Getting tickets in the hands of the real fans. An editorial.

The idea behind the presale email with the code has always been to try and give an edge to real Swifties to get their hands on concert tickets first. Unfortunately, it has its flaws. Technically any scalper can sign up for the mailing list. Also, email has proved not to be 100% efficient. A lot of Swifties have not received the presale code. Is there a better mechanism to do this?

If this is the first-ever editorial you read from me, here’s a warning for you: Quit while you’re ahead, I’m about to get very wordy.

A lot of artist go for the fan club membership. The idea is that you pay a fee, and then you will have access to the code. Is it really any better? It does deter some scalpers from getting mass quantities of tickets, specially if presale tickets obtained through a fan club membership are marked and people caught trying to sell them are expelled from the club. But it also stops Swifties who can’t pay the yearly fee.

Remember younger Swifties who don’t earn a paycheck are not going to be able to convince their parents into joining a fan club. They have better luck on convincing them to buy a ticket, since it’s a one time thing.

Taylor opposes the idea of Fan Clubs with payed memberships. This is not new, she’s been opposed to the idea since she started.

So, as a Taylorgeek and an actual computer geek, I’m a fan of high-tech ideas. So, here’s what I’ve come up with.

Part 1: Secure the access to the presale area

Have you ever noticed you can get into TaylorSwift.com using your Facebook account? It’s a portable key. The same with Twitter. you can use your Facebook/Twitter account to log onto other sites.

What’s missing is a way to allow TaylorSwift.com to register a Ticketmaster.com account. Seems simple enough. You know your TaylorSwift.com username and password. What if you could use it to log in into Ticketmaster? No presale code whatsoever, you already have the key to get in. The area opens on the presale date.

If that’s too hard, use something that already exists. Say Ticketmaster allows you to login via Facebook or Twitter. Then in TaylorSwift.com allow you to register a Facebook or Twitter account. On the day of the presale, Ticketmaster logs you in with your Facebook/Twitter account then verifies that the Facebook account credentials against TaylorSwift.com as well.

Then we don’t have any presale info that can be shared anymore or emails to get lost. Since everyone has an individual access, you are then limited in the number of tickets you buy – say 4 or 6 – to prevent mass scalping.

Part 2: Receiving the tickets

What a lot of fan club presales do is sent the tickets delayed – you buy them early but don’t get them until two weeks from the concert. It works as a deterrent because it makes harder to sell them. The wait is going to be killing you like it would be killing me, yeah.

So don’t send them. All tickets should be printed out. However, don’t allow the tickets to be printed until two weeks from the concert. I’m not too crazy about this part so the solution can work without it.

However, we can actually get rid of the whole ticket business altogether with what follows. Next chapter!

Part 3: Entering the venue

Actually, this is the part I would like implemented most of all. You can even implement just this and shoo away every single scalper in the planet. I’d love it if it was done for every ticket but I know it’s not possible. At least let’s do it for the presale.

Ticketless entry for the presale. You show up the day of the concert with the credit card that you did the purchase with. The standard ticketless entry is to provide the venue with a list of the last four digits of all credit cards sold via that method. This method exists already!

But instead of relying on a printout, there’s another way. Handheld credit card reader technology is widely available. You just slide the credit card, the reader verifies it’s the same credit card that matches a purchase and you’re in.

Or do a hybrid method and use ticket + credit card for the verification. How do you resell a ticket that is tied to a credit card if they verify the credit card at the entrance? There are ways but they’re really complicated enough to prevent this from being profitable for a scalper looking for an easy buck.

These are just ideas, and I’m aware they sound complicated but for the most part they use available technology. I know some of the logistics have to be worked out to see if any of these is feasible for the next tour. Ticketmaster and/or the venues may want fees added to the ticket value for the implementation, and we know how Taylor tries to keep ticket prices down as much as possible.

Ok, brain hurts. I’ll stop now before I scare you away… (too late again, huh)

Taylor Swift is in Manila, Philippines. We keep hearing news from @TSwiftOnTour about the events there. Taylor was not able to meet fans at her airport arrival. It seems to me that the organizers and/or the local security arranged for the event are being overprotective of Taylor… We’ll see how it goes. Hope she gets to walk into the audience, at least.

Coming up in the Calendar!

• February 19: Speak Now tour in Manila, Philippines at Araneta Coliseum.
• February 21: Speak Now tour in Hong Kong, China at AsiaWorld-Expo. Click here for ticket info.
• February 25: Tickets for Omaha, Buffalo and Tacoma go on sale for the general public.
• February 26: Caitlin Evanson‘s Birthday.

(Source: TheSwiftAgency.com)