How Entertainers Used Line-Up to Bring Ticketing In-House and Boost Sales and Marketing Performance

Overview

Entertainers produce more than 2,500 shows a year across 400+ venues, selling over a million tickets annually. By 2023, the company was facing a familiar challenge for producers: marketing budgets were rising, yet ad performance visibility was almost non-existent.

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With no reliable conversion tracking across 400 third-party venue websites and systems, Entertainers couldn’t optimise Ad spend, build a customer database, or understand what was actually driving sales.

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With this in mind, they launched entertainers.tickets - their own, in-house ticketing operation, powered by Line-Up.

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“You can build it, but they don’t just come. Not without data. Not without infrastructure. Not without strategy. We didn’t just build a website. We built a smarter way to sell.”

-  Niall Sanderson, Operations Director, Entertainers

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The Challenge

For years, Entertainers depended exclusively on hundreds of different venue websites to handle ticket sales. But this fragmented approach made it difficult to run effective digital campaigns.

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“We were spending a huge amount each year on ads, but without any server-side tracking or conversion visibility. There was no accountability. We couldn’t tell what was working.”

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With no first-party data and no unified view of sales, Entertainers struggled to:

• Optimise their Meta or Google Ads
• Measure return on ad spend (ROAS)
• Build a database for remarketing
• Control the customer journey or experience

The team were running traffic Ads, but flying blind. Campaigns couldn’t scale and repeat audiences were invisible. Every show felt like starting from scratch.

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The Turning Point

The decision to bring ticketing in-house had been on the table for years. But by 2024, it became essential.

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“It was getting harder and harder to run 21st-century digital campaigns with a 20th-century infrastructure. We needed visibility. We needed ownership.”

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The goal wasn’t just to sell tickets online. It was to build a direct-to-consumer ecosystem that gave Entertainers full visibility and accountability for marketing spend and a scalable infrastructure to grow into new genres and markets.

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Reaping the Benefits of an Ecosystem

With Line-Up at the core, Entertainers were free to design a tech stack that fit their team, their workflows, and their goals.‍

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“We wanted a platform that didn’t require extensive API development or rely on iframes. Line-Up gave us the tools to move fast - and the data layer to track things properly.”‍

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Line-Up’s open architecture made it easy to connect to an ecosystem of best-of-breed tools and partners for every stage of the customer journey:‍

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Line-Up | Ticketing platform

Scottie | Web development

crowdEngage | Customer communications

Activity Stream | CRM and reporting

One Further | Digital strategy and analytics measurement

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Results After 12 Months

The results speak for themselves, with increased sales, Ad performance and customer satisfaction across the board:

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📍 1,500+ shows ticketed

🏟️ 350+ venues onboarded

🌐 10 million+ site visits to entertainers.tickets

💬 32,000+ customer conversations handled via omnichannel support

🌟 4.8 CSAT and 4.7 Trustpilot rating‍

📈 Repeat purchase rates increasing across genres

📣 Meta campaigns now fully conversion-led with reliable ROAS

💡 Confident campaign planning and targeting based on first-party data

🎯 Faster and more efficient national pre-sales with end-to-end control

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The Impact

Smarter Marketing

By switching to a direct-to-consumer model, Entertainers gained complete visibility over what was driving sales. They now run conversion-led campaigns with clear ROAS, precise targeting, and better return on every pound spent.

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“We finally have the visibility to make good marketing decisions. It’s not just about spend - it’s about scale and efficiency.”

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Deeper Customer Relationships

Owning the data has helped build lasting relationships, because customers are no longer anonymous. They’re part of a growing database that can be segmented, retargeted, and nurtured over time.

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“We now understand who our customers are, what they like, and what makes them come back.”

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Repeat purchase rates are rising, even across different genres and locations - something that simply wasn’t possible when sales went through venue partners alone.

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Better Support, Better Experience

“We used to just direct people back to the venue for any ticketing queries. Now we’re in conversation with our customers every day.”

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With their own omnichannel support centre, Entertainers can now resolve issues instantly and offer refunds and exchanges without delay. Customer satisfaction scores speak for themselves:

• 4.8 average CSAT
• 4.7 Trustpilot rating
• Thousands of resolved queries via WhatsApp, chat, email and phone
  
  

More Confident Programming

Having control of their ticketing and marketing infrastructure has made Entertainers more confident and more creative.

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It’s allowed Niall and the team to take more risks - booking new venues, launching in new cities, and exploring new genres - they now know where their audiences are and have the ability to drive their own demand.

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The Impact on Venue Relationships

Despite bringing ticketing in-house, Entertainers has maintained strong relationships with venues they work with across the UK.

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“Of course, we’re not trying to replace venue box offices - the goal is to increase occupancy by selling more tickets, to the benefit of both ourselves and the venues.”

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With their own data, Entertainers can now share insights with venues on campaign performance, customer origin, and booking patterns - helping drive better allocation decisions and more collaborative planning to ultimately sell more tickets.

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Advice to Other Producers

“In-housing ticketing isn’t just flicking a switch. It’s a serious operational commitment. You don’t have the natural footfall of a venue, so you have to discover and build your own audience, your own storefront, and your own systems. For us, the opportunities are huge.”

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Niall’s advice to others is simple:

• Have a clear strategy
• Invest in the right tools and people
• Work with the right partners
• Think like a digital business, not just a show producer

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What’s Next for Entertainers?

Entertainers now continues to refine its digital marketing strategy and deliver first-class customer service across thousands of shows nationwide.

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But the success of entertainers.tickets has also opened the door to something brand-new. Running a large-scale ticketing operation in-house has given the team deep expertise in digital infrastructure, customer support, and operational excellence - expertise now being shared with others through the launch of amp. tickets.‍

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amp. tickets is a new full-service ticketing solution designed for event organisers, venues and promoters who want the control and insight of in-house ticketing without the overhead. Built on the same proven foundations as entertainers.tickets and powered by Line-Up, amp. tickets provides:

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• White-labelled service: Your brand, your tone, your customer experience.
• Expert team: People with live entertainment experience, working behind the scenes to keep everything running smoothly.
• World-class tech: Advanced, flexible ticketing powered by Line-Up’s API-driven platform.

From setup and allocations to customer contact centre, amp. tickets bridges the gap between big-ticket agents and doing it all yourself.

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As Entertainers look ahead, the focus is on continuing to innovate - combining smart technology, great people and seamless experiences to help the live entertainment industry sell better, serve better and grow faster.