Why 75% of First-Time Attendees Never Return (And What to Do About It)

Three out of four first-time attendees never return. Not because the art isn’t strong, but because the follow-up isn’t built for loyalty. Most arts & cultural organizations are investing in acquisition, but losing the retention game where it matters most: right after the first visit.

In this episode, we explore why timing trumps intention, where most post-show strategies fall short, and how small shifts in behavior can drive long-term impact. If you're ready to increase the number of your first-time attendees that come back, this is the conversation to start with.

Key takeaways you can act on:

• Why the “second date” is the most important moment in retention strategy
• How recency shapes return behavior
• Common mistakes organizations make in post-show follow-up
• The difference between audience experience vs. organizational workflow
• Simple, actionable tactics to turn first-time visitors into repeat attendees 

For more insights, past episodes, and to sign up for our newsletter, visit trgarts.com/leadingtheway 

Contact Info:  

Email [e-mail] 

Creators and Guests

Host

Jill S. Robinson

CEO and Owner, TRG Arts

What is Leading the Way with Jill S. Robinson?

Leading the Way with Jill S. Robinson is a journey into the international arts and culture industry. Join Jill, a driving force in the sector who has counseled arts leaders for more than three decades, for conversations with some of the most insightful and daring minds leading the way to a resilient 21st century.

Each year, half of audiences

at many arts organizations

are brand new.

And, of those,

over 75% never return.

Are we as a field over prospecting but under retaining?

and what needs to change?

Welcome to Leading The Way.

Okay, so let's talk about those first timers

and how challenging it is
to get them to come back again

after their first visit.

Eric, are there moments

after that first visit that are

high impact touch points that have a really big impact

on the likelihood of a first timer returning?

Stephen, I think that's a really interesting word

that you use which is "after".

But actually, there's before
and during that make a really big impact.

Why wait until after?

You come into a venue

and there's a point where somebody
welcomes you in, or not.

And how weird does it feel if

someone doesn't welcome you into the venue?

You don't feel connected.
- Totally.

Think about a 'know before you go' email.

I think every organization sends some kind

of pre-attendance communication to audiences but

rarely are they segmented.
- Right.

Rarely are they speaking to
knowing full well that they have

different relationships. They have new, they have

existing, they have returning audiences attending

that performance. But rather than tailoring

information that might be relevant and helpful to

their particular relationship with the venue,

they're just sending a kind of blanket information,

which for some who attend regularly

is going to feel like:

"This is the same stuff I see all the time."

And for others it's going to feel like:

"But I don't know about this or I have

specific questions. I may not know where to park.

I may not know which entrance to use or will you

have food and drink available?"

Plant the idea,

- right?
- That you are starting a journey with us

that we're really

intentional and thoughtful about.

So it's clear that we need to think really

carefully about what happens before.

And yet there is a moment when someone's having their

first visit and the invitation to come back is

really, really key.

If there was one step folks could take

after a first time visit,

what would that step be that you think would have the

greatest impact at changing the

opportunity for someone to come back?

To ask soon and quickly to

get in front of the follow up.

You know, later on, are we getting a thank you and a

welcome back invitation?

- The timing of that invitation is
really important.

And this is something we've seen

in the field.

This is something we've tested, right? It's not a

It's not a difficult thing

to send a follow up email to ask

an audience member to come back.

That's a relatively common practice,
but there's important nuance there

about the timing of that.

Oftentimes, that is sent,
the timing of that communication is sent

based on the rhythms of our staff,

not based on the rhythms of our audiences.

And so when we're talking about that invitation,

making sure that it is waiting for them
as soon as they

pop out their phone, as soon as the performance is

open and there is a message waiting for them

right there that is inviting them back, thanking

them and inviting them back, maybe with an offer

or whatever the next step that they have

determined for that audience member is,

It's not waiting until Monday afternoon when

the marketing team is sitting down at their desks

and being like, okay, I have people I now need to

follow up with who attended over the weekend.

That's communicating based on our team's rhythms

rather than the rhythms of our audience members

and their experiences in our buildings.

When we talk about

the dating analogy, it puts our efforts in

the context of the receiver, which is somebody

who we are trying to woo.

And so you asked the question about the next step

after, but it's all of the prep for the date that

matters as much. So being able to tell someone

that I'm wearing a tan

jacket and I've got readers.

And we're meeting here and I thought about...

Exactly. Like I've actually pre-selected a couple

of things. There's a glass of something on the

table for you when you arrive.

There was a marketing director at a really large

theater company who we used this and came

screaming up to me at a conference saying,

"Jill, Jill, Jill, my husband on our first date asked me

out during the first date for the second."

So around timing. And so they put seat back cards in

front that said, Jill, we're so glad you're here

and here's the invitation that we'd like to make

to you for the next show. And that came out of a

task force that they had on their team where they

were constantly coming up with tactics and ways

to try to get at this better mouse trap.

What holds this back from doing these things? So

like, Brad, you just described it. Like it's sort

of a staffing thing, right? And we were back in

the office on Monday, so we'll do it on Monday.

But why wouldn't we think differently about it?

Why is that taken over as the norm versus doing

it on the front end and having it ready to go?

Well, I think it's about having that intention

that understands this segment's really important.

This relationship I have with new audiences is

really important. This relationship I have with

someone who I'm really interested in is really

important. So you prioritize things a little

differently. You think about it differently. You

anticipate. You prepare differently. You're not

reactive to be like, okay, I guess I'll call back

that person I went out to coffee with last week

and see what they're up to. Like, if that person

is a priority to you, you make the effort and the

energy to talk to them at the right time, to talk

to them as soon as they arrive.

One of favorite stories is at a client who has

implemented this practice. And I was attending

for the first time as a citizen, as a normal

person, not as a consultant who's working with

the-- Not Brad Carlin coming to the show. Just

Brad Carlin, theater lover.

And Brad Carlin, theater lover, brought his

daughter with him to see a show at a client's

theater. And so in their system, I was showing up

as a first-time ticket buyer. And we arrived for

the performance and we had the seat back note.

It blew my daughter's mind. She looked at it and

she's like, "Dad, they know who you are."

Right?

And it was really fascinating. The family in

front of us got one too. They looked at it and

they passed it down and everybody in the group

was like, "This is so cool." It's a very simple

gesture that can start to create those really

lasting impressions that allow us to at least

reduce the friction of a potential return visit.

The great thing is for our sector

is that it's not happening all the time.

So it's an opportunity?

It's a huge opportunity because

how often do you get

acknowledged in that way?

You asked a really interesting question,

which is "Why doesn't this happen?"

And you said, I mean, the data tells a

story about the volume of people that are at risk

in our databases today, right?

And a big chunk of them are
first timers on a volume basis.

The field is seeking new, new, new, new, new and

retention rates are really low.

So we've got this big volume of people and all of

this work, like if we were to change our website

so that a chatbot came up and said, "Hi, Jill,

you're new. We're so glad you're coming."

And said something interesting.
Same thing happened on the phone..

The pre-event email said,

"Jill, do you know where to park?"
And then all the steps.

You do that and if you get, like, what, Brad?

One percent of them to come back?

It feels like you've done all this work.

That's all we've gotten?

brag on the Houston Ballet, Andrew Edmondson,

marketing director, for 10 years

after every single performance.

He was doing this thing, mechanized it, and they

saw 10 years of growth in frequency of patron

return year on year.
And who sees that kind of 10 year.

Package growth and size of package growth.

It's remarkable.

Took a lot of discipline.

Discipline is the thing. I actually think about

Belgrade Theatre in Coventry, who have had the

discipline of the follow-up immediately after

that, the postcard, the email, the tactics that

still direct mail still. Yes, absolutely. Because

how often do you get something through the mail

that's for you that's not a bill or a demand? And

their first time of retention has increased by 10

percent to like 65 percent.

And that is well below that average.

Well, to go back to the dating analogy, it's not

just a moment in time. Relationships grow because

we put time and effort into building them.

So in both of these examples, neither one of these were

just one thing that got them there. Andrew didn't

just send out one email immediately after.

It was event on event, year on year.

And people see that, and then they start feeling

more comfortable and want to come again.

And that connection starts to bloom.

And you do have to feel successful. It's

interesting point because actually there are

moments when you do you look back and go, well,

three first timers came back again

and it doesn't feel successful. Right.

Yeah. But that's the ROI. That's the challenge we

run into around how to ROI this. Right. And which

is ultimately why there is hesitancy in

implementation is because full days, full plates

within organizations. And they're saying, how can

I ROI the time on this particular piece of work

that you're asking me to do?

And this is where maybe another analogy of

how do we think

about the fitness coach?

Or the dietician who's helping you eat better

And it's not that I had a salad today at

lunch and so therefore I will, the ROI on my

salad tomorrow in my health. It's a good time

now. Tomorrow. I did it. It was worth the salad

yesterday. No, the discipline around those

practices changes the ROI horizon into something

completely different. That's not about this week.

That's not even about this season. Right. But

that is about the decade of good discipline and

good practice over time that

generates some of those results.

So we all at this table are working with clients,

all of us, and we see the fatigue.

What are you saying

to clients right now who say, I don't have the

time and I don't have the money. What do you say?

The question to be able to raise this is where

transparency and collaboration with your

colleagues to say, hey, I need to move something

off my plate at this moment in time. And we are

not good as a sector of saying that because we

want to do everything we feel in

the arts. We should do everything.

That's really hard to say to your leader who you

feel often most of the time you're disappointing

80 percent of the time. So I think some of this

also is about leaders giving permission and

ensuring that they're clear about where their

focus would be.

That's a big step.

I think there's time to be found within our teams

and within our structures that doesn't have to

come from an external source that doesn't have to

come from the implementation of technology,

There are apps. There are tools.

There are capabilities within CRMs. So to tell a

client, explore your options around automation

that exists. Now, there's loads of automation.

Yes. Require some learning. It's going to require

some time to learn these new things. But we often

have untapped capacity within really important

roles within our organization, namely the box

office. Our front lines that the job description

or the job requirements don't exist. They aren't

the same from 1995 or 2000 in terms of the volume

of inbound, right? Inbound communications, people

walking up into the box office or people picking

up the phone and needing to call. That has become

a much smaller role. And oftentimes those roles

are reactive roles. And if they're not on the

phone in that moment, there's untapped potential

capacity there where if we restructure job

titles, if we restructure positions to say, I

have a person who has time, who has skills that

maybe I need to develop, but I can steer those

skills in that energy to understand. And that

energy to another part of the business that's

going to free up or add to the capabilities that

I don't currently have.

If you're an organization watching this
and you

are not focusing anything on first time or

retention right now, what are the two things that

you must start doing from tomorrow

that will impact this 75% figure?

Hmm. Well, dating analogy, we've got to know who

they are so that we can invite them back.

And we cannot only do that on email.

Like we cannot only use email

because it's cheap and cheerful.

It's got to be digital. It's got to be direct mail.

And it's got to be curated, right? I mean, Brad,

by name, I'd like to invite you back

to something else quickly.

That feels to me as important as anything.

I'm looking at Brad because we just
were talking about the data.

I mean, to get somebody to

come back within 18 months.

You're breaking the mold, right? You are an

outlier if you're coming back that often. Now,

that doesn't mean we don't think about the timing

of our invitations, right? I may still ask you

for that date, but life may mean that I can't see

you for that amount of time. But that doesn't

mean I'm waiting until that to get that

commitment from you about when I'm going to see

you next. We'll keep asking. We'll keep asking.

And that's, I think, the important thing in terms

of the tactical stuff is thinking about your

rapid response and then to think about your

follow up. The rapid response, how close can you

get that to the moment that that curtain comes

down for that invitation for

the second date to take place?

And to already have it planned when the follow up

is going to take place

ideally through another channel, right?

So that it isn't all email so

that I know I'm going to rapid response
an email right away,

and when 99% don't respond, I know

already know what the next step is going to be

when it's happening and through a different channel.

We have data that tells us we've got a

pretty tight window to get them back if we're

going to get them back to get them to say yes.

Not necessarily when that event is going to be.

We've got about six months after their first

attendance in order to have any real shot to get

them back. After that, the response rates get

really flat. So we have a window that we need to

be thinking actively in that time.

How am I making those invitations?

What channels and how frequently?

I want to add something that I think gets to this

point about before the visit, which is for you to

gather your patron services team, your front of

house team and sit together and imagine the

experience of a customer for the first time.

Every touch point, every interaction, every experience

and how that can be optimized for that

welcome and that first experience.

We are we all know what it's like
to visit a venue, a theater

or go to a restaurant wherever it would be.

And we know those rubs and friction points.

So let's sit together and identify them and work through

one by one about how we can make that experience

a little bit better, a little bit more magic that

will hopefully help make that experience prefect.

I love that. It goes back to a

conversation you and I had years ago
with Fred Reichheld

about the net promoter scoring system.

And remember these episodes.

That's what you're talking about.

These episodes that may have

friction points and how you ID them.

I mean, I do think it's important to acknowledge

what those biggest friction points are and then

not to dwell on those that you can't fix.

Most people can't fix the toilets and the car parking

and in a reasonable amount of time or with the

resources that they have. So don't dwell on those

and don't chuck the whole effort out the window

because you're like, well, we can't fix our

toilets or we get no control of our car.

You can say expectations, right? I remember

standing in a queue in a venue and there was just

someone being entertaining while everyone queued up.

Just make the experience not like you're

being herded through a cattle pen.

So there's ways.

So there's the experience. And then there's

what's on stage and the impact that programming

has on retention and both First timer retention

and also this point around recency.

There's a,

new methodology that we're talking about.

We're using words called magnets and honey
for programming.

Can you give us a bit of an introduction

about what those words mean?

And maybe how a magnet or a honey
piece of programming

can have an impact on retention?

So I think we've really over time, we can't

ignore how vital the role that what we're putting

on our stages, how vital a role the programming

plays in shaping the relationships

that we have with audiences.

It is a critical part to understanding

the relationships with our audiences.
How to drive recency,

how to drive frequency, how to increase

customer value over time.

And so we have been

working on ways to better

understand how we can impact that link

Between what's on our stage
and the relationships that we have.

And sometimes it requires us, you know,

thinking about roles of programming,

just as we would roles within our organizations within

our teams and on stage, right?
Exactly. Job descriptions.

Or a role as a character in a play, right?

This is the role that I play.

Sometimes it's, you know, you get to be as Eric

often was the leading man or other times it's an

it's an ingenue. And other times it's a clown,

right? And so, but you're playing, you're playing

a role and you, you know, what your role is and

how it contributes to the larger narrative.

And we have this in our staff as well, right?

Not every person who works within an organization has

the exact same job description. We have tailored

job descriptions to achieve particular outcomes.

How we measure effectiveness, how we measure

performance within our teams.

We wanted to bring that thinking

to programming as well, not by

saying good art, bad art, do less of this art,

more of that art, but rather how do we get really

clear about the job descriptions?

Can programming be magnetic? Or is

programming more like honey.

And think of a magnet

that just if it's programming that is

magnetic, it is pulling people in.

It is drawing new people in,
It's drawing people in from the

database, but it is it is pulling people in.

And there is different programming that acts more

like honey, which is what is keeping them around,

which is what is making them sticky quite, quite

literally to the organization. And that balance

and understanding the programming that we need both

If we had all magnets, we couldn't sustain.

If we had all sticky honey

programming, we couldn't pay our bills.

So what is the right balance?

What is the right sequencing of this programming

so that programmatic decision makers,
marketing folks and

even fundraising and development professionals

can be speaking the same language about the role

and impact that our programming is going to have.

If we have too many magnets,

I imagine there's a revenue correlation

between magnets and honey, right? It sounds to me

It sounds to me as though magnets will be

taking the lion's share of revenue,

and why would I not have a program

full of magnets if that is paying

the bills and covering my expenses?

There is a

financial element to the way we think about

magnets and honey that runs in a different axis.

So think about magnets and honey as your X axis,

right? And we're just looking at the draw in the

audience. How much of this is about drawing new

people in versus how much of the of this is about

programmatic stickiness within that programming.

So think about your four quadrants. You've got magnetic

programming that may have low financial impact,

Right? Think about programming, for example,

that's targeted towards very particular

communities or is outreach or participation focused.

It is not actually about driving revenues,

but it is about engaging new people.

- It is still be magnetic, yeah.
- Can still be magnetic,

but it's not actually about the money.

And you can have up here in the top right

something that's actually very sticky.

That is your bread and butter.

That is a show - I know for my..

my many of my UK clients, for example, this is

like where Panto sits. Yeah, Panto has high,

high, high levels of loyalty and stickiness and

doesn't have quite the new defile attraction that

we see in other programming,
but it is vital financially.

And so it sits over here in this quadrant,

which is super sticky, but also has a

high financial score. So just because something

So just because something is magnetic,

doesn't actually mean it's the big blockbuster

that's going to bring in loads of money.

We have to kind of balance these things

out and understand, you know, where is it about

the value of the total attendance versus the

value of the audiences in the households and

relationships that are attending.

And we often say you can blockbuster yourself to death,

And so we would be perhaps making a lot of one

and done income, but not with the recurring

revenue that is sustaining.

I always think of that as sugar rushes. Like we

get these like jolts of something, but then we

crash afterwards. So it's a little bit of how do

you get some sustained calories.

We have data on this.

So what is the long term impact of. How do you

blockbuster yourself to death?

Why does that happen?

This is a fundamental question for the field.

Yeah, actually.

Do you prior.. Do you care? Do you think you need

as you pencil it out recurring income or not?

And if you're only doing annual budgeting, then

it may disguise your need for recurring revenue,

because if we have recurring revenue, the

cost of maintenance and the cost of delivering on

what the business produces decreases.

And that is the promise in recurring revenue.

When every dollar pound euro matters right now,

my only metric of success right now is that figure.

How can we think about it differently beyond?

"Oh that show didn't hit its revenue goal,

So it's a failure."

This gets to the job description element of this

of this magnets and honey framework.

If we treat every show with having the same job

description and therefore having the same metrics

for performance evaluation right for success,

then we're going to find ourselves in this in

this situation where more honey driven

programming is being held to the same standard of

sort of success or failure as more magnetic

programming, which we know just demoralizes teams

and makes us feel like we're failing on these

shows rather than understanding that the value of

those shows, we have to look at their success

differently. And it has to be about what

relationships is it fueling and sustaining when

we study this kind of behavior, when we study

these audiences that are attending magnetic shows

versus honey shows and things in between. What we

find in the honey shows are much higher

proportions of donors, much higher proportions of

members in the UK and in Canada, and much higher

proportions of subscribers
in the United States in particular.

Those relationships? - way more valuable.

They are contributing far more to the

bottom line of that organization on a per

household basis than what they are doing to fill

the number of seats or to pay that highest per

cap on that particular show.

So when we reposition
to understand that the job description

of honey programming is to actually fuel to

provide some sugar, we need some calories to

provide some sustenance to those relationships

that are more valuable beyond. Did we get to 70

percent capacity sold or not? And if we didn't,

it's a failure is a really important distinction.

It requires some

balance to get at this intersectionality of

patrons that we need to sustain the future of the field.

We need the programming
that is good for second dates.

That's lower risk, lower cost.

We need to create the opportunities throughout the year.

If everything was only four things a year and they

all needed to be a big blockbuster, there just

isn't enough entry points or invitations for

folks to get a little closer. Learn a little more

about what you do. Get some interest in maybe

what might be your more mission oriented

programming that the artistic team is really

passionate about and is important, but oftentimes

doesn't have the same kind

of draw as more magnetically.

How do we get the artistic teams on board here?

Because this might to them sound

a bit like programming by data.

We have got to get artistic directors at the

table in this conversation at the beginning.

Today,

artistic and executive leaders have to be

partners in this. And I actually see more

awareness of that on the artistic side than I did

20 years ago or 30 years ago, for sure.

There's not a recipe here. There's not an algorithm about

programming. This still, I'm sorry. And I'll

plant my flag to say AI is not going to program

our seasons. It is still going to take artistic

professionals and artistic leaders to both create

and curate the programming that is going to

sustain our organizations and the relationships

that we have. There is no magic kind of math here

that we can bring.
- Isn't that wonderful?

And it is wonderful because

that is the soul of the organizations that we

work with. And yet there can be strategy.

There can be collaboration.

There can be shared vocabulary across teams.

And so that is where

this framework and these job descriptions and

this approach that we're talking about can be

really impactful.

Another strategy that impacts this
which is pricing.

So I wonder about honey and magnets the

things that I've seen there is how we price those

products differently too. And I'm wondering how

price comes into play with retention with the

value proposition of these different types of

programming and even with how we can use price to

incentivize return behavior. So lots of different

parts here that require a strategic conversation

that everyone gets very passionate about.

I wonder first of all about how we price these

different types of products and

what decisions we make around that.

What we've noticed is that let's just stick with

more kind of honey oriented programming at the

moment where organizations think about that

programming is maybe not having the big massive

attendance and draw that more magnetic

programming would have. And so therefore there is

a an assumption then that well then I must price

this down right in order to give it a give it a

shot of trying to inject a little bit of

magnetism into my my my lovely Colorado artisanal

honey right that I've that I've that I've that

have curated for my audiences.

When when in fact

when we study this, we're we're missing an

opportunity to optimize revenue amongst really

sticky valuable patrons.

These are some of the

least price sensitive buyers that we have within

our organizations, and if we had just reoriented

that conversation to say

we can be okay with having perhaps

lower volume of attendance,

higher average ticket prices,

because actually the value of those

customers are really important and we can be okay

with that house being 40 50 percent sold and we

can have a higher ATP than the show that we need

to have the higher price higher volume kind of show.

So oftentimes separating those

conversations out which are very emotional,

is really challenging at first. But if we're all on

the same page about the job description of that

show we can live with the fact that a honey show

can have a higher higher average ticket price

than even some of our some of our magnetic shows.

There's also tension in the field.

Mostly the folks we engage with are

charitable or nonprofit organizations. And so

when we do have a magnet,
the blockbuster kind of magnet,

there is discomfort in

pushing price too high,

in preventing people from attending.

I think we have an obligation for the

institutions that provide and curate creativity

and communities to leverage demand when it exists.

And so the question about how high is too

high like what the price table wants to look like

for those blockbusters how many because we

But how high, is too high?

And you look at what Denzel and Jake are

getting on on Broadway right now.

What Hamilton got. Is that too high?

if you're a nonprofit charitable institution.

I think this is where we really

have to make sure that we're using the right data

to help take the emotion out of it,

the politics out of it.

Everything that we can out of it,

so that we can just let's just be led by the data here.

And of course there's strategic implications.

There are values and,

audience development objectives

and all of those things that have to
come into play in that strategy,

but some people don't want to look at data.

Because it doesn't tell the

story that they want to hear.

And yet discounts do attract people. Right. Yeah.

When we do buy subscription by one subscription

get the second one at 50 percent when we say

theater for all and every seats thirty five

dollars more people come.

So they come back there. There it is. There it is.

So it's like we pay, there's trade offs.

So it might be a legitimate

discussion or decision post pandemic to say we

must grow volume and one of the tactics in our

toolkit is to use price to grow volume. But then

going back to our earlier conversation and then

are you prepared to invest in

retention because it's gonna be harder.

I talk about dynamic pricing is not just

being about maximizing revenue on the bottom line

but that that's market research.

That is telling you what the market
is really willing to pay.

That's real data.

That's no longer guessing in the marketing room to say,

well, how much do you think we should charge for

this show? I don't know. I think people will pay

this. I think people will pay that. That's a lot

of what drives those initial decisions in setting

price for product. But with dynamic pricing over

time, applied rigorously, applied with

discipline, and measured with data along the way,

you will get real actionable data that says, no,

I know what this market will pay for this

product. We have found a price point, and we can

start much closer to that price point. And

actually generate more meaningful revenue off of

the research that was come from dynamic pricing,

as opposed to the incremental two or three pounds

or the incremental five bucks here or there. It's

the research part of it that I don't think people

are talking enough about. They're just talking

about the sticker shock of

dynamic pricing. And it takes away--

are we charging too much?

It gets that fear,

perhaps, out of that discussion and conversation.

I want to help folks listening that have these

conversations every single day.

My show is not selling,

and therefore, the prices must be too high.

Are there one or two data points that you

would recommend immediately?

If that conversation is happening

and emotions are high, pressure is on.

What can we look at? What one or two data points

can we look at that will

help in this conversation?

How much inventory do you have available at your

lowest price point, and what

is that lowest price point?

That is the best evidence I have seen to be able

to walk clients off a ledge of mass discounting,

which is to go, that's interesting.

You still have 250 tickets for less than $30 available.

Really, we think price is the issue on this show?

Right. Right? Right. There's one.

And what's the sell-through rate at various price points?

Are there places where you can see

patterns or could tweak?

We know often it's about how much

we're investing in

marketing. Invested in marketing.

Yeah. Right.

And that's a trick. It's a really tricky wicket

to get into a conversation,

especially at the last minute.

You can also look at the mix of your buyers,

people who are brand new versus people who are

already in your database. How are you seeing and

attracting to honeys and magnets the people who

have come back before? Are they ignoring it?

Or is it really a bunch of first timers?

I do think this point around marketing investment

is really important, because actually, this makes

a difference to honey and magnets too.

And I wonder if there's a moment to just talk about

cost of sale, the differences that that could be

for that, and how also that data point can be

used for pricing. And you're right. It can't be a

metric that can be measured at the end of the

sales cycle. But it's something that we can look

at both on aggregate, by segment, by production.

So in general, a stickier honey show should

have a lower cost of sale. The rationale there is

that because it's honey, we're relying on

existing audiences more. And existing audiences

are less expensive to communicate to and to

convert them into booking.

More magnetic shows are more expensive.

This is where we have to rely upon

channels of media by an advertising and

spend that just require us reaching many, many,

many more people so that we can attract and

convert a smaller proportion of them. So that's

where the higher. You can look at cost of sale in

that way. But I want to underscore investment of

not just money, but in time. Because there can be

really different amounts of time investment in

the campaign activity around some of these shows

on a honey show versus a magnet show.

Give an example.

Like what do you--
- Some of the easiest things

marketing departments can do on a blockbuster

show is just to buy advertising.

Big cost of sale, low time investment.

You're giving a brief to a firm and saying, here are the

channels, or here's what we want to see. Here's a

lot of money. Go make that TV ad for us.

Go get it out there.

High visibility, high cost,

relative low time investment from the marketing staff.

Meanwhile, communicating to our database

effectively, strategically, at a segmented level,

doesn't cost-- can cost you pennies in money, but

cost you days in time. And so we have to be

thinking about how we're not just investing the

money, but how are we investing the time relative

to where we are in the campaign cycle. So this is

often difficult when, again, circling it back to

these job descriptions, when every show we

approach is having the same job description, we

find ourselves over-investing time or money in

some shows that we shouldn't be, and

under-investing in some other places.

Walking away is one of the hardest things, too.

If you have something that's a blockbuster that

you've thought was a blockbuster, you budgeted

for a blockbuster, maybe you've hoped budgeted

it's a blockbuster, and you've invested money,

and you're watching pricing, and it is not going,

and you just have to have the

intestinal courage to go, OK.

And let it go. And that requires leadership.

And that's another conversation. But sometimes we

have to say, OK, we're moving on.

Well, we're taking for granted the success of

another show in the season, and so I'm not

spending time there. Yes. That one's fine. That

one's totally fine. I'm not spending any time

there. I'm putting all my time in the one that's

really struggling. Yes, right.

And the more honey on it. Exactly.

The ROI of your time and energy on that show that

is struggling is diminished by not putting that

same energy into the show where you could

optimize the success of. And so it's not just

being able to walk away. It's about actually

being able to say, we did what we did. Now

articulate it. Right. Here was the plan. Here's

what we tried. Here were the efforts. And we're

not able to build the demand that we thought.

Right. Let's not just give up on things. Let's

make sure we're clear about what it is we're

going to aim to do. But then we have to pivot to

the thing that's successful.

Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

OK, folks, it's time to play a game. We're going

to play save, scrap, or shape. Which will you do?

Welcome to save, scrap, or shape.

Team, I am going to give you

a selection of retention tactics,

and I want you to decide if you're going

to save it, scrap it, or shape it.

Are you ready for your first one?

Ready.

OK, first retention tactic, the post-show survey.

Will you save, scrap, or shape?

Three, two, one.

Oh, two shapes and a scrap.

Mine's actually shapé..

Why are we shaping the post-show survey?

Well, we're going to 'shapé' our post-show surveys

in a way that allows us to segment.

We need to be able to know

who are we listening to.

We may want to have different questions

to different segments.

We may want to have different timings

of our surveys, to different segments, depending

on their frequency. So we can't tune our

listening of the responses unless we know who is

actually getting the survey and how are their

questions being responded to differently than

others. So shaping the surveys to include

segmentation, that's important.

OK, Eric.

Shape it by putting it on a diet. Less questions.

Who wants to answer 20 questions after going to a show?

Two or three at the most. Slim it down.

Questions that you can do something with.

Yes, actionable.

Well, so that's my point. Scrap it because if we

go back to the dating analogy, if I've gone out

on a date with you, then the next important thing

for you to ask me is to go out again.

Not ask me survey questions, not ask me how I did on that

date, but actually ask me out again.

So I don't want a survey. I want an invitation.

Could ours combine? Would you say that you could

maybe scrap it for some

segments, but not all segments?

I think so.

OK, next retention tactic, refer a friend.

Save, scrap, or shape?

Three, two, one.

Some save. Two saves and a shape. Eric, why are

we shaping the refer a friend?

Because we need to be thoughtful about what we're

asking that friend to do. Have we been mindful of

what's the right programmatic ask to bring them

in? What's going to get them the most engaged? So

I think we often descend those out without really

giving it the thought of how to truly bring that

person in. I love the strategy. I wouldn't mind a

little more juge around it.

You're saving, so no juge for you both?

I love some juge. I'm not anti-juge at all.

In fact, I would rather have our audiences

providing the juge for us. There is no better

marketing. There is nothing better or stronger

than word of mouth in terms of connecting people

and demonstrating their connection and affection

for the work that we're putting on stage,

encouraging it, amplifying it, making it easy,

putting strategy behind it, including--

especially on social media-- this is a really

important tactic to build

authentic connection with audiences.

The power of referral. We do not talk about it

enough as an industry. I remember talking to

Fred Reichheld the founder of NPS, and referral. Our

promoters refer more than anyone else.

And it's an engine for revenue, for

brand, for all kinds of good things.

Well, think about how many people actually bring

someone with them at that event. So rather than

the referral later, the referral in the moment

by bringing them.

This is what we could shape, Eric,

actually. That's where the shape is. We call this

ghost data, right? So there are people who are

buying tickets and then bringing lots of people

with them who we have no data or information on.

If we had clever ways to shape the referral--

because that's, in essence, it's a referral. I'm

buying a ticket for me and my friends. They're

coming along. If we could shape how we're

collecting ghost data, we'd learn more about the

people who are being

referred to our organizations.

I love referrals. I love that

we're having this conversation.

OK, your next retention tactic. Direct mail.

Will you save, scrap, or shape?

Three, two, one.

We are two saves and a shape. So Eric, let's talk

about the shape.

I'm once again the shape in the

middle. Yeah, I like that.

We can always get more effective in terms of the

messaging we're putting on. Direct mail is

awesome, by the way. And I love the research that

says that Gen Zers and

Millennials are like, what is this thing

in my mailbox?!

So let's lean into direct mail.

But each piece needs to have a call to action,

needs to motivate somebody to do something,

and wants them to feel welcome.

So need actually is the wrong word. I want to feel

connected through that. So do all of our pieces.

Do that work to drive action

and make someone feel connected.

My save is much more like about a

protester in the street. We're trying to save the

whales, save the trees. There is oftentimes this

broad-based sentiment that it's all got to go.

That direct mail is old, it's antiquated, it

doesn't work, it's inexpensive. It's not

ecologically friendly. All of this isn't entirely

true. It needs the nuance that you've described.

So I think I was coming from a position of--

Totally. Of course it's about retention, because

we can only mail to people who are in our

database for the most part. We would prefer to

mail to people who are in our database. But there

are other ways. We can utilize print. We can

utilize direct communication in lots of other

ways. But just save it. Don't throw it out. Don't

treat it like it's some antiquated thing from the

19th century. It's a powerful communication tool.

And as for addresses, our databases can't just be

full of email addresses.

The last thing I'd say is that the pandemic

created such a volume of email. Email's cheap,

but it doesn't get the same ROI as this present,

this surprise and delight,
- I love calling it a present.

..that comes in our mailboxes. So it's a way..

the environmental thing is a thing.

But there are ways to do this with the right kind of

paper and by segmenting and targeting so we're

not spraying and praying. But we're using this

very powerful communication tool.

I'm a big fan, have always been.

Okay folks, our final retention tactic.
The seat card welcome.

Will you save, scrap or shape?

Three, two, one.

Okay Brad, do you wanna scrap?

You wanna scrap the seat card?

No, no, not really. I think I'm being just a

little provocative here. I want to scrap the way

many organizations are doing this where they

think about it in one broad brush. That either

it's only for new to file or it always looks the

same or it always has the same message. What I

wanna scrap is, even if you're already

implementing something that we feel really

strongly about, to continue to reinvent and test

and to find different ways to elevate what we're

leaving and how we're communicating with people.

So what I wanna get away from is what often

becomes a, really a set it and forget it

mentality of, okay, I gotta do the seat cards and

it becomes drudgery and we put them out, right?

Yeah.

If it feels that way,

scrap it. Find something new,

find a different segment. Find a different way to

communicate so that you're pushing yourself to

not just get settled into one particular tactic,

reinvent the tactic, make

it have a little spark.

I love that, that's why I said shape. I don't

mind the personalization of the paper. Like I

think there is a surprise and delight in that,

but I think there's other technology that can be

used. You could text me, you could have somebody

come and say hello to me. There are different

ways to mechanize this and operationalize it. And

I think testing and learning is the thing here.

And pump up the volume of it. It works for the

person who receives it. But actually the other

audience is the people who observe...

What happened on Jill's phone? And she just got like

an alert that excited her. Or Brad's got that

card on his seat. How did he get that? But if the

card's small and quiet, the impact will be small

and quiet. So think about maximizing.

All it's demonstrating is how we are focusing and putting

the relationships with our audiences first. And

we are actively looking for different ways to

connect with them, to engage with them, to make

them feel special. That's the thing we wanna

save. The exact tactic, right? The exact delivery

mechanism doesn't matter.

Thank you, team, for choosing what you will

save, scrap, or shape.

And I'd love to hear, we'd love to hear,

what you will save, scrap or shape

in your organizations.

Thank you, folks, for the discussion around this retention.

First time of retentions,

though, I've got one question for you

and you've got 10 seconds to answer it.

So you gotta keep it brief.

I don't think I can.
- No, I know.

Should we start with Brad? What is your favorite second date

strategy to convert first time

buyers into repeat attendees?

Jill.

In the event, doing something special pointed at

me that invites me back before I leave the venue.

Eric.

That next morning to get a lovely email

thanking me for coming and just recharging that

halo I felt the night before.

Brad.

I really like both of those, but I would

also add that the pre-show communication going

above and beyond to recognize, appreciate, and

pre-suade and pre-influence the

experience of my first time attending.

Thank you, folks, for this discussion on retention.