Question

In 2010, Ticketmaster found out the hard way that the
entertainment industry is not, in fact, as recession-proof as
it was once widely believed to be. Th e company, which sells
tickets for live music, sports, and cultural events, and which
represents a signifi cant chunk of parent company’s Live
Nation Entertainment’s business, saw a drop in ticket sales
that year of a disconcerting 15 percent. Th en there was the
mounting negative press, including artist boycotts, the vitriol
of thousands of vocal customers, and a number of major
venues refusing to do business with Ticketmaster.
Yet 2012 has been more friendly to the company—under

the leadership of former musician and Stanford MBA-
educated CEO Nathan Hubbard, who took over in 2010

when Ticketmaster merged with Live Nation, the country’s
largest concert promoter. Th ird-quarter earnings were
strong, with just under $2 billion in revenue, a 10 percent
boost from the same period last year, driven largely by Live
Nation’s ticketing and sponsorship divisions. Ticketmaster
was largely responsible as well, thanks to the sale of 36 million
tickets worth $2.1 billion, generating $82.1 million in adjusted
operating income, which translates to an increase of
51 percent for the year.
Th at’s because Hubbard knows how to listen, and read the
writing on the wall, “If we don’t disrupt ourselves, someone
else will,” he said, “I’m not worried about other ticketing
companies. Th e Googles and Apples of the world are our
competition.”
Some of the steps he took to achieve this included to
the creation of LiveAnalytics, a team charged with mining
the information (and related opportunities) surrounding
200 million customers and the 26 million monthly site visitors,
a gold mine that he thought was being ignored. Moreover
Hubbard redirected the company from being an infamously
opaque, rigid and infl exible transaction machine for ticket
sales to a more transparent, fan-centered e-commerce
company, one that listens to the wants and needs of customers
and responds accordingly. A few of the new innovations rolled
out in recent years to achieve this include an interactive venue
map that allows customers to choose their seats (instead of
Ticketmaster selecting the “best available”) and the ability to
buy tickets on iTunes.
Hubbard eliminated certain highly unpopular service
fees, like the $2.50 fee for printing one’s own tickets, which
he announced in the inaugural Ticketmaster blog he created.

Much to the delight of event goers—and the simultaneous
chagrin of promoters and venue owners, who feared that the
move would deter sales—other eff orts toward transparency

included announcing fees on Ticketmaster’s fi rst transaction-
dedicated page, instead of surprising customers with them at

the end, while consolidating others. “I had clients say, ‘What
are you doing? We’ve been doing it this way for 35 years,’”
Hubbard recalled, “I told them, ‘You sound like the record
labels.’”
Social media is an integral part of listening, and of course,
“sharing.” Ticketmaster alerts on Facebook shows friends of
purchasers who is going to what show. An app is in the works
that will even show them where their concertgoing friends
will be seated. Not that it’s all roses for Ticketmaster—yet.
Growth and change always involve, well, growing pains,
and while goodwill for the company is building, it will take
some time to shed the unfortunate reputation of being the
company that “everyone loves to hate.” Ticketmaster made
embarrassing headlines in the fi rst month of 2013 after
prematurely announcing the sale of the president’s Inaugural
Ball and selling out a day early as a result, disappointing
thousands. But as the biggest online seller of tickets for
everything from golf tournaments to operas to theater to
rock concerts, and with Hubbard’s more customer-friendly
focus, Ticketmaster should have plenty of opportunity to
repent their mistakes.

Question:

1. Identify the problems that Ticketmaster was facing, using cause and effect analysis. What were the Symptomatic Effects? What were the Underlying Causes?

2. What process(es) did Nathan Hubbard use to Generate Alternatives? What alternatives were available to Mr. Hubbard? What types of Uncertainty did he experience?

Answer 1

1. Identify the problems that Ticketmaster was facing, using cause and effect analysis. What were the Symptomatic Effects? What were the Underlying Causes?

A business problem has to be identified, analysed and diligently attended to so that the profitability of the firm is not hampered. In the case Ticketmaster is in the downward business cycle wherein a new, young well educated CEO Nathan Hubbard had been hired to be able to revamp the organisation and take it to new heights. Nathan had well realised what problems the firm was suffering from and thus what best resolution can be worked out. Cause Effect analysis in business is represented through a FISHBONE diagram wherein all the causes are analysed and it ends up looking like a whole fish bone. The method employs two factors: (a) Backward analysis i.e what factors caused the firm to deteriorate and lead to loss in profitability. What went wrong in the past so that it can be avioded in the future. (b) Forward analysis i.e what factors or processes need to be implemented to improve the business thus future success is engineered based on these factors.

PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION: Ticket master sells ticket for almost all shows or events like theatre, movie, cultural, theatre etc.

• Due to recession the firm saw a drop in its revenues from ticket sale. General public was not turning to watch open live concerts, theatres or cinema since many job layoffs took plce due to recession and thus purchasing power of the consumers had declined.
• Also there were boycotting artists which lead to cancellation of performances whose ticket had already been sold to customer. Due to some operational glitches like bad behaviour or inability to tie the artists exclusively due to less renumeration lead to several artists boycotting their show leading to deterioration in the brand image of the firm.
• A number of venue managers wherein event like concert, performances were schedule to take place refused to do business with Ticket master thus exclusive rights to sell tickets were not obtained.Ticketmaster failed to tangle venues or event management companies at first hand much before other competitors could influence them and thus they lost exclusive rights to many shows impacting firm's revenue.

Symptomatic effects were decline in revenue or boycott of artists or cancellation of venues etc. Underlying causes were for granted attitude of management wherein they behave as if the firm would continue to dominate the ticket sale industry Going Concern. Proper initiatives and innovation were not taken wth managerial touch so the new avenues of business should be attached rather than deteriorating even the existing factors. The business strategy had to be revamped if the firm wanted to progress in the industry.

All these cumulatively lead to loss in business and down side for the firm.

2. What process(es) did Nathan Hubbard use to Generate Alternatives? What alternatives were available to Mr. Hubbard? What types of Uncertainty did he experience?

Nathan Hubbard being a management personnel who also was a musician himself understood the nittigrtites of the music industry which inturn was a major chunk of revenue for Ticketmaster's business. Mr. Nathan studied the problems of the firm and set up a business analytics team in place "LiveAnalytics". The team was asked to dig data and eventually analyse it, regress it to bring an equation for the firm's management. The firm has 26 million online visitors apart from the rest of the population as to why they were not coming to Ticketmaster for their onestop ticketing solution partner.

Mr. Nathan also found the ticketing system in place as very rigid and less user friendly. He immediatley put in place making the online ticket booking as a swift and happy experience without any fuss. The e-commerce wing had toe be made user friendly and easy so that users of all age could easily utilise the platform for bookin tickets.

Making the customer more powerful wherein the customer chooses his own favorite seats for the amount paid also intesified the whole process of booking ticket online. Customer feels powered by being able to choose seating plces instead of just system allocating you seats.

Then there was the levy of charges for printing tickets directly from the website which even though was major source of secondary income for the firm but Mr. Nathan discovered it to be very unpopular with customers and thus he discarded that practise. This customer friendly initiative was inturn well appreciated with the customers who again started having their interest in booking tickets through Ticketmaster. This stringent practise was going on for the past 35 years in the company and did not go well with the customers thus needed to be discontinued.

Further promoting the firm on social media which was the latest thing for youngsters. This could attract the young popultion to the firm as it was available available on social platforms like facebook with notification pop up from Ticketmasters and facilities like mapping your group of friends attending an event and reaching out to them through Ticketmaster platforms through an underdevelopment app for the firm. Theses latest intiatives niche to the ticketing industry which runs on low margin and better event relation would inturn increase the brand image of the firm and transakte into long term results.