Vivian Feature Focus: Forecasting
Today, we want to highlight a new feature in Vivian that we are super excited to see come to life in our clients’ environments—Forecasting!
For those of you who were familiar with the Forecasting Module the RMA, you remember the time investment required to assemble your comparators and create a forecast for an upcoming production. It was a bit of a tedious process! Well, no more with Vivian. In Vivian, you can forecast ticket sales and revenue for both single tickets and subscriptions for a full production season with just a few clicks.
Here is the step-by-step process—with some pro tips—for setting up forecasts in Vivian using the “Comparator Forecast” setting (the “AI Forecast” setting will be coming soon in Vivian Advanced! For now, we’ll focus on Manual forecasts).
1. Pick the production season you want to forecast.
Go to “Season Setup,” click on “Filters” in the upper right-hand corner of the screen. In the slider that pops out, click on “Add Filter,” select “Production Season,” select the production season you want to forecast, click on “apply filters.”
2. Select your Comparators.
Back on the main “Season Setup” screen you’ll now see the production season you selected (in bold) and all its performances. Now it’s time to select the comparators whose sales data you want to use to create a forecast for your production season.
Click on the bolded line for the production season. This will bring you to a Comparators screen. To find comparators and add them to the “Comparator Finder,” click on “filters” and then click on “Add filter” to add the comparators you want to consider. You may add individual production seasons or full seasons. Next, select the seasons or production seasons you want to review, and click “Apply filters.”
Your potential comparators will then show up like this:
You can use this comparator finder to find shows that performed similarly to how you expect your performance, in this case La Traviata, to perform. You might look for shows that are in the same facility, have a similar number of performances, and have a similar average yield. In the case above I might throw out Sweeney Todd because the Average Price was too low and may sway my forecast, and I’ll also throw out Lydia because it was in a different theatre with a longer run.
You can add comparators to the “Selected Comparators” below (or the comparators you want to use for your forecast) by clicking on the cross to the left of each production season. Once you’re set with your comparators, click “Save.” Vivian will automatically match each of the performances in your comparators to the performances you are forecasting for by Day of Week and Performance Type:
3. Set your Goals.
Now it’s time to set the goals for your ticket sales and revenue for the production season. Remember, your goals are different from your forecast. Your goals are the target numbers that you are aiming to reach with your marketing strategy to meet institutional expectations. Your forecast is where your ticket sales and revenue are likely to end up based on similar historical performances (or, comparators, as we’ve referenced here). Your forecast should, ultimately, inform your goal.
To set your goals, click on the “Goals” button at the top of the page (we’re still in the “Season Setup” screen.) You’ll see existing revenue and seat goals for sub and single tickets. If you use the “budget” line in Tessitura to enter your performance goals, that number will be reflected in the “revenue” numbers. To adjust the goals, click on the bolded production season line. You can then select one of three options in the radio dials:
- Proportionally matching the forecast: If you select this, your goals will match the forecast set with your comparators. So, if a Friday night performance is forecast to sell more tickets than a Wednesday matinee, the Friday night performance will receive a proportionally larger share of the budget than the Wednesday matinee.
- Proportionally matching the current goals: With this selection, Vivian will update any existing goals for each performance so the relationship between each performance’s goals remains the same.
- Equally across events: This selection will give each performance the same goal.
Once you’ve selected the option you prefer, enter the total revenue and seat goals for both subs and single tickets and click “Save Goals.”
4. Review your forecasted sales curve.
Now that you have set your comparators and your goals, let’s go to the “Forecasts” icon in the left-hand navigation. You’ll see, on the right side of the table, your set goals and your forecast—for both the production season in bold and each individual performance (if you don’t see the Production Season in question, you may need to update your filters!). On the left side of the table you’ll see the “End of Week” target— which shows you, using the shape of your forecast as a guide, where you should be at the end of the week to reach your goal—and your actual sales. The arrows indicate if you are trending above or below your goals.
To see your forecasted sales curve for the Production Season, click anywhere on the bolded line at the top. A slider will pop out which will show you a sales curve that includes your actual sales, your forecasted sales, and the sales curve for your goal.
You’ll notice here that you are able to adjust your forecast strength as well. If you want the forecast to be more aggressive, for example, you can increase it by 5% or 10%. If you want to be less aggressive, you can decrease it by 5% or 10%.
At this point you are done creating your forecast! Congratulations! It’s that easy with Vivian, giving you more time to engage with show attendees.
Now let’s see how you can use that forecast in Vivian.
5. Use your forecast in the Monitoring Dashboard.
On your Monitoring Dashboard for the Production Season you just forecasted, you can include a widget to show where your sales are for each performance relative to its forecast and goal.
You can find the Monitoring Dashboard under Report Templates on the left-hand navigation, under “Daily Tracking Reports.” When you create your Monitoring Dashboard, you can go to “View” at the top of the screen and select the “Measures” drop-down to select the measures that use the forecasting data. Those measures are selected in the image below (there are also the same measures for Subscriptions if you scroll down further):
We selected the measures that relate to forecasting and goals for single tickets to add to our Monitoring Dashboard for La Traviata, which look like this:
Here is how to interpret these widgets (the widgets featured in the image above and in the details below above are for single tickets, though the related widgets for total revenue and subscription revenue operate the same way):
- Single Revenue Forecast: This is the single ticket revenue the forecast projects the show will bring in.
- Single Seats Forecast: This is the number of single tickets sold that the forecast projects the show will bring in.
- Single Revenue Trend vs. Goal: The arrow shows if your actual revenue is above or below your forecasted revenue trend.
- Single Revenue with Goal: The Blue bar is your actual revenue. The solid red line is your revenue target for this week to meet your goal. The dotted red line is your goal.
There are also “Seats” version of the last two widgets listed above which can be interpreted similarly, but refer to seats rather than revenue. Use these widgets in the dashboard for a quick view of how each performance is performing against its goal.
6. Use your forecast in Dynamic Pricing.
In the Dynamic Pricing module (which you’ll access on the left-hand navigation of your screen), you can also use your forecast for a quick reference as to how each production is performing as you’re making dynamic pricing decisions. Here’s how:
Once you’re in the Dynamic Pricing screen, select a production you have already created a forecast for under “Filter.” Once the screen populates, you can click on the r the individual performances and a slider will pop out on the right-hand of the screen that shows you the forecast for that production season or performance. You can use that as quick reference as you make dynamic pricing decisions!
That’s it! You now have a forecast you can use in several areas of Vivian to advance your revenue management strategy. If you have any questions about creating forecasts, let us know! Contact us at viviansupport@jcainc.com.
In Vivian Advanced, creating forecasts will be even easier. Scheduled to go live soon, Vivian Advanced has an “Auto” forecast option which will use machine learning to create a forecast for your shows in Tessitura automatically—no manual entry on comparators required! We’ll share another Feature Focus article on Auto Forecasts as soon as Vivian Advanced is released.