People love a queue right?

We have seen a tenfold rise in website traffic in the last few months, events are getting more popular than ever and are seeing 3-4 times the demand for a limited number of tickets. Which we have seen can cause issues with any ticketing system even ours.

It's great to create a hype and advertise an opening date however with this can with some issues. Put it simply trying to get 1000 people through your front door at 10am on friday will not work. Getting 1000 people through your front door in an orderly manner on Friday will work.

At The Entry Point, we've always strived to avoid those notorious website queues that often get bad press—you've probably seen the recent headlines.

So whats the answer?

We have 3 options available in order of preference and recommendation:

1 - Soft Website Launch

This is by far the best option and causes no issues with spikes in demand at all and is our first recommendation in all cases.

We have many large scale events who open their entries for an event way in advance and in some cases the week after their current event has finished. They do this to capture the runners who have finished and are keen to take part in the event again. (as soon as they have forgotten the pain from completing the event)

A good solution is to set your event live and then use our built in newsletter system to let your previous participants know that the entries are open. And as a past participant you have been informed first and can enter using the link you provide.

By soft launching your event and not having a set date each year you completely take away the hype and demand for entries.

2 - Ballot System - Coming Soon

Ballot systems have been in use for many years and famously used at the London Marathon.

How does a ballot system work:

1. Participants register into the ballot over a set period of time.
2. Our platform randomly selects xxx amount of participants and an email is sent out.
3. Participants then login and check their ballot status and if successful they can complete the entry process.

Ballot systems are opened over a period of time and there is no rush at all to get registered. This is the 2nd easiest and simplest way of dealing with the high demand for ticket sales

3 - Website Queue

Anyone who's recently tried to buy concert tickets, especially for Oasis, knows the frustration of the dreaded queue. No doubt, you probably gasped at your place in line, too.

We can integrate a queue system into any of our entry pages.

Tickets go live.

1. Our queue system is monitoring traffic for spikes in demand.
2. If demand rises too fast then the queue will activate and people will be directed to our queue.
3. As soon as the queue is empty and demand has dropped the queue is not used.

It is important to only use a queue if you really need to. As a guide if you know your event opens on a set date every year and traditionally sells out quickly (within an hour or so) then a queue may be a good choice.

A word of caution, using a queue can compound the high demand problem further. We have seen in many cases that people will join the queue on multiple devices increasing the demand 2-3 times more than needed. As an example a queue could contain 1000 actual people but could appear to have 2/3000 people due to participants using multiple devices.

Conclusion

No system will ever satisfy everyone and criticism is inevitable. When demand outstrips supply, issues are unavoidable, so measures must be taken to make the process easier and fairer for all. Ultimately, it comes down to personal preference.

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