Opera Colorado
TRG Database Services
Then and Now
As the 2005-2006 season was approaching, Opera Colorado stood at a momentous time in its 22-year history: the company was about to move into its new, state-of-the-art home, the Ellie Caulkins Opera House. The Opera’s administration realized that this event provided a unique opportunity to maximize marketing and development revenues.
Opera Colorado retained Target Resource Group’s (TRG) Database Services division in January 2005 to help the organization realize additional earned and contributed income while developing a system of re-seating patrons in the new venue. TRG’s program, based on a win-win collaboration between the marketing and development departments, resulted in a near sell-out of the house on subscription and a massive increase in annual fund donations—before the season had begun—a total of $761,800 in incremental ticket and contributed income.
Objectives/TRG Counsel
Integrate patron activity systems according to buying and donating behavior.
TRG consultants worked with the staff on integrating Opera Colorado’s ticketing and fundraising systems to yield a profile of each patron’s overall relationship with the Opera, based on
- Monetary value of purchases and donations, by season;
- Frequency of purchases or donations (consecutive activities were weighted more heavily than intermittent or infrequent activities);
- Recency of purchases or donations (recent activity was weighted more heavily than older activity).
Develop a Patron Loyalty Index
With patrons now housed in one easy-to-sort file, TRG provided counsel on a scoring system that ranked patrons according to their “loyalty.” All weighted variables were scored to yield a patron loyalty index. Using this score the Opera built strategies around specific patron groupings, rewarding the loyalty of patrons while allowing the organization to maximize revenues and address the challenge of equitably re-seating patrons.
Provide direction on integrated messaging
The loyalty score made it possible to target patrons with personalized communications. TRG advised the marketing and development departments to collaborate on messaging strategies:
- Donors received a priority notice regarding required annual fund levels for priority seating;
- Renewal notices sent to subscribers incorporated a personalized message stating the required annual fund gift to qualify for priority seating.
The Numbers
For the historic 2005-2006 season Opera Colorado’s annual fund realized nearly $282,000 in add-on gifts, while the subscription campaign in the same season yielded $480,000 more than budgeted, or nearly 5,000 subscription seats—a virtual sell-out. The unprecedented total of incremental revenues was $762,000—a record-breaking amount for the clients.
Next
TRG’s Database Services division continues its consultancy with Opera Colorado.
Learn more
For additional information, or to speak to a member of the TRG team, please call (719) 314-5830.
