Making Your App the Superstar
at Music Events
Telenor Arena in Norway recently launched their brand new mobile app, T·App, powered by LiveStyled. The team at Telenor Arena worked tirelessly to make the launch a great success, and already, in the very early days, the hard work is paying off. The first major event with T·App available to attendees, saw:
30% OF ATTENDEES
downloaded the app
AVERAGE TRANSACTION
value in the region of £20
15% OF ANCILLARY REVENUE
through the app
To achieve this, Telenor Arena uses a wide range of marketing and operational tactics. Luckily for you, the fantastic team at Telenor Arena are happy for us to share some of their insights into making the app such an incredible success.
LiveStyled Tip
Obviously we would never encourage spamming your customers, but your pre-event communication plan should include an email a day or two before the event promoting the app and its benefits. If it’s on the phone before the customer attends the venue, they’re far more likely to pre-order drinks and actually use the app on the night. Just make sure you filter your data so that people who already have the app get a seperate email highlighting the ability to pre-order and remind them to use it on the night.
Bus Tickets
Telenor Arena further incentivises attendees to get the app by enabling them a further way to book bus tickets from the centre of Oslo to the arena. There’s a discount in-app compared to the online price - another great value add via the app.
Facebook Event Page
Facebook event promotion is the arena’s secret weapon and arguably the biggest pre-event driver of downloads.
The arena invites attendees to mark themselves as going to the event and in the process builds a 16,000 strong Facebook event. This allows them to post the app in the page which in the process, sends a notification to every single attendee.
Arriving at the Event
Promotional Staff
There’s a huge buzz of excitement as people make their way from the shuttle bus drop-off, and the car parks around Telenor Arena.
Before the attendees reach the ticket barriers, they’re greeted by T·App promotional staff, dressed in highly branded hoodies and holding tall signs above their heads. The team are approaching the people arriving telling them about the app and also helping people with any questions they might have.
Taking it to the next level, some of the promo team even have large cardboard photo frames with the artist branding… and a call to action highlighting the app.
Engaging Installations
Once the tickets have been checked, people make their way into the festival area outside the arena. Here you find food trucks and outdoor bars. The marketing team use this high footfall area as another opportunity to highlight T·App to great effect. Amongst the food trucks, there’s the T·App tent, where people can approach the promo staff for help.
There’s also a press wall backdrop with the artist logo, and the T·App logo. Fans are taking pictures, acting like superstars, and sharing these on social media, getting the T·App brand in front of a huge audience. It’s simple and highly effective stuff from the Telenor Arena team.
Inside Telenor Arena
Clear Signage
This is a further part of the experience our Norwegian friends are really getting right. There are lots of adverts and posters promoting T·App. These are strategically positioned around bar areas and in high traffic areas, such as the bathrooms. All these gentle nudges really help to get as many people as possible using the app.
App Only Bars
It’s in the arena you find the F&B operational staff have taken commitment to the app to the next level. Around 20% of till points in the arena are T·App only. This makes it easy for customers to find a convenient place to collect drinks, and the short queues at app bars are a marketing tool in their own right!
The bars are clearly signed and as it gets nearer to the event start time, the promotional staff are moved in from outside and distributed near the bars to assist people using the app.
There are lots of attendees keen to find out how to use the app, given the queues on the T·App bars are much faster moving compared to the standard bars. The main reasons for this are:
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You do not have people dithering at the front of the queue making decisions, as this has been done on the app before coming to the bar.
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Orders are rapidly communicated to bar staff without the need to shout over a noisy crowd.
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There are no cash / card payments slowing things down.
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And finally, the brilliant staff are trained on how to quickly process and redeem the orders, allowing customers to get back to their friends and back to the acts.
On the main arena floor, the back wall is lined with well-organised bars, three standard bars, and one huge, well signed, T·App bar.
The organisation of this bar area was phenomenal. At the entrance to the queue, a small number of T·App branded staff were checking people had their phones ready with their orders up on the screen to encourage speed. If you do not have your order ready, you couldn't join the queue. This helped in two ways: one, it meant that the queue moved incredibly fast as people had their phones out with the order on; and two, for those who didn't realise it was an app only queue, they were told how to use the app or directed to a standard bar. This resulted in lightning fast service in the T·App bar.
Beat the Clock
At the peak bar rush time, just before the headline act, it took over 5 minutes to queue and order a drink at the standard bar.
The T·App bar took less than 90 seconds. This speedy and high-quality service adds heaps of value to the
customer experience, and really gives people a tangible reason to use the app.
The Results
That's what it’s all about - getting more people using the app, improving the experience for the attendees, and gathering data to learn more about the customer. All of this enables venues to personalise content and promotions, resulting in incremental revenue for the venue.
This was the first major event at Telenor Arena where T·App was fully launched:
30% OF ATTENDEES
downloaded the app
AVERAGE TRANSACTION
value in the region of £20
15% OF ANCILLARY REVENUE
through the app
This is a testament to the incredible job the marketing team are doing, awareness of the app is growing rapidly, and therefore revenue through the app looks set to reach incredible levels in the future.
Download The App
Download the app and take a look for yourself. Available on both iOS and Android.
Download the app and take a look for yourself. Available on both iOS and Android.
