Anyone use EZticketlive.com for online ticket sales?

[wickedfarmer]

Got a call from them and at first glance it sounds good. They have a marketing brainfart though on website. Website says there is a $275 start up fee....but they do not charge that in contract they assure me. Yes I have looked at others. They are calling me tonight and through 'go to meeting website" they are putting on a demo for me. I will update later. So far looks like standard service fee (customer paid) and normal small credit card percentage. Idea of St. louis next year is in their head.

Wicked Farmer

[wickedfarmer]

competitors....please feel free to add what makes your company good.

Scanner costs....ease of banking...pointing out your advantage is not bashing competitor.

[Karl Fields]

Mark,
Never heard of (or used) them, but then there seem to be a lot of online ticket companies popping up.
With any of them, after all the whistles, bells and costs have been compared, don't forget the BIG one: do you really trust that company to hold your money for a period of time?

[wickedfarmer]

After 3 way phone chat with them

Their live demo they did with other accounts looked simple for customer...seemless...well laid out. The company is four years into this and had accounts from pumpkin patches, haunts, county fairs, gun shows, and more. Costs....35cents per transaction....and 3.5% credit card fee using their gateway & merchant account (hope my terms are correct reading my hen scratches afterwards). One dollar ticket conveineince fee. You can choose to build cost into ticket or add separate on to ticket price. Forgot to ask about scanner fee..but they are sending me more info. If you do not like service...can't get problems resolved tear up conract/working agreement. Come across as company that is hungry to please and build business and would do what it takes. Confrence call was at my conveinience from owners home...not just "our business hours are 9-5..."

Wicked Farmer

[Haunted Prints (EOM)]

Online ticket sales companies are overrated. Sell them yourself through paypal or another authorized channel. This will eliminate frequent credit card and additional charges.

[jakprintsHAUNT]

Depending on your situation online ticketing and hard ticketing or wristbands both have their pros and cons. There are costs associated with each, and from what I have personally looked into, evens out about the same either way if you were to pay a service to sell your tickets online or do it yourself. I know hard tickets/wristbands are definitely going to be cheaper than the $1 per conveniece fee and/or credit card fees online. Any credit service is going to cost you though. Paypal I believe is around 2.5-3% as well so it would only save you a fraction going that way, let alone either your or someone else's time you would have to pay to monitor or manage. There are a lot of logistics with that which would likely not be worth it to do on your own without a service as well. That is where the only benefit of online ticketing comes in is the ability to presell your tickets via the internet. Even that, depending on your area, may be worth that $1+ per ticket sold or it might not. That one is tough and I have not seen a lot of hard data on it.

There are counterfeiting concerns with both ways of ticketing, but there are definitely ways to combat that with hard ticketing such as we have done with blacklight reactive ink or foil stamping that is virtually counterfeit proof. It also gives the patron a souvenir to take home.

In my personal opinion, especially when it is the main source of your revenue, I personally would prefer to have 100% control of all of those assets in house. It would be most cost effective to do hard tickets or wristbands and get a contract for a card reader through your bank to be able to accept credit cards, or even one of those new ones you can now get for smartphones. I know a lot of touring musicians that swear by those. Then that $1 per person fee you are not paying out for each ticket sold can go to marketing dollars to get more people there. I dont think you would get a significantly larger amount of business by simply adding the online ticketing, its more about the marketing. Accepting credit cards in general will undoubtedly bring some more business though, we are in a very credit rich economy right now, where more people are carrying only plastic even if it is just their check card. The only benefit that a service might bring (but you can also get this with some card reading contracts) is if they offered chargeback protection. This is the only concern of accepting credit cards because if someone uses a stolen card, or a kid uses mom's card without asking, the charges can be reversed, but the statististics of that happening and making that big of an effect on your business is minimal.

Som of this is only going on opinion, some on research or experience, others may disagree. Good luck whichever way you go, would love to hear feedback from others on this.

Mike "Pogo" Hach