Ticketrends Editor-In-Chief Brian Sikorski caught up with TicketWeb COO Dan Teree recently in this Ticketrends CenterStage Exclusive Interview
 
Brian: - Dan, the big question that we get is about the relationship between you and Ticketmaster.
 
Dan: - Yeah, we get that all the time.
 
Brian: - So lay it out for us. What is the relationship and when would a particular venue or performer choose you over your big brother?
 
Dan: - Well, you have to understand the history of TicketWeb to appreciate today's situation. TicketWeb has always specialized in serving small and medium-sized clients, especially festivals and rock-n-roll clubs throughout the United States and the United Kingdom. This has not changed since TicketWeb agreed to join Ticketmaster and Ticketmaster has always let TicketWeb "do its thing." Listen, the client is the one who decides which ticketing provider they think is the best and will serve their needs. That might be TicketWeb, Ticketmaster or 50 other competitors in this free land of ours. We do like to think that TicketWeb or one of our sister company products are the best at serving their respective segments. But to answer your question directly, clients choose TicketWeb because our web-based system is powerful but easy-to-use. No manual required. Our system puts them in control of their own business and helps them improve and streamline their business and make more money. Period. To allude to one of my favorite movies, Spinal Tap, TicketWeb takes our clients' businesses up several notches. TicketWeb goes to 11. 

Brian: - From my recollection when Al Gore invented the Internet, you guys were really at the forefront of this new technology. Being located in San Francisco must have helped.
 
Dan: - For sure. When I moved to San Francisco in 1997, the Internet was just beginning to pop (in a good way). It seemed like everyone was joining a company related to what they loved most. It was like Hobby.com. If you liked pets - then you went to work for pets.com; if you liked cars - you went to work at cars.com, and so on. I love live music and was naturally drawn to TicketWeb. 
 
Brian: - Why the great success in the UK - were your customers more ready for change? We see our friends in the UK and Europe as early adopters of many technologies like self service kiosks, smart cards, wireless access control. 
 
Dan: I don't need to tell you, but the UK obviously enjoys a major place among music, theatre and festivals of all sorts. TicketWeb saw this early on and simply filled a market need. We customize our software to fit the local requirements and are always tweaking. Many European markets (and Asian for that matter) are ahead of the U.S. in many ways, such as cell phone usage and the use of smart cards. Over time, TicketWeb will definitely match our offering to take advantage of these new technologies and consumer behavior.
 
Brian: Back to the question about the relationship with Ticketmaster and the soon-to-be-released T3.
 
Dan: For sure - we are extremely fortunate and happy to have them in our family. Do you like the way I said that? Our family? Look, TM provides us with a high level of autonomy that allows us to grow as the entrepreneurial company that we are. With our 35 employees we are large enough to run at a high level of customer service, but small enough to react quickly to change. TM's CEO, John Pleasants, and the folks at Ticketmaster are an incredibly smart and caring bunch and are always looking for ways to sell more tickets for our clients. That's the name of the game. They know TicketWeb's people and technology are dedicated to serving a certain segment of the ticketing market. We love what we do. That's why they bought us and that's why they keep allowing us to do our thing. 

Brian: Many of the smaller companies that we know have strategically positioned themselves in hope of a purchase by Ticketmaster. It is curious that they did not rebrand TicketWeb as a product group. 
 
Dan: We like to think that our success is why we have kept our branding and our autonomy. As the younger smaller brother, we bring fresh ideas and rapid developments to the marketplace. As far as companies wanting to be acquired by Ticketmaster or TicketWeb, I have no doubt that many companies desire this. But Ticketmaster is already solid in the U.S. and working their butts off to build on the products we already own. Of course, we're always open to compelling opportunities. But integrating companies is always a risky thing and so you need to be smart about who you buy, when and for how much. I think a lot of folks have unrealistic expectations about what they are worth. Ticketing is a tough business and unless you have size and scale, it's hard to build a business in a way that is clean and organized - something that someone actually wants to buy - instead of something where you open the closet door only to have all this stuff fall out and watch your kid's soccer ball bounce down the hallway. Yikes.
 
Brian: So you can reach into big brother's tool box take out whatever you need and hit the street. That is a formidable competitive advantage Dan.
 
Dan: (smiling over the phone) - Yes, I suppose it is. Our next release called T3 (or TicketWeb 3.0) should present features and functionality that are extremely attractive to the market because of this relationship. For example, print-at-home tickets, bar-code scanning at the client site, expanded online marketing modules to really drive the marketing side of our clients' businesses. TicketWeb is also greatly expanding what we call our "Free Marketing Network" where we promote our clients' events on 3rd party websites such as Citysearch.com, Evite.com, Ticketmaster.com and other large traffic sites. Marketing is getting so expensive these days and this is what our clients are screaming for. We think we are uniquely positioned to answer their call and most of these are exclusive to TicketWeb because they fall under the IAC (InterActiveCorp) umbrella of sister companies. This is something none of our competitors can offer.
 
Brian: The name itself elicits images of a popular movie and character that was pretty tough. Any implied message here?
 
Dan: (now grinning ear to ear over the phone) - Ahhh yes T3. The name was suggested by one of our Java engineers. Simple, yet powerful. It's certainly not meant to be scary. It IS meant to be strong. Time will tell.. We have built the system to be flexible to support our varied customer base. We can support someone looking to sell 5 tickets or 50,000 tickets or 500,000 tickets. The exciting thing is that T3 is going to allow TicketWeb to serve our clients in many new ways that will allow them to sell more tickets and increase their profits. We are confident that the combination of our customizable feature-rich technology and our exclusive online distribution relationships with the Citysearch's and Evite's of the world will allow TicketWeb to sell more tickets than any of our competitors.
 
Brian: This will be a big deal in the marketplace. Are you saying that TicketWeb 3.0 or T3 is going to be like Ticketmaster Lite - for smaller venues?
 
Dan: We will be offering everything from print-at-home technology and bar code scanning to online marketing tools and full box office features, which does seem to cover the needs of this market. Whether we are considered Ticketmaster Lite isn't really important. We want to be viewed as a complete system that "does not gather dust" because all of our online functionality will be used by the client. Oh yeah, all of this will come at a very attractive price to our clients and consumers.
 
Brian: Dan, this is big news and we appreciate that you chose to speak with us at www.ticketrends.com first with this information. Our members need timely information for their decision making and we look forward to hearing more about TicketWeb as you roll out T3!
 
Dan: Thanks Brian, you guys are doing a great job on covering hot topics and issues. Always nice to speak with you and we appreciate the opportunity to talk to the marketplace and look forward to your upcoming conference series.