Welcome to 60 seconds with... where we interview a great business every month.
This month, we met with
WeGotTickets.comCEO and co-founder, Dave Newton, to get the low-down on his best business advice and highlights in a minute or less!
PayPal (PP): In your own words, can you tell us a bit about your business please?
Dave Newton (DN): WeGotTickets started out back in April 2000 when we created a ticketing system for our own live music events in London and Oxford.17 years later, we still have the same passion for live entertainment and commitment to simple, honest ticketing and ethical business practices that we had when we started.
PP: How would you describe your customers?
DN: We have two distinct customer groups – the event organisers whose events we sell tickets for (our “clients”) and the ticket buyers (“customers”) who buy those tickets and attend the events. Our ticket buyers are largely defined by the events that we have on sale but there are many regulars who use our site as a source of event-discovery.
PP: What’s been your biggest highlight since the business started?
DN: A post on the
Drowned In Sound website in response to someone asking “who rips you off less?” which simply said: “I think the generally accepted answer is WeGotTickets.”
PP: What would you say is the one thing your business couldn’t function without?
DN: I would say that our key can’t-do-without asset is our team – not just the impeccable support department but our sales, marketing, account management, product development, software development, accounts and HR teams.
PP: How has the growth of mobile impacted your business?
DN: It’s driven us to focus our development on optimizing event discovery and purchase flows. We always wanted to keep the customer’s ticket-buying journey down to a minimum number of steps but this has become increasingly a priority for mobile users.And this is only the beginning.
PP: What is your favourite thing about using PayPal?
DN: The notable 27% improvement in our abandonment rates at the method of payment selection page. It’s clear that a significant proportion of our customers want to use PayPal and that some of them will drop out of the payment process if they don’t have that option.
PP: If you were to give one piece of advice to other businesses, what would it be?
DN: Don’t heed unsolicited advice from other business owners who don’t know your business as well as you do.
PP: Finally, if you were stranded on a desert island, what 3 things would you take with you?
DN: A solar-charged satellite phone, an unlimited supply of distress flares and a Ocado home-delivery account with plenty of credit on it.
PP: Thanks for joining us for 60 seconds Dave.
Read the full case study with WeGotTickets
here.
To find out more about growing your mobile business, please
click here.