Ticketmaster, which has increasingly turned to social media to improve its e-commerce efforts, was honored recently by social commerce technology company Bazaarvoice for initiatives that Ticketmaster has undertaken to act on customer feedback.
Ticketmaster, a division of Live Nation Entertainment, beat out American Express, L.L.Bean and United Pet Group for the “Insight” award for the best example of using “consumer feedback to inform the way products and services are developed.” All four finalists are clients of Bazaarvoice, which awarded the prize at its recent Social Commerce Summit.
“[The finalists in this category] have designed systems for listening to customers and for distilling these insights into action across the organization,” according to Bazaarvoice. “Their efforts result in increased customer retention and confidence.”
Spearheaded by CEO Nathan Hubbard, Ticketmaster has embraced social media efforts to help drive ticket sales by setting up extensive Facebook integration; allowing customers to write review of shows; updating its online shopping cart; and launching a company blog called “Ticketology.”
The moves are designed to help make the company more consumer friendly, but Ticketmaster still has a long way to go in area. The company’s convenience and other fees are still considered onerous by most fans, and at times its customer service has been criticized. And, at the same time the company was honored by Bazaarvoice, Ticketmaster was separately among the four finalists for the Worst Company in America voted on by readers of The Consumerist Web site. The other three finalists are Comcast, last year’s overall winner as the worst company; Bank of America; and British Petroleum.
Hubbard, however, has taken it upon himself to become the face of Ticketmaster, launching a Twitter page and taking on the company’s rivals firsthand.
“By driving a high volume of reviews from live-event goers, Ticketmaster provides even better service to its clients who host these events. In just 18 months, they generated almost two million reviews globally,” Bazaarvoice said. “Today, 245 of their clients receive weekly reports on venues and acts, and some of them have used reviews to boost marketing, create great customer experiences, and improve product offerings. Creating areas of the Ticketmaster and LiveNation sites dedicated to re-using the content from reviews gives them additional ad revenue to sell, and their customer support team uses reviews to pinpoint improvements to the website, purchase process, and the live event itself.”
