Stand By Your Fans: Joe Pug’s Ten Dollar Tour
Joe Pug, an independent singer-songwriter, has a history of generosity and a strong belief in grassroots fan connections. Over the past year, he’s given away over 20,000 copies of a two-song sampler CD with handwritten thank-you notes inside (you can snag one here). For his recent run of shows, Joe wanted to offer his fans the fairest-priced ticket possible, so he sold a batch of tickets direct-to-fan for exactly $10, with no additional fees or charges above the retail price. They sold out in a matter of hours and helped drive hundreds of additional ticket sales. He also used Topspin’s targeted marketing tools to remind fans about upcoming shows in their town. How did he do it?
No-Fee Tickets:
Joe and his team coordinated with Chicago music venue Metro to obtain 100 tickets that Joe could sell direct-to-fan. Topspin’s service fee was built into the ticket-pricing flow, so Joe’s customers were able to purchase the ticket for exactly the retail price listed on his website, without incurring any additional fees. Joe’s team added these tickets to the Topspin Catalog, created a Buy Button for them, and launched the offer on his website. He then emailed his fan base with an announcement about the tickets and blogged about them on his website (read his post here). Once the tickets sold out, he directed fans to Metro’s standard purchase page and encouraged them to buy tickets there.
Targeted Email Blasts:
During the tour, Joe sent emails to targeted groups of fans prior to the show in their area, reminding them about 
the gig. The email recipients were segmented in the Topspin App by going to Network > Select Region, choosing a region of fans, and clicking “Send Email to Selected Group”. The emails included links to websites where fans could buy tickets and a reminder about the $10 price point. The emails were simple, informal, and included specific information for the recipient’s city.
Subject Line Variation:
About half of the “reminder” emails featured a generic subject line like “Headed your way”. The others included city-specific subjects, such as “Nashville show Monday”. By varying the subject lines, Joe’s team was able to analyze the responses and see how different subjects affected open rates.
Tickets:
• Sold out of the no-fee tickets
- First batch of 50 tickets launched on 8/12 and sold out in less than 24 hours.
-Second batch of 50 tickets launched on 9/2 sold out in less than 2 weeks
• Drove sales of standard tickets
- After the no-fee tickets were sold out, Joe’s website directed fans to the Metro’s ticket page to buy regular tickets. This tactic helped generate over 600 pre-sales.
Emails:
• The geo-targeted emails had an average open rate of 61%
• Emails with city-specific subject lines had an average open rate of 76%
• Direct-to-fan ticket sales proved extremely effective. Joe sold out of his allotment and strengthened his connection to his fan base by offering them a fair price. In this case, the goal was to super-serve fans and build their loyalty, rather than just to make money.
• Joe capitalized on the momentum from the no-fee ticket offer. After the tickets sold out, his suggestion to purchase tickets through Metro’s website helped drive a significant increase in sales.
• The geo-targeted email blasts achieved astronomical open-rates. Their highly-specific content, combined with the fact that Joe does not oversaturate his audience with messages (he sends one email a month), let fans know that these emails were highly relevant.
• The emails with city-specific subject lines proved most effective. In the future, Joe and his team know to use this strategy when composing targeted emails.
