Segerstrom Center for the Arts
Inspiring patrons through an innovative digital experience
Looking for a visual and technological refresh, the Segerstrom Center for the Arts (SCFTA) tasked iMedia with the challenge to re-imagine SCFTAs digital experience.
Through theatrical productions, music, educational programs, dance instruction, community and children’s entertainment, the SCFTA delights audiences across the country and needed a world class digital experience to better represent the brand and reduce the friction its old experience presented in the ticket buying process.
SeatMe™ - The First 3D Select-Your-Own Seat (SYOS) Application for Tessitura
The SeatMe™ seat selection process provides 3 distinct benefits for performing arts organizations: immersive patron experience, less empty seats, and higher order value. Ticket buyers virtually enter the venue, see the stage from any seat, and look around to see the aisles, stairs, and exits. Buyers can consider potential purchase barriers, such as restricted leg room or an obstructed view, and choose the seat that’s right for them.
The Challenge
The scope was to redesign the entire site, from information architecture to content audit to design and technology rebuild from scratch in order to present patrons a seamless, easy to digest experience. SCFTA wanted to remove any barriers in the ticket buying process which existed on the old site. They wanted to allow patrons to be able to consume more content per session, find tickets to events easier, and increase the volume of and efficiency of the ticket buying process. Additionally, SCFTA wanted to deliver the application in a scalable fashion so it would perform during heavy traffic.
What We Did
Engaging Design
Key to the success of the new design experience was the optimization of the user journey while incorporating the new SCFTA brand identity and ensuring brand storytelling and usability remained paramount throughout the digital experience.
Select Your Own Seat
Our 3D virtual seating product, SeatMe, was integrated to present patrons with an immersive seating experience where they could look around the entire theater from each seat or section as they consider a purchase.
Web Development
Developed on Kentico, the new SCFTA site utilizes many of the great features of Kentico V13 such as, a custom widget-based system, custom page types, the ability to create content workflows and the WYSIWYG interface.
Custom Integrations
Beyond integrating SeatMe into the SCFTA website, we integrated with Tessitura for their best-in-class ticketing system. It is responsible for user authentication, seat allocation, ticketing features, cart functionality, checkout, and CRM/ERP. We built a robust faceted calendar feature for event searching and allowed for custom Choose Your Own subscriptions for patrons who wanted to curate their experience.
The Results
The new Segerstrom Center for the Arts’ website has been very well received. With SeatMe, obstructed view seats and other tickets that were previously a harder sell are becoming more frequently purchased because patrons are now able to get a full 3D view of what their seat would truly look like before purchasing. Reviewing a six week period, year-over-year between 2022 to 2023, we have seen: