Author : Saxe Coulson
October 29, 2018

How to Collect Event Attendee Data and Why It Matters

In the digital age, we tend to often hear people talk about data, especially when it concerns digital marketing. Google, Facebook and Amazon tend to store and collect quite a bit of it, maybe for the government to spy on us and usually to sell to major corporations so they can learn more about the soap we use and the cars we drive or the cars we might want to drive.

Every time we click on a website, every time we type something in a search window, every time we speak to Siri, Alexa or Google, this is data collected and stored by servers and massive databases to allow companies to learn more about us as well and to learn what we are interested in.

This is why you might start seeing sponsored posts and ads in your newsfeed for a new cell phone after you were watching YouTube videos of the latest cell phones. Although this might seem a bit intrusive and annoying, it allows companies to not only sell more products but also to serve more targeted ads. It makes much more sense for them to show ads to people searching and clicking on what Is relative to their products rather than what is not.

So what does this mean for electronic music? How can we use data in order to sell more tickets or sell more records and why should we be collecting it? How do we collect data when we don’t have millions of dollars to spend or very little to no budget?

Knowing Your Audience

It is very important to know your audience as much as possible. You want to know what their favorite genres of music are, who their favorite artists are, what they look for in a party or event. Maybe they are more into Chicago House or Detroit Techno rather than Dutch House or sounds from Berlin. They might prefer Carl Cox over Ben Klock or Maceo Plex over Lee Burridge. They might favor the aesthetics and creativity of a party over the sound and music or they might care more about the vibe and crowd.

Knowing key factors about your audience allows you to know what type of sounds your audience prefers and what you might need to add more of to your next party. It also allows you to know the direction your label or event or music should go in and the next artist it would make the most sense to sign or book or collaborate with.

Finding Brands to Partner With

Marketers love data and the more you have of it the better you can convince them that you’re the right one to partner with. By collecting data from your audience, you can better assess what brands might be a right fit. Maybe you discover that a good majority of your audience is vegan or are avid travelers and of course you will surely discover that many are producers with home studios. All this information is valuable for brands and not only allows you discover the type of brands that might make a good partnership but also shows brands that the consumer they are trying to market to listens to your music or is at your event.

If you can discover that people listening to your music or attending your event are world travelers then why not partner up with a travel company or airline even? If you can discover that the majority of the people listening to your music or attending your event are vegan then maybe you can have a vegan artist do a cooking show or talk about their favorite vegan food options in their next interview? Maybe you can even offer vegan food options at your next event and partner up with a vegan food truck. Once you have these audience insights, you can discover what your audience is into and ultimately what they spend their money on which is what companies and brands care about most.

Collecting The Data

Many of us are already collecting names and email addresses and sometimes even home addresses and phone numbers. This is great and allows us to send information about the next release or next event but doesn’t really give us any insight as to who is listening or who is attending.

We of course know how many plays we got or downloads and how many tickets we sold or people attended but we might not even know simple statistics as what the average age of our listeners or attendees are, where they are from, whether they are male or female or gay or straight or transsexual.

This is all data that is necessary and easily obtainable through Google Analytics and streaming services such as Youtube and Soundcloud and Spotify, etc. but isn’t exactly very specific and doesn’t necessarily allow us to know much about our audience aside from where they are located and how old they are.

When we look into deeper analytics, we can find one’s income, marital status, and education as well. This is usually pretty standard information when putting together a media kit or sponsorship deck and once again is all necessary but also doesn’t really get to specific as to who our audience is and what they are into.

Facebook is good at providing quite a bit of these insights when visiting the page but when you visit the business tools within Facebook advertising you’ll see that they have an Audience Insights tool. Facebook’s Audience Insights tool allows you to not only see the above information about who likes your page but also what other pages they like and their interests and hobbies as well as their job titles. This gives you a much deeper understanding into your audience and allows you to learn much more about who likes your fan page.

Another way to collect very specific data is through surveying your listeners and/or attendees. You can do this through your promo service and ask what type of equipment an artist uses or you can ask attendees questions relative to your event. This can allow you to approach audio brands and allow you to know what you can do to make your party better. You might be able to find an audio brand that is releasing a new piece of equipment that those on your promo pool might be interested in buying. You might be able to find that many of the attendees at your event want food options or maybe the artists they want to see.

Not only can you ask questions and conduct surveys while promoting your release or selling tickets to your event but also before someone buys your next release or during and after your event. It is simple as just asking to fill out a short survey in order to make your event better or asking a few questions about the music you are presenting. You can even offer incentives like free merchandise or a chance to win tickets or a copy of your next vinyl release.

Contests and giveaways are also a great way to collect data. Platforms such as Hive and Toneden as well as many others can make it super easy to run contests and ticket giveaways. You can also partner with brands to offer a chance to win free products and collect relative data at the same time as well.

Just like major companies and corporations are constantly collecting data and trying to advertise their products to you, you should be collecting data as well as an artist, producer, or event promoter. This allows you to better understand who Is listening to and buying your music and who is attending your events. Without collecting this data, you are just guessing as to what type of music your audience is into and what kind of parties they like.

Just because you see a lot of positive commentary or smiling faces at your event doesn’t necessarily mean that your fans are completely satisfied and you can’t do better. By figuring out what your audience prefers and what they want more of, the more music you will sell, the more tickets you will sell, and the happier everyone will be including your fans which is what matters the most.

For more insight on how to gain and collect data and for a proper assessment of your brand or party or music reach out to info@6amgroup.com