Hi!
The boy finished his last summer at camp.
Patrick Gracey wrote a piece in The Stage about the need for British theatre ticket prices to increase.
He offers up some interesting reasons to support the price rise:
- Production costs are higher.
- Investments are difficult to recoup.
- Maintaining quality is essential.
All of Patrick’s ideas are valid and, probably, accurate.
They also miss a larger point about ticket buyers and what moves them to buy: “What’s in it for me?”
Fans buy because they want to fill a need.
There are limitless needs that a ticket to the theatre can fill. (Really, any ticket.):
- A date
- A celebration
- Open a business relationship
- To be seen at a hot show
- “Everyone needs to see a show in London…”
I can go on.
The challenge with Patrick’s argument is that it focuses on the needs of the producer, the show.
A foundational rule of marketing is that the customer doesn’t care about your profit margin.
Appeals to the health of the theatre might apply to certain buyers, but it isn’t likely to appeal to everyone, or, even most ticket buyers.
Your profit margin, production costs, or investor’s losses aren’t going to move a potential buyer to purchase.
That’s why you have to focus on the buyer’s concern: “What’s in it for me?”
Value.
What value?
Look at the two forms of value:
- Tangible
- Intangible
Tangible is the stuff you can measure.
This might be the right ticket, right place, right time idea.
Intangible is the stuff you can’t measure.
This is being able to go see John Krasinski in Angry Alan when you are in New York City for the afternoon, and the only show is at 5 PM.
This is taking your wife to her favorite restaurant on your anniversary.
This is buying someone a special gift because you want to show your appreciation.
Fans don’t buy for you.
They buy for themselves.
So, ticket prices for British theatre, or, any theatre may need to rise to keep up with the costs of creating compelling shows.
But selling that to your potential market isn’t likely to be a winning argument because that’s not what people are really buying.
They are buying value.
“What’s in it for me?”
Indeed.
What do you think?
Join me on Slack to talk about it.
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