From the Executive Corner
by Dave Butler, Paciolan

With summer behind us most of you are extraordinarily busy — the college football season is in full-swing, holiday season planning for our performing arts clients is abuzz and the baseball season finale, the playoffs, has arrived. These events represent a significant opportunity for all of us to provide a great experience for our fans and patrons as they go online to purchase and manage their tickets. Rest assured that with effective planning, your ticketing infrastructure will manage even the largest of on-sales as evidenced by some of your recent successes that I’d like to share with you.

I’m pleased to announce that the San Diego Padres made the playoffs joining another Paciolan client, the New York Mets. When tickets for games one, two and five went on sale this past weekend, fans went to the Padres website in droves never-before seen on e.Venue. Between the seven and eleven minute mark, online ticket sales averaged 817 tickets/minute. After just 15 minutes over 9,250 tickets were sold, and after 60 minutes, over 26,000 tickets were sold.

Not to be left out, arenas have been hot as well this summer. In late July the Rolling Stones went on sale in Halifax, Nova Scotia. The concert, held in late September, was the largest ever seen in Halifax totaling 50,000 diehard Mick Jagger fans! During the on-sale ticket sales approached 600 tickets per minute over brief periods and 15,000 in the first hour.

Clearly these events represent only two of the quarter’s larger on-sales. Joining this rarified cadre of large on-sales is Alabama football singles, the NY Mets post-season on-sales, Elton John at the Labatt Arena, Nebraska’s volleyball singles and many, many other events.

I bring this information to your attention as I want you to know that all of us at Paciolan want you to feel confident in your ticketing system’s ability to manage hi-volume on-sales. In the on-sale letter below, you’ll find a series of best practices built specifically to assist you in ensuring that your on-sale is a success. Together with Paciolan ticketing operations, customer service and client partner teams, we’ll continue to provide you with a well-tuned ticketing infrastructure that will provide your fans and patrons with an exceptional experience.

Sincerely,

Dave

Successfully Managing Event
On-sales
by Bob Alexander, Paciolan

Internet adoption continues to grow at a record pace as consumers opt to avoid box office lines by purchasing tickets online. As Internet adoption increases, Paciolan will continue to help you provide your fans and patrons with a successful and satisfying online experience. One critical element to your on-sales success is advance preparation and communication between you and Paciolan.

To address this critical success factor, we have built a series of documents aimed at providing you with the tools needed to ensure a successful on-sale. Feel free to socialize this with your staffs by directing them to the PSO site where they will find the following documents:

• On-sale Notification Form: Informs Paciolan staff of upcoming on-sales enabling key staff to help you plan for a successful fan experience
• Client Escalation Process for On-sales: Identifies the Paciolan staff dedicated to ensuring your on-sale satisfaction
• On-sale Checklists: Defines the key steps required to prepare for upcoming on-sales

To find these documents on the PSO site, simply:

• Log into PSO.
• Click the Documentation link. The Documentation Main Page displays.
• Click On-sale Documents.

We also have created a new Community Forum thread, On-sale Best Practices, where we invite you to share your on-sale stories and ideas and, in the process, help your industry colleagues realize future success. On the Community Portal, you’ll also find our On-sale Satisfaction Survey. We’ve built this form to capture key on-sale data directly from you immediately after your on-sale to ensure continuous improvement.

Our goal is simply to help you earn your patron’s total satisfaction and in the process help you keep your customers for life.

Pro Sports and Arenas Webinar Series
by Craig Ricks, Paciolan

The arena and professional sports markets have unique challenges. To help address many of these challenges, Paciolan launched a recurring monthly webinar, the Arena and Pro Sports Webinar Series, built exclusively for arenas and professional sports clients. These monthly sessions review the hottest topics in the industry and address how your peers leverage these opportunities to the fullest.

To ensure compelling subject matter, we distributed a survey to your colleagues. Upon analyzing survey results, the following topics are rated as the most important:

• How to effectively leverage the secondary market to drive revenues
• Handling and preparing event on-sales
• Leveraging the full capabilities of your ticketing system

During the inaugural webinar we provided you with the insight needed to help you discern how to capitalize on the secondary market by reviewing key information in both formal and informal sessions.

Guest Speakers Included

• Dan Migala, Publisher of the Migala Report
• Chris Pohl, Director, Ticket Technology and Development of the Philadelphia Phillies

We invite you to visit the community portal to view a listing of upcoming events in the Arena and Pro Sports Webinar Series, and discuss these hot topics with your peers live on the Community Forums!

Ticket Marketplace and Digital Ticketing Best Practices for College Athletics
by Craig Ricks, Paciolan

Several universities launched Ticket Marketplace this fall for football, and several more plan to launch the service for the upcoming basketball season. In an effort to facilitate best practices within the Paciolan community, some examples of these early successes are listed below and additional insights are posted within the community forums.

Boston College
With the sold out home opener against Clemson, Eagle fans diligently searched for high-demand tickets, often without success. Recognizing an opportunity to capture incremental sales and better serve their fans, Boston College (BC) came up with an innovative solution. BC placed a SOLD OUT notice on their e.Venue event page and included an integrated link to Ticket Marketplace directing fans to buy tickets.

In less than 2 days, Boston College fans purchased over 350 tickets through Ticket Marketplace, meeting demand for excess tickets and putting “butts in seats”.

U.S. Naval Academy
The U.S. Naval Academy (Navy) is in a sell out situation for their Homecoming game vs. Rutgers. Having already experienced success with Ticket Marketplace, the Navy ticket office wanted to aggressively promote Ticket Marketplace inventory by sending a targeted email to their database of fans. Knowing that this game is a hot ticket, they built an N*Mail campaign that specifically promoted tickets for the Rutgers game that were available on Ticket Marketplace. By customizing the email to build upon the excitement of the rivalry, Navy sold incremental tickets for game. To date, Navy has sold over 950 tickets via Ticket Marketplace and the number is rapidly growing.

Louisiana State University
Louisiana State University (LSU) offers a student-only Ticket Marketplace to allow students to buy and sell unused tickets. By creating customized campaigns that include the integrated student PIN number within the email, LSU is able to leverage this vehicle to pack the student section on game day. With the early success of the program, LSU has already sold hundreds of tickets to students and expects sales to increase considerably throughout the course of the season. LSU brands the marketplace as "A Ticket Exchange for Students by Students", and requires student identification before entering the game, ensuring that the public is unable to use student tickets.

Continue the Discussions on the Forums
Many other universities put their unique spin on Ticket Marketplace to promote their programs and achieve their objectives for the season. We invite you to continue the sharing of best practices by participating in an open discussion regarding Ticket Marketplace within the Community Forums.

Football Season Renewals Reach All-Time High
by James Kim, Paciolan

This season, over 50 colleges participated in the Football Renewal program, giving it the highest client-participation rate of any renewals program in Paciolan history. The program involved colleges partnering with Paciolan to achieve the highest online football season renewal rate leveraging best practices and email marketing. The program ran from January 1 through August 31 with Paciolan providing email marketing assistance during renewal campaigns.

Online renewal rates of colleges that did not participate in the program collectively realized online renewal rates of 21% whereas over 53% (approximately 350,000) of the participating universities’ season ticket holders renewed online this year, resulting in the highest adoption rates to date.

Many of the successful participants implemented the following marketing tactics:

• Offered Internet-early renewal period resulting in considerable savings in printing and mailing costs
• Sent three graphically-rich emails promoting season renewals:
  • Announce the commencement of the football season
  • Serve as a reminder to renew
  • Serve as a final reminder to renew
• Offered incentives to drive online renewals :
  • Discounts on order processing fees
  • A chance to win prizes such as free season tickets, athletic apparel and autographed balls
  • Additional priority points
• Sent last minute “renewal warning deadline” postcards

The University of Michigan won top honors again this year with an 81% online season renewal rates with the University of Georgia and Virginia Tech following closely behind with 78% and 71%, respectively.

Notably, Washington State University, a first-timer in online season renewals, generated an impressive 58% online renewal rate in their rookie season. They launched a very creative campaign, awarding additional priority points for online renewals and heavily leveraging email marketing.

Paciolan will provide similar email marketing assistance during the upcoming Bowl season. To start planning for online bowl ticket requests and streamlining the process, please contact your Client Partner.

Who’s Talking? Results of the Paciolan Community Forums Survey
by Augi Garred, Paciolan

The Community Forums—private discussion boards for and moderated by Paciolan clients—provide a safe, convenient, 24/7 online environment to share ideas, post questions, brainstorm solutions and network with other Paciolan clients.

We recently conducted a survey of our forums’ users to ensure that we provide you with an optimal experience. The results were positive, with excellent feedback on how to improve the boards. Here are some highlights.

Usage stats: How Paciolan clients use the forums
Percentages based on usage time.

• 86%: Post questions about their Paciolan system
• 45%: Brainstorm ideas to help their business
• 54%: Share best practices
• 40%: Network with other Paciolan clients
• 31%: Share product tips
• 18%: Locate colleagues
• 13%: Post job openings
• 9%: Seek out job opportunities

The survey results also include details on forum satisfaction, recommended enhancements and Paciolan’s plan of action to make them even better.

Our Plan for Improving the Community Forums
We are committed to providing our clients with the best possible experience and compelling reasons to utilize the discussion boards. To do this, we intend to:

• Actively and consistently promote the forums to the Paciolan community to increase overall participation and the number of users.
• Arm our client moderators with the tools they need, plus invite “super users” to join the moderator team.
• Start a PACnet board to engage the client community in discussions about the annual event.

Click here to download the complete survey results (PDF).

Get Information and Register for the Community Forums
Click here

More Universities Move to the Digital Ticket for Football
by Craig Ricks, Paciolan

Of the nearly 80 Paciolan clients that leverage the power of Access Management, 30 are universities. Many of these universities recently launched or expanded their Access Management coverage to stadium-wide scanning for football this fall. Clients such as Kansas State University, University of Iowa, Louisiana State University, University of South Carolina, University of Michigan, University of Virginia, University of Wisconsin, Stanford University, and Aloha Stadium at University of Hawaii all fit into this category.

University of Iowa Success Story
Top ranked Ohio State's arrival in Iowa City marked the biggest game in decades for the highly ranked University of Iowa. ESPN's Game Day drew the largest crowd in Game Day history and built massive media hype. With an avid Hawkeye fan base and a well-traveled contingent of Buckeye fans, the Iowa ticket office knew this game would be a true test of their new Access Management system.

When game time came, the Access Management system worked flawlessly, allowing ushers to quickly scan tickets and enabling fans to easily enter the stadium. One of the biggest advantages of scanning tickets is the ability to easily identify fraudulent tickets. With huge demand for the game, ushers identified over 400 counterfeit tickets.

"Each counterfeit ticket was caught at the gate, eliminating conflicts at the seats with our season tickets holders," stated David Sandstrum, Assistant Athletic Director for Ticket Operations. "I can only imagine how one of our lifetime donors would have reacted if they found someone sitting in their seats for the biggest game of the year."

"I'm very pleased that we had Access installed at our stadium for a game of this magnitude," added Sandstrum.

Benefits of Access Management
One of the immediate benefits for fans is the ability to purchase tickets online and instantly receive their tickets via print-at-home delivery. Print-at-home delivery not only benefits the fans, but allows the university to tap into additional revenue opportunities with sponsorship exposure on the ticket. The University of Hawaii, for example, features 12 sponsors on their print-at-home tickets creating extra value with their digital ticketing system. (See example)

With Access Management, several universities are also turning on additional digital ticketing features to allow fans to electronically transfer tickets to other parties or place unused tickets for sale via Ticket Marketplace. The University of Virginia offers these features to their fans as a convenience to season ticket holders and as a deterrent to counterfeit tickets. Since unique bar codes are printed on each ticket, the unused ticket is easily deactivated, while the newly resold or transferred ticket is enabled to ensure entry. (View article)

With the growing trend in digital ticketing and the many benefits for both fans and venues, there is no doubt additional value will be gained as venues continue to expand their digital offering.

We invite you to continue the discussion on digital ticketing and Access Management in the Community Forums.

Paciolan Announces Compliance with Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS)
by Shaw Taylor, Paciolan

Late last month Paciolan announced that the company validated compliance with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (PCI DSS). Through PCI DSS compliance, Paciolan helps all of our clients manage data security risks related to credit cardholder data for both hosted and non-hosted clients.

PCI DSS, endorsed by Visa, MasterCard International, Discover, American Express and JCB, requires merchants and service providers that store, process or transmit customer credit card data, to adopt information security controls and processes to ensure data integrity. Frequent compliance reports by a certified third-party assessor are required to achieve compliance for merchants and service providers that process a large number of transactions. Merchants and service providers that do not comply with the PCI DSS requirements are subject to penalties or fines. Details pertaining to PCI DSS compliance can be found on the PCI Security Standards Council website, www.pcisecuritystandards.org.

"Many live entertainment venues and sports teams selling merchandise online are required to conduct all such transactions in an environment that is in compliance with PCI DSS standards. By meeting these requirements, Paciolan enables its venues to run their online businesses confidently in a safe, industry-compliant manner," said Robert J. McCullen, CEO of AmbironTrustWave.

"In an era of growing litigation related to online breaches of consumer data, our customers are under increasing pressure to ensure that they protect their fans' and patrons' credit card information," said Dave Butler, CEO of Paciolan. "Paciolan's newly earned PCI compliance assures our clients that their infrastructure adheres to aggressive guidelines set forth by the leading card companies to protect valuable patron card data. We're pleased to have met this milestone and look forward to providing the infrastructure that ensures card holders' data integrity now and in years to come."

Learning Center Series
by Ted Geiss, Paciolan

Discover how Paciolan's Learning Center Series (LCS) will make you and your team more efficient and productive than ever before. Check out the updated, user friendly webinars that replace traditional on site training.

The LCS presents features and functionality that correspond to best practices, helping you complete basic tasks with your Paciolan system. See for yourself how simple it is to get organized, complete basic tasks, and get more done with familiar functions you use every day. Don't miss this opportunity to make the LCS work for you.

This unique educational series is designed to demonstrate existing functionality and provide training on the latest enhancements that will make your job easier. Through the LCS you will gain access to Paciolan experts to share knowledge that will enable you to better manage your business. These hour-long sessions will give you the knowledge you need to:

• Increase your understanding of Paciolan functionality
• Implement new features
• Gain tricks, tips and tools
• Improve patron management and relationships
• Learn and apply industry best practices

To participate in any LCS session, simply register online via the Community Portal and preview upcoming events.

If you missed any of the previous LCS sessions, you will find them archived on the PSO site. To access these archives, simply follow these steps:

• Log into PSO.
• Click the Documentation link. The Documentation Main Page displays.
• Click on Learning Center Series Archive link.