Search by performer, event, or venue

In the first part of this post we presented our guide to the primary ticket markets.  Now we will drill-down on the secondary ticket market and conclude with a side-by-side comparison.

Secondary Ticket Market, Brokers and Resellers

P2P

‘Person-to-person’ buying often from a friend who has an extra ticket (if your lucky you can get a “friendly” discount). Most recently this type of ticket purchasing has received a tech upgrade via markets such as Craigslist and Facebook.

P2P Pros

• Directly buying from people in your extended network or location (can result in discounts)
• Sites like Craiglist and Facebook have broadened access to P2P ticket buyers and sellers

P2P Cons

• Limited, unreliable selection
• No guaranteed availability of tickets to future events

Scalpers

Scalpers resell tickets direct to ticket-seekers. Scalping is typically executed in the vicinity of the venue of a sporting event or concert. Scalping is not to be confused with secondary ticket websites that offer secure checkouts from legitimate companies.

Scalper Pros

• Allows for last minute purchasing and facilitates spontaneous access to top events
• Instant gratification – you buy directly with people at or near the event you will be attending

Scalper Cons

• No price guarantee – popular ticket events might be bring ticket prices outside your budget
• Significant risk of buying fraudulent, forged tickets
• It helps to have basic negotiation skills
• No guarantees or return policy

No Scalp Zones

No scalp zones are designated locations where fans sell extra tickets they have at face value – typically located at or in the immediate vicinity of the venue (see ‘Scalp Free Zone, Fenway Park)

No Scalp Zone Pros

• These locations are fixed, so you always know where to look for available tickets
• Allows for last minute purchases of extra face value tickets from fellow fans

No Scalp Zone Cons

• Limited availability – most stadiums don’t have such zones
• No guarantee that their will be extra tickets in the no scalp zone for a given game (this problem worsens with the most popular games)

Secondary Ticket Websites

Secondary ticket websites are technology driven website hubs for reselling tickets, allowing access to ticket deals and sold out tickets. The secondary ticket market has revolutionized the ticket industry and has grown to be a $15 Billion industry according to Sports Marketing Quarterly. Major players in the space include StubHub, RazorGator, and TicketsNow.

Secondary Ticket Website Pros

• Access to sold out and cheap tickets
• Tickets available for all major games, concerts, and events
• Optimized site flows provide a solid user experience
• Price fluctuations allow for discount and bargain shopping

Secondary Ticket Website Cons

• Can’t get tickets when they first go on sale
• Do not provide insight on price movements, which can be unsettling for the potential ticket buyer
• Can be hard to evaluate which tickets are the best deal

Ticket Search Engines/ Ticket Aggregators –

Do the countless number of secondary ticket websites, aggregators such as SeatGeek (our company), TicketStumbler (UPDATE:TicketStumbler is no longer active), SeatKarma, Tickex and FanSnap have launched ticket search engines where users can browse and compare sports and music tickets from all the major providers in one place (at SeatGeek we combine this with ticket forecasting, deal discovery, and event discovery to help users save time and money).

Ticket Search Engine/Aggregator Pros

• All the benefits of secondary ticket websites
• Side-by-side ticket price comparisons from all the major sites
• Access to a larger inventory of tickets across all major secondary ticket networks, increasing your chances of finding both cheap and sold out tickets
• At SeatGeek, we take it a step farther by providing ticket price forecasts and “goodness of deal” metrics to help users buy at the right time and save money

Ticket Search Engine/Aggregator Cons

• Can’t get tickets when they first go on sale
• Users are redirected for checkout at trusted partner sites, breaking the flow of the user experience

Sports and Concert Ticket Market Conclusions

Primary Ticket Market

• + Paying face value (plus fees) reduces uncertainty
• + Person-to-person interaction at box offices
• + Primary authorized sellers like Ticketmaster offer a broad selection and a good consumer experience
• - Box offices often have long lines
• - Primary market tickets often sell out quickly
• - Complex, opaque fee structure
• - Prices are fixed so you cannot find deals below face value

Secondary Ticket Market

• + Exhaustive inventory–you can always find tickets for the events you want to attend
• + Using an aggregator, you can get a comprehensive picture of what’s available
• + Some sites (like, ahem, SeatGeek) offer detailed analytics and price forecasts, ensuring you get the best deals
• + Offer the possibility of getting tickets well below face value
• + More transparent fees than primary market
• - Tickets not available immediately after they go on sale
• - Uncertainty due to price fluctuations

Use the above pros/cons comparison to determine which market and sub-market best fits your needs. Hopefully after reading this you feel like a smarter ticket buyer. Knowing the characteristics of each market, as well as the pros and cons, should help you to make smarter decisions that suit your specific purchasing needs and ultimately help you save time and money.

If you disagree with our assessment of the market or have additional discussion points, please comment below.

What is SeatGeek?
SeatGeek is a ticket search engine (aka ticket aggregator) that enables fans to quickly and easily find the best price for sports and concert events on the secondary ticket market

Part I of our Buying Event Tickets, Expert Series

When buying NFL tickets, or other event tickets, we are all faced with numerous options – some familiar and some very unfamiliar. Most of us have bought tickets from a local ticket box office or from a friend with an extra ticket. Some of us have also purchased traditionally from Ticketmaster and more recently online with Ticketmaster.com, StubHub and other websites. Though many of these paths might seem elementary, they are still unfamiliar to a large segment of sports and music fans. Even for those that are familiar with these purchasing methods, not all realize that they are interacting with very different types of ticket markets with varying pros and cons. In this article, we outline the different places to buy sports and music tickets -  after you have finished you will be able to:

• Understand the different types of sports and concert ticket markets (primary ticket market vs secondary ticket market
• Know the traits of each ticket market
• Have a sense of the pros and cons to each method of buying tickets
• Be able to use this information to take actionable steps to improve your ticket buying experience in the future

Primary Ticket Market and Sellers (first time sale)

If you have purchased event tickets before, you have certainly used the primary ticket market. Whether or not you internalized that, is a different story, but if you have purchased tickets off of Ticketmaster, Live Nation, a box office or right at a venues ticket booth before entering, these were all primary market tickets. Whereas tickets on StubHub, eBay, Craigslist etc. would be secondary market tickets (aka they were purchased on the primary market and then resold). Now that you know the basic difference, let’s look at the different aspects of the primary ticket market along with the advantages and disadvantages of each.

Box offices

Most of us have been to a ticket box office (i.e. when attending the movies). A box office is a place where tickets are sold to the public for admission to a venue. In sports and music, box offices exist as physical locations at stadiums, arenas, and venues. If you like to buy your tickets in the full atmosphere of the event and receive person-to-person interaction, this might be the market for you. The downsides though are that box office tickets are often sold out, require waiting in long lines, and are In some cities, getting to the box office can be a major inconvenience. With many of them being located in downtown areas, located in inconvenient locations. Even so, there are many purists who still enjoy the process of waiting in a long line as it can build fanaticism and camaraderie (i.e. Duke students camp out for big game).

Box Office Pros

• Box offices allow fans to get tickets at face value (this is often a pro, but at the same time fans can often get tickets for below face value on the secondary ticket market for certain events, most often in the MLB)
• Box offices are located in the heart of the team or event setting

Box Office Cons

• Tickets often sell out before they even become available in the box office
• Box offices tend to have long lines/long waiting times
• Inconvenient locations which require travel before tickets can be bought

Team or Venue Websites

Tickets can also be accessed directly on the primary market from a team or venue website.  These are often fulfilled via a primary authorized seller.

Team or Venue Website Pros

• Going straight to the source provides the first access to tickets (though with the speed of the modern secondary markets, this advantage is eroding fast)
• You can view only tickets from your favorite teams and artists, at the venues you have access to (making it a simpler browsing experience)
• Tickets sold at face value

Team or Venue Website Cons

• Even though these don’t require waiting in physical lines, the demand is still high and popular tickets sell out quickly on venue websites
• Many of these sites don’t specialize in online ticket sales, so the user experience can be tough to navigate and frustrating for the user

Primary Authorized Sellers

Primary authorized sellers are the original providers of tickets at face value. Buying with a primary seller often includes fees above and beyond the face value ticket price. Ticketmaster is the quintessential primary authorized seller serving both the offline and online primary ticket markets. These authorized companies sell ‘first sale’ tickets on behalf of individual teams and venues at face value. Primary tickets can also be purchased directly from sports companies such as the MLB, as well as team sites.

Primary Authorized Seller Pros

• Partner directly with teams, bands, and venues to offer first access to tickets
• Offer services both offline and online allowing access to tickets regardless of user purchasing preferences

Primary Authorized Seller Cons

• High “convenience” and service fees
• Non-transparent pricing–you don’t see the full price (including fees) until late in the checkout process (update: Ticketmaster has since started surfacing fees earlier in the checkout flow)
• High demand frequently yields sold out tickets
• Prices are fixed, leaving no room for bargains on cheap tickets, which can often be find on the secondary ticket market

That wraps up our analysis of the primary ticket market. Check back tomorrow for the conclusion to this ticket market guide including a full profile of the secondary ticket market and a side-by-side comparison of the advantages and disadvantages of both. Agree or disagree with anything in this post? Comment below, we would love to hear your thoughts.

—> Check out part II to our expert series which discusses the secondary ticket market in detail.

Much like the travel industry a few years back, the sports and music ticket industry is evolving at a rapid pace.  However, few people know what the term ‘secondary ticket market‘ means, even though many use this market often at sites like StubHub.  Furthermore, for novices that search with queries similar to “buying sports tickets” they get a list of online sites where they can buy tickets, but no articles on what these actually are and how they relate to more traditional options.  Many searchers  struggle with how to find discount tickets or sold out tickets (depending on their personal ticket purchasing goals).  With these issues in mind, ‘Buying Sports and Concert Tickets: The Expert Series’ was born to fill a gap in educating users about buying in both the primary and secondary ticket markets.

Why the ‘Buying Tickets’ series?

• There is little content on purchasing tickets that discusses all major options, especially from industry experts
• At SeatGeek we have expertise on sports and music tickets – we live the industry everyday – and wanted to share our knowledge
• We are passionate about sports and music, and want to make it as easy as possible to search, find, and buy tickets
• We are personally invested in the ticketing industry, and strongly believe in the power of web based services to help users save money and time when buying tickets
• We hope to educate newcomers and refine the purchasing habits of regular buyers

The ‘Sports and Concert Tickets’ series schedule:

• The series will kick off early next week
• There will be 6 total posts that cover a full range of ticket buying topics
• Posts will be spaced out every 2-3 days (as quick as we can get input from everyone at SeatGeek)
• Posts will feature expert thoughts and advice from the SeatGeek founders Jack Groetzinger and Russ D’Souza

The Topics:

• Buying Sports and Concert Tickets 101
• Get Great Tickets at the Best Prices: Advanced Ticket Buying
• 5 Tips for Buying Sold Out Tickets
• Stop Losing Money: 5 Tips for Buying Cheap Tickets
• Buying Tickets on SeatGeek: The Buyers Guide
• Timing Your Ticket Buying: 5 Trends in MLB Ticket Prices

We look forward to sharing this ticket buying series.  In the meantime, check out SeatGeek for your sports and concert ticket needs or reach out to SeatGeek on Twitter if you have any questions or comments – we respond in a timely manner!

updates

Buying Sports and Concert Tickets: The Expert Series (Part II)

• Stop Buying Blind – A Guide to Sports and Concert Ticket Markets
• Stop Buying Blind – A Guide to Sports and Concert Ticket Markets (2/2)