Good communication is key. With this in mind, we thought it would be a good idea to give you some hints and tips on how to communicate effectively with individuals and the team as a whole. At it’s core, the box office acts as a clearinghouse for information and sales. Customers expect the box office to know exactly what is happening within your organisation - or at least be able to quickly find the answer. They have the ability to maximise your marketing efforts and ultimately push sales. This ability to engage patrons and act as a bridge between your organisation can be achieved through good communication. The box office must know exactly what is happening and the best way to sell tickets and provide information.
Communication Tip 1: Staff Notices Through Ticketsolve
This tip is Ticketsolve specific. Within the system, key staff can add notes that all staff can see. For example, the marketing staff may include an update on a new email marketing campaign with discount. When the box office login, they can be taken straight to the ‘Check Notices’ tab to see what’s new, and if there anything relevant they need to know. It's a simple idea, but a lot of our users use it to great effect. The box office manager can also add notes to each individual show so that all box office staff can see these notes when talking to customers
Communication Tip 2: Box Office Meetings
Meetings are difficult. They are time consuming and can be hard to organise given varying schedules. But box office meetings are really worth the effort. Getting your whole team together in one room to take them through anything new within the organisation, or even just to get together and talk is really valuable. It foster cohesiveness, and broadens communication channels that might otherwise be missed. Get togethers don’t have to be every month, even having one just before the season brochure goes out is worthwhile. It’s a great opportunity for all the team to hear from the programming and marketing teams on each event in the season. Staff can learn about why the event was booked, the target audience, tips on how best to sell the show etc. If you can get the team together every couple of months, it is a great opportunity for staff training and encourage peer learning. Throwing in some refreshments helps as well!
Communication Tip 3: Slack - Hassle Free Communication
If you are not familiar with Slack, it is an online instant messaging tool that is designed specifically for teams. The app allows you to communicate with all your team members from one central place. You can set up everyone in the organisation on Slack, with each department having their own channel. At the risk of getting all infomercial on you, it is really one of the best communication tools we have used at Ticketsolve. It allows us to enhance the communication throughout the entire organisation, and allows us to share and collaborate on projects easily. At Ticketsolve, we have even set up two channels for the the whole organisation #random and #general. For example, #random is where we can post anything to share with the organisation and have some fun as well! If you want to learn more, just head over to their website https://slack.com/is
Communication Tip 4: Team Building / Social
One of the best ways to get your team talking, is to get them out of the office and doing something fun. While I like paint balling, that might not be everyone’s cup of tea. Point is, whether it is interpretive dance glass blowing or just dinner and drinks down the local, a fresh perspective can do wonders. Again, like the team meetings, it doesn't have to be every month, but it's a great way to give your team a little thank you, and gets them talking to each other. It’s a win-win.
These are just a few tips to help improve communication in your box office team, and obviously these can be used across the entire organisation. Try them out to see if they help in anyway, we would love to hear how you get on. If you have any ideas yourself, please comment below. Good luck and we hope that these tips will help.
