an event. However, if

he/she has access to a computer, even a basic laptop computer, the ticket

verification software can be used to make the process of checking tickets

much easier.

The ticket verification software is a standalone JAVA application designed to

be capable of running on any platform on any computer with a Java Virtual

Machine.

The software reads all the information about the tickets sold for a particular

event from an encrypted file, which is downloaded by the event manager from

the web site.

This file contains information about each ticket including the name and

address of the purchaser and when the ticket was purchased, if required for

extra verification.

If the event manager has access to a

barcode scanner, this can be used to verify

printed tickets. Alternatively, the software

can be queried for the confirmation number

received when a ticket is purchased.

The diagram to the right shows an overview

of the verification software usage.


_____________________________________________________________________ 48

File Format

When an event manager closes an event, he/she can download an encrypted

file containing all the information about the tickets sold. The ticket verification

software reads this file.

When decrypted, the file begins one line containing information about the

event, which is followed by a line for each ticket sold, containing the details of

each ticket including the serial number. See Appendix IV for a detailed

description of the file format used.

Security

It is paramount that this file is not compromised as it contains all serial

numbers and corresponding customer details for every ticket sold. Thus, once

the information has been compiled in the file on the web server as above, it is

encrypted using a DES session key created from the event manager’s

password. The verification software requests this password from the customer

and can decrypt the file and store all the information in the program.


_____________________________________________________________________ 49

Appendix:

Appendix I: Assumptions For Break-Even Analysis

Monthly expense = 6045.8 Including cr card –6920tickets! First month – 150 events, 3 tickets each, 750 Second month – 300 events, 3 tickets each 900 tickets Third month – 500 events , 4 tickets each, 2000 tickets Fourth month –1000events , 4 tickets each 4000 tickets Fifth month – 1200 events, 5 tickets each 6000 tickets. Six month - 1200 events, 5 tickets each 6000 tickets. Seventh month – 1200 events, 5 tickets 6,000 tickets Eight month – 1400 events, 5 tickets 7,000 tickets Ninth month – 1400 events, 5 tickets 7,000 tickets Tenth month – 1500 events, 5 tickets 7,500 tickets Eleventh month – 1800 events, 5 tickets 9,000 Twelfth month – 1800 events, 5 tickets 9,000 Appendix II: Survey and Analysis

Gathering Of Personal Details

1. Age: 2. Sex: 3. Occupation 4. Income (<€10K, €10K-€25K, €26K-€40K) 5. Do you Own Credit Card 6. How Often Do you Use Internet

(Daily, Every few days, Every Week, Rarely)

Gathering Of Customer Behaviour

1. How often do you attend concerts, gigs, comedians or similar events? (Never, 1-3 a month, 4-6 a month, 6+ a month)

2. When you attend these events, how often do you pre-purchase your tickets using a credit card? (Never, Some of the time, Most of the time, Always)

3. How often do you attend events where a ticket pre-purchasing option is not available? (Never, Sometimes, Often, Always)

4. How much money would you spend a week on event attendance/club admission? (< €5, €6-15, €16-30, €31-60, €61+)


_____________________________________________________________________ 50

5. How do you mainly find out about upcoming events? (Friends, Online, Radio, Television, Newspapers) Other (Please Specify):

7. Do you use Ticket master?

(Yes, No)

8. If 'Yes' are you satisfied with their service?

(Yes, No)

Ranking Statements with options very true, true, Untrue, Very Untrue

1. I like to browse through upcoming events 2. I miss events because I do not hear about them 3. I feel purchasing tickets online reduces stress 4. I feel purchasing tickets online is safe 5. I often worry about events being sold out 6. I feel concert tickets are too expensive 7. I would like to receive an e-mail detailing upcoming events 8. Booking fees for tickets are too high

Personal Details Percentage of Responds by sex 72 % of the people responded were males and the rest were females. So it was a majority of males who took part in our survey.

Percentage of Responds by Sex

28%

72%

FemaleMale

Gathering Of Customer Behaviour 1.Attendance For Small Events This chart shows that two-thirds of people (68%) attend 1-3 small events a month, while ¼ never attend small events. So this chart would indicate that


_____________________________________________________________________ 51

over 70% of the population attend small events on a regular basis (at least once a month). This is very good for eTickets as it shows that we have a large target market to aim at.

2. Credit Card Usage This chart is very evenly divided. 20% always use credit cards to pre-purchase their tickets for small events, 31% use credit cards most of the time, 30% some of the time and 19% never. What this indicates is that when attending events over 80% of people purchase tickets using their credit card. This is good news for eTickets as it shows that people are already familiar with and willing to use their credit card to pre-book tickets for events online.

Attendance for Small Events

68%2%

3%

27%1-3 a month 4-6 a month 6+ a month Never


_____________________________________________________________________ 52

3.Attendance Where Pre-booking isn’t Available The main feature of this chart is that only 3% of those surveyed always attend events when there are is no pre-booking available, while 36% never attend. This indicates that people are reluctant to attend events when tickets can’t be pre-purchased. So venues and promoters are clearly missing out on a lot of potential paying customers by not having tickets available for purchase before the event takes place. This is where our service would come in very handy.

4. Money Spend a week on Event Attendance/ Club Admission

Credit Card Usage

20%

31%19%

30% Always Most of the timeNever Some of the time

Attendance where pre-book isn’t available

3%

36%

17%

44%

Always Never Often Sometimes


_____________________________________________________________________ 53

Money spend a week on event attendance/club admission

18%

50%

26%

3%

3%

<5€06 to 15€16 to 30€31 to 60€61€+

This chart shows that 94% of people spend €30 or less on admission a week, with 68% spending €15 or less. 5. Source of Information About the events This chart shows that most people find out about upcoming events either through their friends (44%) or online (37%). Online appeared to be much more popular than through the traditional media such as newspapers, radio and television which together only accounted for 19%. So it seems that the best way to advertise small events is online.

6. Usage of Ticketmaster This chart shows that the vast majority of people (92%) use Ticketmaster, so they are familiar with purchasing tickets online.

Source Of Information

44%

8%

37%

8% 3%

Friends Newspapers Online Radio Television

Usage Of Ticketmaster

8%

92%

NoYes


_____________________________________________________________________ 54

7. Satisfaction with Ticketmaster This chart illustrates that most people are not fully happy with Ticketmaster.

Ticketmaster Satisfaction

68%

32%

No Yes

Ranking Statements with options very true, true, Untrue, Very Untrue 1. Willingness to browse through upcoming events

This chart shows 39% of people have a great inclination towards browsing through upcoming events. On the contrary only a few people disagree with the above statement. 2.Missing Tickets being uniformed

Here in this chart 44% of the people responded that they missed events because they did not know about them. 3. Purchasing Online is Safe

Miss Tickets being Uninformed

14%

44%

34%

8%

Very true.True.Untrue.Very Untrue.

Willingness to browse through upcoming events

39%

33%

25%

3%



_____________________________________________________________________ 55

Majority of the people who took part in the survey believe that the purchase is secure. 4. Online Purchase Reduce Stress

Like what we saw in the previous chart, this chart also depicts how stress is reduced for people when they go for online purchases. 5. Worries About Events being sold out

This chart shows how much people are excited about the various events. About 73% of people are really bothered about the tickets being sold out. On the contrary only a few ¼ are not much concerned about them. In brief, the people are very much worried about events being sold out quickly. It will definitely benefit eTickets. 6. Concerts Tickets are expensive

Purchasing Online is Safe

33%

52%

13% 2%


Online Purchase Reduce Stress

40%

36%

19%5%


Worries About Events being sold out

25%

48%

19%

8%



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The interesting feature of this graph is that more than 3/4 of the people agree that the concert tickets are very expensive. 92% of the people agree with the statement. 7. Willingness to Receive Upcoming events info.

About 52% of the people want to receive e-mail pertaining upcoming events information. The email provided by the customers while registering with eTickets is used to provide the latest information about the various events. 8. Booking fee for tickets are too high

Booking Fee for Tickets are High

73%

22%

5%

Very true.True.Untrue.

The above Pie Chart shows that majority of the people (73%) who took part in survey firmly agree that the booking fee for Tickets are very high. About 22% of the people agree that the booking fees are high where as a least number of people think that the fee is not much.

Concert Tickets Are Expensive

67%

25%

8%

Very true.True.Untrue.

Like to Recive Upcoming evnts info.

23%

29%28%

20%Very true.True.Untrue.Very Untrue.


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Appendix III: Database Structure

The database comprises the following four tables. Below is an overview of the fields in each table, with comments where necessary. eTickets_events - Field Name Field Type Comment eventID int(11) Unique identifier for each event username varchar(40) -

status int(11) 0=Pending, 1=On Sale, 2=Temporarily off sale, 4=Event closed

title varchar(200) - date date - time time - venue varchar(100) - category varchar(100) - description blob -

image varchar(100) Contains a link to an image uploaded by event manager

public char(1) y/n. Denotes whether event will be publicly listed on site

eTickets_tickets -

Field Name Field Type Comment eventID int(11) -

types int(11) How many different types of tickets are on sale for event

amountA int(11) Total number of tickets available for each type of ticket amountB int(11) - amountC int(11) - amountD int(11) - amountE int(11) - amountF int(11) - soldA int(11) Total number of tickets sold for each type of ticket soldB int(11) - soldC int(11) - soldD int(11) - soldE int(11) - soldF int(11) - priceA varchar(20) - priceB varchar(20) - priceC varchar(20) - priceD varchar(20) -


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priceE varchar(20) - priceF varchar(20) -

descriptionA varchar(100) Description of each type of ticket (e.g. Seated/Standing etc.)

descriptionB varchar(100) - descriptionC varchar(100) - descriptionD varchar(100) - descriptionE varchar(100) - descriptionF varchar(100) -

eTickets_tickets_sold -

Field Name Field Type Comment eventID int(11) - number int(11) - description varchar(100) - serial int(11) - date datetime - name varchar(20) - address1 varchar(20) - address2 varchar(20) - address3 varchar(20) - phone varchar(100) - email varchar(100) -

eTickets_users -

Field Name Field Type Comment

username varchar(40) - password varchar(50) - type varchar(10) - name varchar(100) - address1 varchar(100) - address2 varchar(100) - address3 varchar(100) - phone varchar(100) - email varchar(100) - sessionID varchar(100) Used when a user logs in to the site


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Appendix IV: Verification Software File Format

The file that contains all the information about the tickets sold for an event is a plaintext file, which has been encrypted using PKCS#5 with the algorithm pbeWithMD5AndDES. The event manager’s web site password is used to perform the encryption and decryption. The file has a TVS extension, denoting that the file is readable by the eTickets Ticket Verification Software. When the file is created on the web server, it is also encrypted on the server side before being made available to the event manager. Therefore, even if the file is intercepted as it is transferred, its contents remain private without the knowledge of the password. When opening the file with the ticket verification software, the user will be prompted for the password, and will proceed to attempt to decrypt the file, and store the information for the event in memory. When decrypted, the file consists of n+1 lines of text, where n is equal to the number of tickets sold. These lines take the following form: Line 1: Contains details specific to the event. All fields appear on one tab-delimited line as follows: eventID - username - event title - date - time - venue Lines 2 - end: Every other line in the file contains information about a ticket sold. These are also tab-delimited lines containing the following fields: ticket no. - description - serial no. - date/time purchased - name address line 1 - address line 2 - address line 3 - phone no. - e-mail address Appendix V: Ticketmaster report

Ticketmaster Announces Top Selling Day in History More Than 1 Million Tickets Sold in 24 Hours 53 Percent of All Sales Conducted Online at www.Ticketmaster.com LOS ANGELES, March 6 /PRNewswire/ -- Ticketmaster logged record ticket sales Saturday, March 1, selling more than 1 million tickets, 53 percent of which were sold online at www.Ticketmaster.com . Consumers logged on, dialed and walked-up to purchase tickets to superstar acts, including the Dixie Chicks and Bruce Springsteen. "Big on-sale weekends truly allow Ticketmaster to showcase the technology that makes these types of sales numbers possible," said Terry Barnes, chairman and CEO of Ticketmaster. "The incredible demand we experienced on Saturday validates the strength of Ticketmaster's state-of-the-art technology and gives us a good indication that we are off to a very strong summer season." Driving the top selling day company-wide: * Single Day Ticket Sales of 1.1 million tickets (excluding tickets sold through Venue box office) Single Day Ticket Sales of 1.7 million tickets (including tickets sold through Venue box office) 53 percent of all Ticketmaster tickets were sold online via www.Ticketmaster.com Driving the top selling day company-wide: * Single Day Ticket Sales of 1.1 million tickets (excluding tickets sold through Venue box office) * Single Day Ticket Sales of 1.7 million tickets (including tickets sold through Venue box office)


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* 53 percent of all Ticketmaster tickets were sold online via www.Ticketmaster.com * More than 1,500 IVR (voice recognition lines) ports sold a record 85,000 tickets * 750 call center representatives handling consumer requests * More than 3,500 retail ticket outlets to facilitate ticket orders * Top Selling Acts included the Dixie Chicks and Bruce Springsteen * 1,851 events performing at 1,741 venues were offered for sale on Saturday ranging from MLB, NHL and NBA games to the Circus, Broadway Theatre and a variety of leading rock, pop and country concerts These numbers broke Ticketmaster's previous one-day record established March 25, 2000. About Ticketmaster Ticketmaster, the world's leading ticketing company, sold more than 95 million tickets valued at more than $4 billion in 2002, through www.Ticketmaster.com , one of the largest e-commerce sites on the Internet, more than 3,500 retail Ticket Center outlets and 19 worldwide telephone call centers. Ticketmaster serves more than 8,000 clients worldwide and acts as the exclusive ticketing service for hundreds of leading arenas, stadiums, performing arts venues, and theaters and is the official ticketing provider and supporter of the Athens 2004 Olympic Games. Ticketmaster is headquartered in West Hollywood, California and is a division of USA Interactive (Nasdaq: USAI). Ticketmaster Source - http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=112145&p=irol-newsArticle_Print&ID=571653&highlight Appendix VI: Advertising rates and demographics

E-mail from Mark Gilleran of the Marketing Dept at Hotpress: Hi Mark, The media pack and my contact details are below. If you need any more specific information on Hot Press readers in any particular are, do not hesitate to contact me. This is the generic break down, but I have more in-depth figures if you need them. The rates are excluding VAT and are open to negotiation depending on frequency of advertising. We will always try to work within the confines of all advertiser's budgets. Yours sincerely, Mark -- Mark Gilleran Advertising Executive Tel: +353-1-2411540 Mob: +353-87-6622790 Fax: +353-1-2411538 HOT PRESS INFO. Hot Press - The Bigger Picture Hot Press is the leading & established publication of it’s genre. Now in its 29th year of publication, Hot Press is living proof that you don’t survive, much less move forward, by standing still. Always a magazine that has kept abreast and frequently ahead of the times, Hot Press has entered the new millennium with a whole new look and sense of purpose. This in turn has allowed the magazine to break ground - increasing its quota of fashion, gaming and much more! Readership Profile Hot Press has the highest 15-34 Years readership profile of any publication


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measured on JNRS. . Hot Press 79% - up 4% on JNRS 2003 . U 63% . The Star 52% . Evening Herald 44% . Sunday World 46% . U 63% 39,000 Adult Hot Press Readers every fortnight -(JNRS 2004) .80% under 35 years .56.4% Male following .71% High Earning potential ABC1 C2 .74% High Disposable income due to single status Our readership has increased 18.18% over the last year, an overall increase of 44.44% over last 18 months and an 88.99% increase in Women readers over last 18 months. We now have an extended monthly readership of 89,000 excluding Northern Ireland. The Addition of Hot Press is essential to any young adult-based advertising campaign, because it adds key ingredients to its effectiveness. Advertising in Hot Press provides: ? Exposure and branding in a market leading publication ? Specific targeting with no wastage ? Cash-rich, young readership audience with strong purchasing power ? A reader profile open to new product launches and concepts ? Tailored advertising/sponsorship packages to suit your budget and target requirements Since it’s launch in January 2002 membership of Hotpress.com has risen to 20,000 subscribed members. It is a perfect high value / low cost platform to complement the print medium to offer greater exposure. The Demographics for hotpress.com are as follows: Occupation: Sex: Age: AB-50% Male 62% 79% 18-35 C1-36% Female 38% 50% 18-25 C2-14% 50% 26-35 In All- Hot Press has a clear identity. It is leisurely committed reading. Its editorial environment is complementary in creating the ideal vehicle for advertisements O.T.S. and impact. Change may be vital but longevity can only be assured if certain principles are adhered to. Which is why Hot Press remains a byword for top quality writing on all aspects of popular culture-from music, cinema and comedy to politics, sport and lifestyle and it’s why the famous Hot Press Interview-home over the years to bishops, presidents. authors, actors and rock stars-is still the most quoted in the business. Hot copy, hot looks, hot attitude-Hot Press Play with fire. There is no escape. _____________________________________________________________ Colour .PRICES. Mono Double Page €6995 Double Page €4724 Full Page €4052 Full Page €2729 Half Page €2884 Half Page €1919 Quarter Page €1769 Quarter Page €1229 Eighth Page €1213 Eighth Page €860


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*10% premium for IFC, IBC & specially requested positions. 15% for OBC. PUBLICATION DATES & COPY DEADLINES 2005 Vol. No. Publication Date Deadline 29 01 13th Jan 6th Jan 29 02 27th Jan 20th Jan 29 03 10th Feb 3rd Feb 29 04 24th Feb 17th Feb 29 05 10th Mar 3rd Mar 29 06 24th Mar 18th Mar 29 07 7th Apr 31st Mar 29 08 21st Apr 14th Apr 29 09 5th May 28th Apr 29 10 19th May 12th May 29 11 2nd June 26th May 29 12 16th June 9th June 29 13 30th June 23rd June 29 14 14th July 7th July 29 15 28th July 21st July 29 16 11th Aug 4th Aug 29 17 25th Aug 18th Aug 29 18 8th Sept 1st Sept 29 19 22nd Sept 15th Sept 29 20 6th Oct 29th Sept 29 21 20th Oct 14th Oct 29 22 3rd Nov 27th Oct 29 23 17th Nov 10th Nov 29 24 1st Dec [Xmas Issue - subject to change] 29 25 tbc [Annual - 2006 round-up] __________________________________________________ .DIMENSIONS. DOUBLE PAGE: 310mm tall X 536mm plus 3mm of bleed on all sides. FULL PAGE: 310mm tall X 270mm wide plus 3mm of bleed on outside, top and bottom of ad. HALF PAGE HORIZONTAL (full bleed): 151mm tall X 270mm wide plus 3mm of bleed on outside and bottom of ad. HALF PAGE VERTICAL (full bleed): 310mm tall X 134mm wide plus 3mm of bleed on outside, top and bottom of ad. HALF PAGE HORIZONTAL (non-bleed): 137mm tall X 246mm wide. HALF PAGE VERTICAL (non-bleed): 282mm tall X 122mm wide. QUARTER PAGE STRIP: 282mm tall X 59mm wide. QUARTER PAGE: 137mm X 122mm wide. EIGHTH PAGE: 67mm tall X 121mm wide. ________________________________________________________________

See also http://www.hotpress.com/music/1279946.html for online rates


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Appendix VII: Financial Sources

Legal fees/ Start up regulations – www.cro.ie Domain Registry – www.iedr.ie Hosting services – www.letshost.ie Computer Equipment – www.dell.ie Stationary and office furniture – www.viking-direct.co.uk Office Furniture – www.argos.ie Rent in Invent - http://webpages.dcu.ie/~inventwm/59.html

Appendix VIII: Correspondence with promoters

Samuel Beckett Theatre: I am replying on behalf of the Samuel Beckett Theatre and not Players Theatre. We are a relatively small venue and our main function is the produce plays which form part of the coursework of the students of the School of Drama. Because of this, our main audience is made up of Trinity students and family/friends of participants. A high proportion of our sales are 'on the door' and we usually don't have full capacity audiences. Therefore, advance sales are not of huge importance and the expense and administration of online booking would not be cost-effective. Having said that, we would consider the sort of service that your project proposes. Outside term time, we hire the theatre to outside producers and they would sometimes have online booking (e.g. the Dublin Theatre Festival) or would utilise an outside booking service which has online booking (Central Ticket Bureau). Good luck with your project. Contact me again if further info would be useful. Francis At 13:33 19/07/2005, you wrote: >Dear Sir/Madam, >I am part of a group of Masters students studying in DCU. We are doing a >project on an alternative online ticket sales company to Ticketmaster in >Ireland. The focus of the project is the idea that promoters/venues like >yourselves can choose to advertise an event on our site, and the company >would facilitate selling tickets online. It would be a safe and flexible >system and we would take a small comission (8%-10%) on tickets sold. There >would be no service charge and displaying an event with us would be entirely >your own choice. > >We would appreciate it if you could help us in our studies. We would simply >like to know if you would envisage using such a service, and why you do not >currently sell tickets online. Any information you provide would be greatly >appreciated. > >Regards, > >Mark Coleman Francis Thackaberry, General Manager Samuel Beckett Theatre/School of Drama Trinity College, Dublin 2 Phone: +353 (0)1 608 1334 Fax: +353 (0)1 679 3488 e-mail: [email protected] Web: www.tcd.ie/Drama Tallaght Civic Theatre Mark, At this particular theatre we have a capacity of roughly 300 seats. Most nights when we have a show, we do not fill the theatre to


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capacity and therefore do not consider an online ticket sales system a viable option financially. We do, however, get frequent requests for such a service. The service you would be offering is one we would consider closely. Best of luck, Peter Cronin, General Manager Charlie Hodges – Dublin Event Promoter Alright Mark, Yeah your idea sounds pretty interesting. We put on roughly 6 events a month, mostly dj sets and club nights as well as the occasional larger event. Assuming the service is safe and easy enough for us to manage, we would use it alright. We often have people ask about advanced bookings so that they can turn up late. Anyway best of luck with it, hope to see you at our next night, Charlie

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e-Tickets – a ticketing website for small eventsasmeaton/MECPracticums2005/e... · 2005-08-05 · e-Tickets – a ticketing website for small events Group Members: Peter Kelly