How to sell your event tickets as holiday gifts

The calendar may still say it’s October, but make no mistake, the holiday shopping season has already begun. More than 60% of Americans will start shopping before Thanksgiving this year. 

Even more importantly, a new study finds that 54% of Americans plan to spend money on experiences rather than physical gifts this holiday season. Is your event prepared to take advantage of that?

Humans crave experiences. The kinds of authentic connections we make at events help to boost our overall happiness. And it makes sense that we’re all looking for more of that this year. Follow these steps to take advantage of the increase in experience-based holiday spending this year with ticket gifting.

Evaluate your ticket offerings

Think about how you can make your existing event tickets more attractive - and convenient -  to holiday shoppers. 

If you’re not already offering bundled tickets, now is a good time to set those up.  Whether that means bundling products and tickets together, or creating an all-access pass that gives the ticket holder access to all the experiences your event offers. Your regular customers might enjoy the flexibility of purchasing individual attractions a la carte, but holiday gifters want something that will make a splash. 

Subscriptions also make excellent holiday gifts. Do you host multiple events throughout the year? Allow your guests to subscribe so that they can lock in their tickets now. Or use the video-on-demand model: more and more event producers are incorporating a virtual (live-stream) component to their events, and allowing subscribers to access a video library of event recordings. 

Click below for ideas on how to incorporate subscriptions into your ticket offerings. 

Promote your tickets as gifts

Don’t expect your audience to think of it all on their own. Let them know that your tickets can be gifted to family & friends, and remind them that they make great gifts. Got a puzzle lover in the family? Sure, you could give them yet another 1000-piece jigsaw, but wouldn’t a family trip to an escape room be more memorable? Need the perfect gift for a loved one who’s notoriously hard to buy for? Give them tickets to a local improv club - we all love a good laugh! 

Provide your audience with specific examples of how your tickets can make the perfect gift. Continue to remind them throughout the holiday season. Tickets are the ultimate last-minute gift because they can be delivered electronically, instantly.

Get creative on social media

Social media is still one of the most effective ways to engage your audience. Remind your fans that your tickets make the perfect holiday gift, and use social media to show not only how to purchase but why they should. 

Posting memories of past events is a great way to accomplish this. It reminds guests how much they enjoyed your events, and helps holiday shoppers picture their loved ones enjoying future experiences. You could even post ideas for creative ways your tickets can be packaged to make the recipient feel extra special. At the same time, tickets are the ultimate low-waste gift because they can be delivered electronically and they won’t end up in a landfill later!

Video content is king on social media these days, so make sure you’re incorporating video content into your posts. Check out our guide to Stories and Reels for tips on how to do that!

Enable gifting for your events

Passage makes it simple for you to enable ticket gifting for any of your events. 

When gifting is enabled, a purchaser can designate part or all of their ticket purchase as a gift for someone else! Read on for setup instructions.

To enable ticketing gifting:

1. Click "Manage" under the events drop-down in the admin area. 
   
   
2. Go into your event settings (from the Manage Events screen, select "Edit" under your event name). 
   
   
3. Under "Ticket Info" -> "Ticket Options" click the check mark next to "Enable Gifting" and then click "Save Event" to save your changes.

Your event is now enabled for ticket gifting! 

Now, when your customer visits your page, they'll see an option to mark purchase as a gift by clicking "This is a Gift" (either on the checkout screen, or next to the checkout button before the checkout screen). 

Before Checkout Screen:

On Checkout Screen:

At checkout, your customer will see four option after selecting "This is a Gift":

Recipient Email Address. This is required! This is who will receive the gifted ticket(s). 

1. Items Included in Gift. A purchased can choose to include all or just some of the tickets in their cart as a gift to the recipient.
   
   
2. Message (optional). The purchaser can write a message that will be included in the email to the recipient.
   
   
3. Send Date (optional). The purchaser can also specify a specific date/time to send the gifted tickets to the recipient. 

The recipient will receive an email message that notifies them of the gift and allows them to click a button to accept the tickets (at which point they'll need to login to an existing account, or create a new one):

The ticket purchaser can also see the status of their gift (whether or not the tickets have been accepted yet) from their "My Tickets" page:

Advanced Usage

You can also send a link to your events that automatically enables ticket gifting (for use in links from your website, promotional emails, or social media) by adding "?gift=true" to the end of your event URL. So if your event URL was "https://app.gopassage.com/events/ocean-fire" , then "https://app.gopassage.com/events/ocean-fire?gift=true" would automatically enable ticket gifting for the purchaser.

Conclusion

People sending holiday gifts are often looking for the easiest way to send a gift, while also choosing something that’s thoughtful and personalized for the recipient. Knowing that your events allow ticket gifting may make their decision easier. If you need help setting up ticket gifting for your event, schedule an onboarding call with our support team. We’ll help set everything up for you!