Welcome from the Tessitura Next Generation Board Steering Committee!
We will be very focused on ensuring we have significant membership input throughout the Next Generation Software development project, and our hope is to foster creative thinking, to be forward-looking and visionary.
In that vein, over the next few weeks we'll toss out some questions to spur dialogue and to engage your thoughts in creative directions. Here are a few questions that have been on our minds as we have gone through the process of envisioning this project. We would love to hear your ideas and thoughts, so please share them through this forum:
How would you define a "ticket"?
How would you define an "event"? (consider all types of events, including fundraising and education events, not just performances).
In answering these questions, consider the ways our organizations might be packaging the various 'items' we sell. Does a ticket do more than get you into a performance? Can a ticket be good for more than one person or more than one 'item'? Can a ticket by "reused", used for multiple items and or entries? Can it include merchandise, food, drinks, parking, online access/activities? In what ways could contribution and memberships affect a ticket?
Think 'out of the box'!
Thanks to everyone for the very thoughtful responses to the first set of questions. We're going to take a first stab at consolidating all the thoughts into a concise and organized "definition" of "ticket" and "event" as they might exist in the Next Generation platform. In a few days, we'll run those definitions by you to make sure we captured everything and for further refinement.
In the meantime, here is another set of questions to respond to. This may be a slightly more challenging exercise. Here goes:
What else is part of handling a contribution, solicitation, or ticket sale that is not currently part of entering the ‘discrete transaction’ in Tessitura? Are there multiple discrete transactions or tasks that link together to form more of a process, perhaps even tasks that cross different people or departments, and involve Tessitura and non-Tessitura functions? What is the difference between “processing discrete transactions (a ticket sale, a contribution)” and actually managing patrons relationships and experiences? What tools or capabilities would help you manage the entire process(es)?
Let's hear your thoughts!
Alan
I’ve used our Guided Tours business as an example (probably most closely aligns with a Groups operation) as an example where multiple external processes are required to support aTours order. We manage all the following through a series of more or less custom processes, some through Tess, some not.
Discerning who is making the booking vs who is attending the event (including Your Ref/Our Ref type notes). Includes checking demographic info about actual attendees vs primary Constituent making the booking.
Checking the Constituent’s access to discounted rates
Checking the Constituent’s credit status (ie Invoice vs direct payment)
Creating orders. Ideally the customer could create unseated orders online which trigger actions by reservations team. Also alert rosterers to check Tour Guide availability
Interaction with Event Management systems (in our case EBMS) to check venue availability
An Order Status ‘dashboard’ (ideally a web portal for the customer to view current status of their orders). An order can go through multiple statuses in a booking cycle (tentative, confirmed and invoiced, awaiting payment, reconfirmed, adjustment to numbers, payment received, order cancelled, etc..). These all can potentially require actions by either reservations, Finance ‘accounts receivable’ or rosterers.
Fulfillment of order. Checking confirmed numbers vs actual arrivals. Managing adjustments (including issuing credits?). Web based customer feedback post event?
On another matter, managing cancelled performances probably deserves a Forum of its own! It definitely triggers a whole range of follow-up activities, from ticketing to customer service and finance reconciliation.