Early Access — Aggregating demand to reduce no-show rate

Lyte's mission is to fill every seat by maximizing demand for events while providing promoters with data & capabilities needed to ensure tickets are going to the hands of true fans — not scalpers and brokers. The result is events sell out faster, have higher attendance rates, and earn more per fan.

My role: User research, Prototyping, Product strategy, UI/UX design, Implementation

Platform: Mobile & desktop web

Tools: Figma, Principle

Timeline: Nov 2019 - Feb 2020

[fig 1]

The problem

Onsale —
The battlefield of bots and fans

The 10 minutes waiting room pushes fans to hit the maximum amount of tickets and scalpers to run bots capturing as many tickets as possible. The unintended consequence of this behavior is that inexperienced resellers fluctuates the market price to be unpredictable. Resulting in low turnout, hurting key sources of income of the event organizer.

[fig 2] Purchase experience segmentation

How might we...

Transform ticket purchases from a rushed transaction to a well-planned experience

Extend the purchase window, remove the stress to help fans do better plannings.

Increase fulfillment rate, means more fans get to go.

Decrease no show rate, means more revenue for our clients

Product strategy

Early access

From passively battling with scalping to proactively prioritizing fans.

[fig 3] Before: Official ticket exchange that opens after tickets sell out

- Limited access to ticket holders
- Prices need to undercut the secondary market
- Relying on event partners’ referral to drive supply

[fig 4] Early access: Opens before the onsale to capture demand

- Smartly allocate supply, if fans’ first option sells out then direct them to their second options
- Get organic traffic from event partners
- Automatically move request to exchange if tickets sell out at face value

MVP goal

Reduce Waste on Tickets
Release Fans' Stress
Increase Partners' Yield

Early access opens up a window of time for our partners to remove the bad actors and allow fans to focus on ticket options than the quantity. We provide ways for fans to increase their chances of getting tickets, but if tickets sell out, fans could easily move the order to our official exchange at face value.

[fig 5] Take. Your. Time.

Give days—not minutes—to let fans plan and perfect their experience.

[fig 6] Offer flexibility

Coachella has two weekends but with the same lineup. By offering the flexible option, we're able to allocate demand and let more fans in.

[fig 7] Soldout recovery

If tickets are sold out during early access, we are still able to either promote available options or direct fans to our official exchange.

Tactical research finding

Fans make decision collaboratively

Fans value group preference over their personal preference

Most fans decide on which tickets to get based on their friends' preferences. Connecting the group together helps us to allocate demand and to move the whole group instead of individuals.

[fig 8] Interview notes

Design goal

How can we encourage the group to request tickets together?

We conducted more user testings and identified key frictions throughout the process that stop the initiator and contributor from connecting with each other.

Frictions for the initiator: The amount of the effort he/she needs to take to "convince" the friends to join.

Frictions for the contributor: The amount of information he/she needs in order to join.

[fig 9] Create group request flow

Design solution-1

Enhance incentives, set up the right expectation

"It just felt neutral", "Nothing really happened"
_V1.0 feedbacks
We decided not to trigger native share right away cause we need to provide context on what'll happen and we want to be able to track where they share the link. V2.1 utilizes the space also allows the group initiator to customize their group name, which will be shown on the group card.

[fig 10] Invite friends to your group V2.1

[fig 11] Iterations

Design solution-2

Increase group intimacy, provide context upfront

"I tested out the link before I sent it to my friends", "It's like another referral thing"
_V1.0 feedbacks
To reduce confusion for both the initiators and the contributors, we added context throughout the sharing process. And put the name of initiator and the group upfront to increase intimacy and trust from the contributors.

[fig 12] Invitation V2.2

[fig 13] Iterations

Success metrics

Pilot features rolled out

We ended up launching V1.0 with 2020 BottleRock music festival, and here are some outstanding data we collected.

[fig 14] Feedback from fans and our partner

50%

Conversion rate

50% of fans who got invited by their friends successfully created the reservation.

3% v.s 18%

Reservation cancelation rate

The cancelation rate in the group — 3% is significantly lower than the cancelation rate of regular reservations aren't tided to the group, which is 18%.

1.7 v.s 2.3

Quantity per order

Fans that are in the group only hit an average of 1.7 tickets per reservation compares to 2.3 in regular reservations.

Credits and thanks to

Amadeo, Yauhen, Valery, Design team
Slava, Alex, Alex Z, Alexey, Alex S, Raman, Elena, Sasha, Engineering team