Scottish Rangers make use of ticketing system

Using Software4Sport's TALENT Sport ticketing and CRM system has helped Scottish Premier club Rangers save two weeks off processing season tickets, extended the range of online services for supporters and increased sales of season tickets.

Rangers began using the TALENT Sport ticketing and CRM system in 2005.

"Since we started using TALENT Sport, we have finished processing renewals two weeks earlier than in previous years, whilst reducing our temporary staff headcount by ten people," said Andy Ward, Head of Ticketing for Rangers FC. "We used the two weeks saved to call supporters who hadn't renewed and were consequently able to convert 700 of those into sales, worth GBP 250 000. There is no way we would have had the time for this before we started using TALENT Sport."

One way of saving time is by automating time-consuming processes.

"TALENT Sport has automated processes such as Direct Debits, which were a major burden when we had to process them manually," Ward said. "It has also consolidated other procedures such as our Continuous Credit Card Mandate schemes."

Another way time has been saved is with online season ticket renewals, which the club launched earlier this year.

"We have 42 000 season ticket holders and 3000 of those who have renewed this year chose to do so online • which was more than we anticipated. This has brought us major savings on postage, printing and administration," Ward said.

The online season ticket renewals is managed by TALENT Sport. As well as covering renewals, it lets supporters pay by Direct Debit and sign up to the Rangers 'CCM' scheme - all in one transaction.

'CCM' is a pre-payment scheme for non-season ticket home games such as European and Scottish cup matches and non SPL away contests - matches for which tickets are often in high demand. Supporters sign up in advance to buy tickets, and when the match is confirmed, payment for their ticket is taken automatically.

"When a match is announced you may only have a matter of days to sell thousands of tickets," Ward said. "TALENT Sport processes payments automatically in batch instead of us having to set up and process each sale manually one by one. For the Club, the more people that sign up, the better."

Another new service that is helping to drive sales is an online season ticket waiting list, as fans can specify which stand and area of the stadium they would like and select up to eight seats, subject to availability.

"This gives supporters another convenient way of signing up to the waiting list, without having to spend time on the phone," Ward said. "Since we launched the service on the 9th May, we have had some positive feedback, which is reflected in the numbers. Four thousand people have joined the list so far • 1,000 of those online. Because it is so convenient, it is attracting new people to sign up who may not have done so otherwise."

Once the submission is made online, TALENT Sport automatically adds the supporter to the waiting list, records their seating preferences and triggers an action which the call centre team follow up on if the seats are available.

Ward said, after calling the waiting list, the club had "converted 1,500 into sales in just eight days, worth over GBP 500 000."

TALENT Sport is a ticketing and customer relationship management (CRM) system for sports clubs, developed by Software4Sport. In the last twelve months, the system has been extensively developed.

"We have worked with our customers to introduce new functionality that meets their needs, such as automated telephone sales, automated customer purchase tracking and SMS ticket notification," said Glenn Jackson, Managing Director of Software4Sport. "TALENT Sport is now better equipped than ever to help sports clubs cut their operating costs, drive revenue and provide their supporters with a speedier, personalised 24 hour service."

Source: euFootball.BIZ © Copyright 2006 - All rights reserved.