5 sure-fire ways to boost your festival ticket sales

1. Create an Incentive with Early Bird Tickets

Everyone loves a bargain, and early bird tickets are a brilliant way to tap into that.

For the uninitiated, early bird tickets are a limited batch of discounted tickets released at the very start of your sales cycle. They’re one of the best ways to drive early momentum – arguably the most crucial phase of any campaign – while also supporting cash flow, easing planning pressures, and setting your festival up for success.

Worried about losing money by underpricing? Simply structure your pricing tiers so that later releases (like your Final Release tickets) balance out the discount.

The keyword here is incentive. Early bird tickets give your audience a reason to buy early, and they typically sell faster than any other ticket type. Strong early sales also generate momentum, spark FOMO, and help build a buzz that carries through your campaign.

Learn more about early bird ticketing and how to set up tiers in the Skiddle Promotion Centre.

2. Give Your Attendees Exclusive Access

In today’s world, people expect more for their money, and festivals are no exception. One way to add extra value? Introduce a VIP experience.

Think premium viewing areas, meet-and-greets, luxury camping, exclusive content, and perks like fast-track entry or private bars. These kinds of upgrades elevate the experience and help your event feel that bit more special.

There’s no denying the appetite for exclusivity. In 2025, festivals like Parklife, Lytham Festival, Hardwick Festival, and All Points East offered elaborate VIP and backstage upgrade packages, including fast-track access, high-end dining, private bars, and VIP lounges. These tickets sold out faster than ever, showing a clear willingness among festival-goers to pay more for a premium experience.

Offering a VIP tier is a great way to appeal to more discerning customers—and boost your bottom line.

If you’re considering this, take a look at our guide to ticket dependencies to get started.

3. Create Urgency with Limited-Time Offers

When promoting your festival, you want your audience to feel that missing out would be a disaster. Smart lineups and strong marketing help, but adding urgency through time-limited offers can supercharge your sales.

That’s where Discount Codes come in.

Available in the Skiddle Promotion Centre, Discount Codes let you offer a fixed amount or percentage off ticket prices. You can choose:

• Single-use codes (valid for one order only),

• Limited-use codes (with a capped number of uses per code),

• Unlimited codes (a code usable any number of times).
  

You can even run multiple code types at once during your campaign.

Discount Codes are a great way to build awareness and exposure. For example, you could run a user-generated content (UGC) competition on social media, where fans share photos or videos from previous events in exchange for an exclusive discount. This not only generates content, but it also floods your audience’s feeds with visuals from your festival, increasing reach and engagement.

Or why not try a flash sale? Drop a 24-hour discount and shout about it everywhere—emails, social posts, stories, SMS. Time-limited deals create urgency and can drive a healthy spike in sales.

Watch our video tutorial to learn how to set up Discount Codes.

4. Raise Value with Bundle Deals

So, we’ve covered discounts, flash sales, early birds, and other thoughtful strategies. But what else can tip the balance for someone still undecided?

Bundle deals.

A bundle adds extra value to a standard ticket, something additional, possibly at a discount, that makes the offer feel like a win.

They’re especially effective for engaging loyal fans. For example, include limited-run merchandise exclusive to the bundle to increase perceived value. Separate it from your main merch line to boost exclusivity.

And it doesn’t stop at merch. You can also bundle:

• Drink tokens

• Food offers

• Discounts with vendors

• Early access to certain stages
  

Whatever you choose, the goal is the same: add as much value as possible and sell more tickets.

5. Boost Future Sales with Post-Festival Content

Fast-forward to the end of summer. The stages are packed down and the fields are empty, but your work isn’t done.

Now’s the perfect time to keep the momentum going and start driving demand for your next edition.

A proven tactic here is Social Proof: a psychological principle that says people tend to follow the actions of others. In marketing, this means that when people see others enjoying or endorsing your event, they’re more likely to buy in too.

So, leverage your audience. Gather testimonials, create recap videos, and showcase the best moments from your festival. Ask fans to share what made the event memorable and why they’d recommend it to others. If you’ve got a high star rating on Skiddle or TripAdvisor, shout about it!

Social proof builds trust, eases buyer hesitation, and boosts your credibility. It’s one of the simplest, most effective tools for increasing conversions.

And there you have it! Five sure-fire ways to boost your festival ticket sales, both during your campaign and long after the gates of your festival close.

Enjoyed this article? There’s plenty more where that came from. Visit the Skiddle Promotion Centre Blog for more tips and insights, and follow us on Instagram and LinkedIn to stay in the loop with the latest industry trends.