Heather vs. Online Ticket Purchasing...an epic battle

I've only recently entered the torrid battlefield known as "Online Ticket Purchasing." I'm talking about purchasing tickets to go see a show--a concert, a musical, a comedian, etc. Purchasing a ticket online for these kinds of events is no big deal really, as long as you want to go see a show that no one else wants to see, as long as the event's general admission, or as long as you don't care how much the ticket costs.

But--if you are trying to purchase tickets for a high-demand show, and you want a good seat for that show and you want it to cost what you budgeted for it--suddenly the world of Online Ticket Purchasing gets a lot hairier. (By hairier, I mean, likely to make you more apt to pull out your hair.)

Recently, I have had one Online Ticket Purchasing failure followed by two Online Ticket Purchasing successes. I would like to introduce you to this process so that you will become a master of Online Ticket Purchasing, as I recently have been.

Case Study One: The Brandi Carlile Debacle

This month, Brandi Carlile opened her spring tour with one acoustic CD-release event in Seattle. The venue had 200 seats available. Since I've spent the last six months falling in love with Brandi's music, I wanted to be there for her spring tour kickoff in a fantastic, intimate venue.

But unfortunately, I committed violated key to victory #1--take advantage of the pre-sale date. I didn't pay attention until it was too late that the pre-sale tickets were on sale. In Brandi's case, this required no specific memberships or passwords, so all I would have needed to do was be ready to buy the tickets at the time they went on sale, which I did not. Four days later when I realized this, all of the pre-sale tickets were gone.

So I marked on my calendar to be there on Saturday, February 17th at 10:00am to buy my ticket with the masses, but as soon as the link to "Purchase Tickets" was revealed, it stated that all the tickets were already sold out.

A small part of me believed I'd be able to get some off of Craig's List or eBay, but all of my check-in's since then saw the $25 tickets priced anywhere from $75 to $150. No way.

So because I missed the opportunity to buy pre-sale...I missed the opportunity to buy tickets at all! Bummer!

Case Study Two: The Brandi Carlile Victory

Last week Clay calls me and says, "They've added a Brandi tour date in Seattle in June." That's when I realized the importance of becoming allies with ticket mega-fans. This is the key to victory #2--get to know someone that's more obsessed than you are with getting tickets to a particular show. Maybe you want to see someone live, but you don't want to keep track of all the dates and how-to's...a mega-fan will do all of this work for you. It's pretty great. If you don't know this person individually, you can usually find them online at fan forums. Start at the band/musical/comedian website and work the links from there...or just google for "crazy fans of ____" and you'll usually find them. Crazy fans like to be seen and heard.

In the case of Brandi Carlile, this was the only way I would have even known in time that Brandi tickets were going onsale--because as a mega-fan, Clay received an email I didn't get.

And so--at the appointed moment last week, I got online at 9:57am and waited for the tickets to go onsale. This revealed key to victory #3--while prepping to buy tickets, refresh your page often. If you're doing this, you'll be prepped to buy tickets at 10:00am according to the site that's selling you tickets, as opposed to 10:00am at the time your computer says it's 10:00am. Those tickets are crucial, as shown in Case Study One, which revealed that sometimes tickets are sold out within seconds of going onsale based on whose computers linked them to the ticket sales the fastest.

Within a few seconds of the Brandi tickets going onsale, I had two seats secured in row three and just had to step through the rest of the process. That's when I learned of key to victory #4--register your login information with the online ticket agency before it's time to buy tickets. I did not do this--I waited to register while I was in the process of buying tickets. Do not do this! Take care of setting up an account and logging into the site (if possible) prior to the tickets going onsale. It is completely nerve-wracking to have those tickets being held for you in cyberspace with no confirmation that they're yours yet. In those precious moments while you're registering, there's an internal panic that says, "If something goes wrong and the system boots me out during registration, I'm going to lose my place in line and potentially lose getting seats this fantastic or seats at all!" It's very, very stressful.

In the case of Brandi, it all worked out well...and within about five minutes, I had successfully secured two seats in the third row of the Moore Theater for a concert in Seattle on June 1st. Fantastic!

Case Study Three: The Rent Debacle and Ultimate Victory

Following my own advice, months ago I secured my key to victory #2 in hearing from Renthead Miranda that Rent was coming to Seattle. I took extra caution myself by keeping track of the dates online and as we've neared the event and calling the venue to find out when tickets would go onsale. I knew it would be early-April, so I began checking the website for the venue and Ticketmaster weekly. Eventually, one of the sites finally posted that Monday, April 2nd at 10:00am was the pre-sale timeline. This might seem a bit manic, but I swear to you that the entire system of buying tickets is working against you going to the show...you have to fight it! You must embrace key to victory #5--do your research! If you don't know exactly when tickets are going on sale, you might miss the opportunity to buy them at all, because they might be gone by the time you find out at all.

So on Monday, April 2nd, at 9:50am, my phone rang while in the middle of a meeting to let me know that it was time to go buy the tickets. That's right--key to victory #6 is setting yourself a reminder to buy the tickets. If you get distracted and miss that 10:00am timeline, you might be waving goodbye to your tickets. Is that really work the extra three minutes of chat time by the copy machine?! Absolutely not! Program the alarm on your cell phone or in Outlook or something! Paste a note on your bathroom mirror. Anything to keep you from missing that 10:00am timeline! And in all of this 10:00am-ness, remember key to victory #7--make sure you're ready to buy tickets at 10:00am local time. If you're in Chicago buying tickets for DC, those tickets are going onsale at 9:00am your time.

So I had my reminder, and I had my refresh button ready...but...I had violated a yet-unknown rule. Which is--key to victory #8--make sure you have the pre-sale password. For Rent, I'm on a mailing list, I was checking multiple websites, but I'd never seen any details about a pre-sale password. So it slipped my mind...until I was into Ticketmaster, ready to buy five tickets, and told that I couldn't proceed without the password. Egads!

I panicked! I rechecked all the reference websites...nothing...I made up fake passwords of Rent-related terms...nothing...and I started hyperventilating...because there was only one possible night I could go see the show, and I needed five tickets (one for me and four for my four wise friends who ensured key to victory #1--befriending an OCD fan!)

So I did what any good mega-fan does--I began scouring the internet to find another crazy fan who would have posted the presale passwords on their blog. This was a good plan...but I could find passwords for shows in everywhere but Seattle. After a few minutes of internet research, however, I came across Fat Wallet, a site designed for fans to post pre-sale passwords to the masses. I ran a search on Rent Seattle, found the password immediately, entered it into Ticketmaster, and discovered I'd found the golden ticket of entry! Success!

The process was still stressful because of Ticketmaster's impossible-to-read security verification secret word box thing, and because I'd violated key to victory #4 and had old credit card information stored on Ticketmaster that needed updating.

But--regardless, I secured five tickets in the sixteenth row on opening night of Rent in Seattle. Two hours later I discovered I am a mega-fan when my Renthead friend Miranda called to let me know about the Pre-Sale password, and I told her, "I already got it. And I have tickets for opening night in Seattle!"



So I am gleeful this week as I successfully secured primo tickets to Rent and Brandi Carlile. I have been a victorious online ticket purchaser...and I'm very happy to share this gleaned knowledge with you so that you can can share the joy of being at the events that you want to be at. As I've commiserated with others over the online ticket purchasing (by others, I mean Dad), I've discovered that many people have knowledge to share from their font of wisdom. Please comment and share your own experiences/advice...from one manic fan to another.