😭🎫🎟 "Should I Sell My Taylor Swift Tickets?" | 🏔 A 'Big Question' Edition.

The money stuff that you wish they taught in school

Even if you don’t know all the words to “Love Story” (come on, really?) I think you’ll learn something interesting today.

And if you’re a Swiftie? Well, I think you’ll come away with a whole new level of appreciation for this incredibly impressive woman (after researching and writing this one, I definitely did).

Q: “I got FOMO after the first concerts sold out so I went and spent heaps on Taylor Swift tickets when the next one went on sale 😭. Should I try sell them to get my money back?”

-Ella, 19, NSW

Ella’s question lets us talk about some really interesting money stuff like:

• Marketing tactics that companies can use on you to get you to spend your money (and how to spot them)

• The incredible multibillion dollar business that’s been built by a singer who is only 33 🤯

• Whether it’s a better decision to sell or keep those tickets (and why)

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Now, let’s get into this Big Question.

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Answer

The answer is divided up into 3 sections:

1. 🛒FOMO Marketing (and how to spot it)

2. 🎤🏟 ‘Brand Swift’ and Taylor the Billion Dollar CEO

3. 🎫🎟 Should You Sell Your Tickets or Go?

🛒 FOMO Marketing

Prior to the Eras Tour, Taylor hadn’t been on tour since 2018. That contributed to an effect known as ‘pent up’ or ‘latent’ demand. That’s just economist talk for when there is more demand than the supply for a product or service. 

That effect is often turbocharged when something is a ‘special edition’ or ‘limited release’. 

• Collectibles companies do this really well when they relaunch a ‘classic’ or ‘vintage’ edition of something. 

• Fast food outlets also occasionally do it to great effect (McDonald’s Szechuan Sauce anyone? Credit to anyone who gets the reference 😜).

A concert represents a special kind of ‘limited release’. You can only experience it if you are there, in a physical location, at a specific point in time. It doesn’t matter that there’s over 140 tour dates. Most of us can only go to the few tour dates in our city.

Then there’s fear of missing out (FOMO). This isn’t just a Millennial and Gen Z thing. It’s actually a really well-known psychological trait that all of us carry around. The fancy name is ‘loss aversion’ or ‘regret aversion’. We are human. And the research shows that all humans are POWERFULLY motivated by this trait. 

So when you say you got FOMO, that’s because you were biologically wired to! It’s definitely not a bad thing or a weakness on your part!

The natural social buzz and paid marketing for the Eras tour harnessed these effects incredibly well. 

Limited Supply…

• There was a set number of tour dates and available tickets.

… and Skyrocketing Demand

• There was heaps of pent up demand (since Taylor hadn’t toured for years).

• She is the biggest recording artist in the world.

• There is a huge desire for live experiences after years of Covid restrictions.

• By the time tickets were about to go on sale in Australia there was already huge amounts of online buzz about how quickly previous concerts had sold out.

• The tour dates in a city weren’t all announced at once. They allowed the first dates to sell out before announcing if there were any more available dates in that city. That amplified all of the above.

Examples of Deliberate FOMO Marketing

Companies can sometimes take advantage of this in-built trait to prompt us to take action (i.e. buy stuff). It’s not bad thing if it’s done honestly.

For example, if a product is about to run out, then pointing that fact out to a potential customer who’s browsing might help them avoid feeling disappointed if they don’t put in an order and then it sells out soon after.

But it also helps to be able to know when there’s an attempt to influence you happening.

So here’s 9 examples you’re going to start to notice all over the place once you read the following list:

1. The ‘only 2 left in stock’ style prompt when you’re online shopping for clothes / shoes (often paired with #8 on this list).

2. The ‘17 people have viewed this property / room in the last 24 hours’ nudge that you’ll see on Airbnb and other accommodation providers.

3. The ‘limited edition release / drop’ and building hype tactic for new product releases.  

4. The ‘pre-order now to guarantee your [insert product here]’ method.

   …..

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5. The ‘discount ending by this date’ message.

6. The ‘closing down sale’ tactic (it becomes a slightly dishonest tactic when the store isn’t actually closing down). 

7. The ‘book or buy now because [insert product here] usually sells out fast’ prompt or popup.

8. The ‘you have these items left in your online cart’ (usually paired with #1 on this list) email or push notification.

9. And the old classic, the simple ‘limited time only, so act now’ offer.

🎤🏟 ‘Brand Swift’ and Taylor the Billion Dollar CEO

I don’t pretend to know heaps about the music industry. But I do love analysing businesses. 

And if you look at ‘Brand Swift’ as a business, and Taylor as the CEO of that business, you start to uncover a pretty incredible set of facts. Here’s some numbers (all in Australian dollars):

• $15,000,000 - $22,000,000. The average amount that each show of the US leg of the tour is estimated to have earned.

• $2,200,000,000. That’s $2.2 billion. Billion. With a ‘B’. The Eras tour is set to break every kind of record. By the end of its multiyear, 140-plus show globe-spanning run, this is the estimate for the total that will be earned in ticket sales.

• $150,000. The amount of the one-off bonus (on top of their regular salary) that Taylor gave every member of her crew, including the truck drivers who transported hundreds of crates of gear around the US for the stage show.

• $150,000,000. The amount that the ‘Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour’ movie has sold in pre-sale tickets globally. That number will go up when it’s actually released. Incredible. (Side note: ticket prices have been set at $19.89. That’s the same as one of her most popular albums, and her birth year. Genius). 

• $101,000,000. The estimated amount that Taylor earns each year from streaming services (like Spotify and Apple Music) when fans stream her songs. 

• $?. There’s more. Merchandise (friendship bracelets anyone?). Sponsorships. Licensing deals. They would all likely add up to millions more. 

It’s worth keeping in mind that those earnings numbers above are ‘revenue’ not ‘profit’.

Taylor has to pay a lot of costs to make these concerts happen. Things like stadium hire and wages for performers in her show, the stage hands and other staff.

But still. That’s a truly incredible business operating alongside the music. With a hugely talented performer, but also business leader, running both shows.

🎫🎟 Should You Sell Your Tickets or Go?

Alright Ella. All that up there might have been interesting (hopefully). But let’s deal with your specific problem. You seem a bit torn. That’s totally fair.

• On the one hand, you’re clearly a big fan. 

• On the other hand you’ve spent a lot of money on tickets. Maybe it was more than you wanted to spend when you first decided to buy them. 

So I can see why you might think that you’ve made a ‘bad’ decision to spend a few hundred dollars on tickets. But hopefully you can see with some of the info in the first section above why you (and literally thousands of others) were motivated to do that. 

This next part is just my opinion, so if you’re more comfortable with another option, you should 100% do that instead. But for what it’s worth, here’s what I think.

Keep the tickets.

Go. Sing every song at the top of your lungs. Dance. If you’re going with friends or family, book dinner together at an awesome restaurant before the show. Make a real event of the whole thing. In fact, if you can, get everyone to save up and share a hotel room nearby for after the show (nothing worse than having to spend hours late at night trying to get home afterwards). 

Why?

• 🙅🏻‍♀️ Because money isn’t just for earning. 

• 🙅🏻‍♀️ Money isn’t just for saving. 

• 🙅🏻‍♀️ And it’s definitely not just for counting / accumulating in a bank account. 

Money is also there for spending on things that you love, and that bring you joy.

I can’t think of many better things to spend some of your savings on than tickets to a concert where you’re surrounded by thousands of other people who love the same musician as you. 

And in this case, that musician just happens to be a truly generational, world class talent, who has created an event that is being hailed as a once in a lifetime experience.

There is ZERO way you should miss the chance to make that lifelong memory.

And since you’ve got a fair bit of time until the actual concert rolls around, you’ve got time to save if you wanted to also do the restaurant / hotel / ‘make a weekend of it’ thing.

What I’ve always done (and written about here before) is to save 20% of my pay from my job every single time. That means that when an opportunity like this comes along I’ve got a pool of savings to draw on to convert into something that I value. You could try doing that from now until then.

I hope that reading this was interesting, and that it helps you out with what to do! 

-Ry