Beyond tickets: unlocking a new revenue stream by building a Commerce offering

Beyond tickets: unlocking a
new revenue stream by building a Commerce offering

Founded in London in 2014, DICE has reimagined how fans discover and purchase tickets to live events. Its user-friendly app locks tickets to smartphones, ensuring they remain with real fans, not resellers, while promoting transparent pricing. When a fan activates their ticket for an event, a QR code is generated, granting access to the event.

Although the app is renowned for its simple, frictionless purchase flow—select a ticket type, choose the quantity,
and checkout—selling non-ticket products was previously impossible due to technical limitations. As part of DICE's
long-term strategy to diversify its revenue streams and offer more value to partners, we aimed, as a starting point, to enable a range of experiential extras, such as VIP upgrades, queue jumps, and artist meet & greets.

I led the design effort on the B2C/native app side to launch
the first iteration of this new commerce feature.

Founded in London in 2014, DICE has reimagined how fans discover and purchase tickets to live events. Its user-friendly app locks tickets to smartphones, ensuring they remain with real fans, not resellers, while promoting transparent pricing. When a fan activates their ticket for an event, a QR code is generated, granting access to the event.

Although the app is renowned for its simple, frictionless purchase flow—select a ticket type, choose the quantity,
and checkout—selling non-ticket products was previously impossible due to technical limitations. As part of DICE's
long-term strategy to diversify its revenue streams and offer more value to partners, we aimed, as a starting point, to enable a range of experiential extras, such as VIP upgrades, queue jumps, and artist meet & greets.

I led the design effort on the B2C/native app side to launch
the first iteration of this new commerce feature.

Timeline

March 2023 – Jan. 2024

Role

Senior Product Designer (B2C)

My contribution

Discovery

Ideation

Prototyping

Visual Design

User testing

Team

1 x Product Manager

2 x Product Designers (B2C/myself + B2B)

1 x User researcher

1 x UX Writer

3 x Frontend Engineers

2 x Backend Engineers

2 x QA Testers

An opportunity aligning with the company’s mission to ‘Get people out more’

A ticketing ecosystem typically includes the ticketing company (like DICE), event organizers or partners, venues, artists, and fans. Post-pandemic competition highlighted two critical issues for DICE:

  1. Partner requests and lost contracts indicated that offering additional products could enhance both partner revenue and the value DICE provides;

  2. Pressure from investors to reach profitability and reduce reliance on funding made it crucial to explore new revenue streams.

This led to the hypothesis that offering non-ticket products could enhance partner revenue and event volume, increase fan satisfaction, while helping DICE diversify its revenue streams.

Entering uncharted territory
—what do we focus on?

Entering uncharted territory—what do
we focus on?

As a greenfield initiative, we initially faced more questions than answers, especially in defining 'additional products',  which could encompass a wide array of offerings.  During the discovery phase, I collaborated with the second Product Designer on the team, Belen Poyo, who focused on Extras for DICE’s B2B platform.

More questions than answers

Starting with a blank slate, we encountered more questions than answers, particularly around defining ‘additional products,’ which could span a wide range of offerings.

Competitor landscape is uninspiring

We found other apps’ extras purchasing experiences to be generic and underwhelming. This highlighted the opportunity to create a distinctive, engaging version that could differentiate us.

Navigating choices

To manage the variety of possible extras, we mapped and ranked them with input from the PM, Client Success and Engineering teams. ‘Experiential’ extras like VIP passes and meet & greets were promising due to:

  • Simpler design and build;

  • No need for physical fulfillment;

  • Enhanced fan experience.

Insights from three perspectives

Our research highlighted key insights from different perspectives that influenced the direction:

  • A partner survey confirmed interest in selling experiential and merch items alongside tickets; 

  • Fan interviews revealed experiential extras to be perceived as off-brand for UK fans but very appealing to fans in the US; 

  • Business data indicated the need to prioritize the US market and increase event offerings there.

Refining the focus: two crucial technical constraints

Refining the focus:
two crucial technical constraints

My early attempts to explore integrating ticket and extras purchases in a single flow were blocked by backend limitations. Furthermore, issuing separate QR codes for extras and tickets proved unfeasible with our third-party scanning solution.

Given our findings, we determined that our focus would be on:

  • Selling ‘experiential’/ digital extras only, through select US partners;

  • Available to fans with the DICE app who have already purchased tickets;

  • Tying extras to tickets and claiming them upon entry to eliminate the need for a separate QR code.

A visual and interactive exploration journey

Since purchased tickets and extras needed to be somehow linked together, two sections within the app's information architecture emerged as ideal candidates for integrating the extras purchase flow:

  • The Ticket List screen, where users view their purchased tickets;

  • The Ticket View screen, which generates the QR code for ticket activation.

I began exploring ways to integrate a new element within the ‘ticket stub’ to highlight the availability of extras.

A touch of branding wizardry before the full release

I collaborated with DICE’s in-house Creative team and briefed the external agency Animade to reimagine DICE’s logo, ‘The Fan’, in multiple new directions. This led to bespoke animations that enhanced specific extras, while strengthening the company’s branding.

Retrospective

As of January 2024, the solution successfully launched a
flagship product in a new business vertical, enabling DICE to unlock additional revenue streams, reach new user groups,
and strengthen total fan LTV (Lifetime-Value). Specifically,
during the alpha and beta phases, we observed:

  • At alpha launch, a 10% conversion rate from viewing to purchasing an extra (a result attributed to the limited range
    of extras available at launch).

  • At beta launch, a 30% uplift in total event revenue for venue partners when extras were purchased.

These early results position DICE for continued growth, with
plans to expand the offering and refine the user experience in future iterations.

As of January 2024, the solution successfully launched a flagship product in a new business vertical, enabling DICE to unlock additional revenue streams, reach new user groups, and strengthen total fan LTV (Lifetime-Value). Specifically,
during the alpha and beta phases, we observed:

  • At alpha launch, a 10% conversion rate from viewing to purchasing an extra (a result attributed to the limited range
    of extras available at launch).

  • At beta launch, a 30% uplift in total event revenue for venue partners when extras were purchased.

These early results position DICE for continued growth, with
plans to expand the offering and refine the user experience in future iterations.

As of January 2024, the solution
successfully launched a flagship product in
a new business vertical, enabling DICE to unlock additional revenue streams, reach new user groups, and strengthen total fan LTV (Lifetime-Value). Specifically, during the
alpha and beta phases, we observed:

  • At alpha launch, a 10% conversion rate from viewing to purchasing an extra (a result attributed to the limited range
    of extras available at launch).

  • At beta launch, a 30% uplift in total event revenue for venue partners when extras were purchased.

These early results position DICE for continued growth, with plans to expand the offering and refine the user experience in future iterations.

Next steps

  • Testing the flow with a larger number of partners;

  • Exploring the integration of the extras purchase flow on the DICE website;

  • Continue expanding the offering by eventually including merch items as part of trial initiatives.

Learnings

Adaptability in design under pressure: The team faced enormous expectations to deliver the new commerce feature quickly.
The reality was that, at the beginning, no one had a clear
roadmap on what exactly needed to be done or how to achieve
it. This situation tested my ability to navigate uncertainty and overcome obstacles.

Adaptability in design under pressure:
The team faced enormous expectations
to deliver the new commerce feature
quickly. The reality was that, at the beginning, no one had a clear roadmap
on what exactly needed to be done or
how to achieve it. This situation tested
my ability to navigate uncertainty and
overcome obstacles.

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