Three Things I Learned At The SBJ Drive Conference
Musings from the conference at the Star in Frisco
Three Things I Learned at SBJ Drive in Dallas this week:
I used to go to conferences all the time. When we were building TicketManager, conferences were a vital part of our growth. We had to get the word out and we didn't have much marketing budget. So we hit the road.
I made so many friends along the way. People who are now CEOs and titans of industry. At the time, we were all just kids trying to sell our wares. We've seen some hit it big, and some take big hits. But there's something reassuring about seeing those familiar faces from time to time.
What I learned this week at the SBJ Drive conference in Frisco:
Ticketing Needs New Ideas
When we started TicketManager, we'd go to all the conferences. Every SBJ conference, every NATB, Tickets.com, ALSD, Ticketmaster, NSF, and on and on. We really started to hit them in 2010. Back then, the big ideas were seat upgrades, group sales, and opaque ticket sales. The companies were Experience, Split Season Tickets, ScoreBig, and FanSnap. We'd see them on every panel, everywhere.
We don't have any new ideas.
The conference was overwhelmingly the same stuff. Opaque ticket sales have been renamed consolidation and have become a billion-dollar business. Seat upgrades are back, and there are a number of companies getting into that game (again), and group sales has gone from Groupmatics to Spinzo to Fevo.
But where are the new ideas?
Everyone was throwing around the term "AI" with very little understanding of what AI really is. Your superfast bot is not AI. It's a superfast bot.
We need new ideas in the space. Especially now with the DOJ looking to mix things up (which I don’t agree with)Sponsors have overwhelmed too many conferences
This isn't an SBJ thing. It's an every-conference thing.
Having a title sponsor who gets thirty minutes at a keynote makes sense. Or a panel here or there.
I understand these shows need to turn a profit.
However, too many of these conferences have given the sponsors too much control and too much content. The panels are becoming infomercials, which is fine, but it is also driving away guests, and the competition of the sponsors have no interest in attending.Cosm is cool
That's kinda obvious, but can they sustain as a real business?Beyond being cool, they're powering 700 planetariums and their tech is being licensed out. Will be interesting to watch them grow.
Ticketing companies are gearing up for a seismic shift
Just about every ticketing company or PE I spoke with said the same thing this week: They think the DOJ may break up Live Nation or impose sanctions on them. And ticketing may shake up quite a bit. I heard it from primaries, secondaries, and consolidators. All are positioning themselves to pounce if something shakes loose.