A ticket sales report shows, for one event at one cut-off time, how many tickets of each type
are sold, what they brought in after discounts and refunds, the average price paid, and how
that compares with the plan for the same week. It fits on one page, with one column per ticket
type, and it goes out on the same day every week. The template below adds two readings: the
revenue gap split into volume and price, and the weekly run rate you still need.

[Download the ticket sales report template (CSV)](https://eventiq.io/templates/ticket-sales-report.csv). No email required.

## What goes in a ticket sales report?

Eight blocks, in a fixed order. The CSV holds 25 lines in these blocks, with one column per
ticket type and one for the total.
| Block | Lines | Rule that keeps it honest |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Header | Event and edition, cut-off date and time, weeks to event, source report, currency, fee and tax basis | One cut-off for every line on the page |
| Ticket type | Name and list price | Use the types as they are set up in the registration platform, and do not regroup them mid-cycle |
| Tickets | Issued, cancelled, net to date, net this week | Count tickets, never orders |
| Money | Gross sales, discounts, refunds, net sales, average net price | Net sales is the headline. Fees and taxes stay out, and the header says so |
| Plan | Final plan, share of final plan, plan to date, pace index | Plan to date comes from your own prior cycles |
| Variance | Net sales against plan to date, volume effect, price effect | The two effects add up to the variance, to the dollar |
| Run rate | Required weekly run rate, trailing three-week average | Read both against the same weeks last cycle |
| Not sold | Complimentary badges, capacity sell-through | Comps sit below the paid total and never inside it |
Four definitions carry the page. Write them in the header before the first report goes out.

**Ticket.** One seat. An order can hold several seats, so an order count understates sales by
an amount that changes every week.

**Net tickets.** Tickets issued minus tickets cancelled, as of the cut-off. A transfer between
people does not change the count. An upgrade moves a ticket from one type to another.

**Gross and net sales.** Gross sales is list price times tickets issued. Net sales takes out
discounts, meaning promo codes and negotiated reductions, and refunds. Processing fees and
sales tax stay out of every line.

**Cut-off.** The moment the export was taken. Sunday 23:59 in the event's time zone works well,
because Monday's meeting then reads a full week.

## Which formulas does the report use?

**Net tickets = Tickets issued − Tickets cancelled**

**Gross sales = List price × Tickets issued**

**Net sales = Gross sales − Discounts − Refunds**

**Average net price = Net sales ÷ Net tickets**

**Share of final plan = Net tickets ÷ Final plan tickets**

**Pace index = Net tickets to date ÷ Plan tickets to date**

**Sell-through = (Net tickets + Complimentary badges) ÷ Capacity**

Share of final plan and pace index answer different questions. Seventy percent of the final
plan six weeks out can be ahead or behind, depending on how much of the room normally arrives
in those six weeks. The pace index compares today's count with what the plan expected by today.

Plan to date needs your own arrival shares: the fraction of final sales each prior edition held
at the same number of weeks out. Do not borrow a published curve. The Maritz Registration
Insights Report analyzed more than 360,000 registration records across 30 trade shows and found
that in 2023, 45% of registrants signed up in the final 4 weeks before the event
([PCMA Convene](https://www.pcma.org/rethinking-early-bird-pricing-other-event-registration-strategies/)).
Those are registration records from trade shows, not a survey and not conferences, so the
figure shows that late sales can be large and says nothing about your own curve. The method
for building the shares is on
[conference registration forecasting](https://eventiq.io/md/blog/conference-registration-forecasting).

## How do you separate a volume problem from a price problem?

A revenue gap has two possible sources: fewer tickets than planned, or a lower price per ticket
than planned. The responses are different, so the report should split the gap before anyone
discusses it.

**Net sales variance = Net sales to date − Planned net sales to date**

**Volume effect = (Net tickets to date − Plan tickets to date) × Planned average price**

**Price effect = (Average net price − Planned average price) × Net tickets to date**

**Net sales variance = Volume effect + Price effect**

A negative volume effect is a demand or reach question. A negative price effect points at mix
or at discounting: more of the room on the cheaper types than planned, a code used more widely
than intended, or a tier that stayed open too long. If a pricing tier is behind the price
effect, the break-even arithmetic for that tier is on the
[early bird registration](https://eventiq.io/md/blog/early-bird-pricing) page.

Use the planned average price for the same point in the cycle. Early tiers sell first, so an
early average set against the full-cycle plan shows a price shortfall that is only the
calendar.

## Can the remaining weeks close the gap?

Turn the gap into a weekly number and compare it with what you are selling now.

**Required weekly run rate = (Final plan tickets − Net tickets to date) ÷ Weeks remaining**

**Trailing average = Net tickets sold in the last 3 weeks ÷ 3**
| Status | Condition | What the report says |
| --- | --- | --- |
| On course | Required weekly run rate at or below the trailing three-week average | Nothing to decide. Send the page |
| Watch | Required rate above the trailing average, and at or below what the same remaining weeks averaged last cycle | The late weeks have to deliver as they did last time. Say so in one line, with the projected finish at the current rate |
| Flag | Required rate above both | The projected shortfall in tickets and in net sales, and a diagnostic before anyone proposes spend or a discount |
With no prior cycle, use the trailing average alone and mark the status provisional. When the
rule flags, the next step is a diagnosis in cost order, starting with whether the tracking
broke. That sequence is on the [low ticket sales](https://eventiq.io/md/blog/low-ticket-sales) page.

## Example: a 1,000-ticket conference six weeks out

Take a two-day conference six weeks out, with a final plan of 1,000 paid tickets and a capacity
of 1,200. All figures are hypothetical. The cut-off is Sunday 23:59, and fees and taxes are
excluded.
| Ticket type | List price | Issued | Cancelled | Net tickets | Net this week | Final plan | Share of final plan |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Early bird (closed) | $695 | 262 | 8 | 254 | 0 | 250 | 101.6% |
| Standard | $895 | 214 | 4 | 210 | 24 | 400 | 52.5% |
| Member | $595 | 148 | 2 | 146 | 12 | 220 | 66.4% |
| Group, 5 or more | $745 | 60 | 0 | 60 | 5 | 90 | 66.7% |
| Student | $295 | 31 | 1 | 30 | 3 | 40 | 75.0% |
| Total paid |  | 715 | 15 | 700 | 44 | 1,000 | 70.0% || Ticket type | Gross sales | Discounts | Refunds | Net sales | Average net price |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Early bird (closed) | $182,090 | $0 | $5,560 | $176,530 | $695.00 |
| Standard | $191,530 | $3,600 | $3,580 | $184,350 | $877.86 |
| Member | $88,060 | $0 | $1,190 | $86,870 | $595.00 |
| Group, 5 or more | $44,700 | $0 | $0 | $44,700 | $745.00 |
| Student | $9,145 | $0 | $295 | $8,850 | $295.00 |
| Total paid | $515,525 | $3,600 | $10,625 | $501,300 | $716.14 |
The Standard discount is a $100 partner code used on 36 tickets. Below the paid total sit 85
complimentary badges, which makes 785 badges against a capacity of 1,200 and a sell-through of
65.4%.

**Pace.** The plan expected 740 tickets by this week at a planned average price of $710, which
is $525,400 of planned net sales to date. The pace index is 700 ÷ 740 = 0.95.

**Variance.** Net sales variance is $501,300 − $525,400 = −$24,100. The volume effect is
(700 − 740) × $710 = −$28,400. The price effect is $501,300 − (700 × $710) = +$4,300, which is
the $6.14 difference in average price across 700 tickets. The two effects sum to −$24,100.

**Run rate.** The event needs (1,000 − 700) ÷ 6 = 50 net tickets a week. The last three weeks
sold 38, 41, and 44, an average of 41. Suppose the final six weeks of the last cycle averaged
46. The required rate is above both, so the status is Flag.

At 46 a week the event finishes at 700 + 276 = 976, which is 24 tickets short and about
$17,200 of net sales at the current average price. At 41 a week it finishes at 946, which is 54
short and about $38,700.

The gap is volume, and it sits in Standard, which is at 52.5% of its plan and needs 190 more
tickets, about 32 a week against 24 this week. Price is ahead of plan, so a discount would
lower the half of the equation that is working.

## What mistakes make a ticket sales report wrong?

**Two cut-offs on one page.** Tickets pulled on Monday and money pulled on Wednesday produce an
average price that describes neither day. Pull every line in one export.

**Comps counted as sold.** Add the 85 complimentary badges to the example and the average net
price falls from $716 to $639 without a single price changing. Keep comps on their own line.

**Final plan used as the yardstick.** "70% of plan" reads as bad news or good news depending on
the reader. Report plan to date and the pace index beside it.

**Cumulative totals only.** A cumulative line always goes up. The weekly column is where a
slowdown shows first, so both belong on the page.

## Who gets the report, and how often?

Weekly, on a fixed cut-off, to the event lead, the marketing lead, and whoever owns the revenue
line in finance. All three should read the same page. If you add a midweek count in the final
four weeks, keep the weekly cut-off as the figure of record, so that week-over-week comparisons
stay like for like.

The final plan and the planned average price come from the registration lines of your
[event budget](https://eventiq.io/md/blog/event-budget-template). When the budget is reforecast, restate the plan
columns on the report and note the date, or the variance will be measured against a plan nobody
holds any more. Where this page sits among an event's other reports is covered on
[event reporting](https://eventiq.io/md/event-reporting).

## What to do this quarter

- Write the four definitions and the fee and tax basis into the report header, and get finance
  to sign off on them.
- Compute arrival shares from your last two or three cycles, and build plan to date in tickets
  and in average price for each week.
- Fill the template for the current event from one export, one column per ticket type.
- Put the volume and price split and the run-rate status first in the weekly meeting.
- Agree on the Watch and Flag conditions before sales open, and name who runs the diagnostic.

## Common questions

### Should the report show gross sales or net sales?

Both, with net sales as the headline. Gross shows what list prices would have delivered, and
the lines between gross and net show what discounts and refunds took out: $14,225 in the
example. State in the header that processing fees and taxes are excluded, because the first
question from finance will be about the basis.

### Is a ticket sales report the same as recognized revenue?

No. It is a count of bookings at a cut-off, taken from the registration platform. Recognized
revenue comes from the ledger, after refunds, timing rules, and the reconciliation finance
runs. Give the board the ledger figure and use this report to manage the weeks before the
event.

### How do we set plan to date with only one prior cycle?

Use that cycle's weekly shares, label the plan provisional, and expect the pace index to be
noisy. Record this cycle's weekly net tickets as you go. After the event you have two curves
and a range between them.

## Where EventIQ fits

EventIQ replaces nothing. It connects on top of the platforms you already run: event platforms
(Cvent, Zoom, Swapcard), CRM (Salesforce, HubSpot, GoHighLevel), and marketing (Google Ads, Meta
Ads, LinkedIn Ads, Mailchimp, Google Analytics). Platforms with an API outside that list are
connected on request.

Registrations from Cvent carry their date, ticket type, and price where the platform provides
them, so the ticket type mix, the average price per type, and registrations by week are figures
you can read on the event. The attendance forecast fits a registration curve to the event's own
sign-up pace, once there are about two weeks of registration data, and it is shown as a range.
A check on registration pace flags a slowdown. It runs when you ask for it.

The price EventIQ stores is the ticket price the source provides. Discounts, refunds,
processing fees, and taxes are not part of what it holds, so the net sales lines on this report
come from your registration platform's own finance export. The plan columns are yours as well:
the revenue target on an event is a figure your team enters. EventIQ does not send reports on a
schedule and makes no recommendations, so the weekly cut-off, the run-rate rule, and the
decision stay with your team.

[Book a demo](https://eventiq.io/#early-access) to see registrations by ticket type, price, and week on a sample
event, in a 20-minute demo.

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HTML version: https://eventiq.io/templates/ticket-sales-report