Ticketmaster Wants a Slice of the Daily Deal Pie – Launches tmDeals

Ticketmaster enters the realm of daily dealing with the launch of tmDeals.

Ticketmaster UK, a Live Nation Entertainment Incorporated company (New York Stock Exchange ticker symbol: LYV), announced the launch of its new site tmDeals. TmDeals will offer consumers personalized deals via email for theater, music, sports, comedy and family events, based on their location and preferences.

Chris Edmonds (managing director – Ticketmaster UK), was thrilled with the launch and in his press statement had this to say: “We are extremely excited about launching tmDeals into the UK marketplace. Given our leading position in the live entertainment industry, we are in the ideal position to be able to offer consumers great deals on tickets to a wide range of events.Given the strength of our digital infrastructure and consumer database resources, we can tailor our service to match each and every fan’s needs, setting us apart from the competition.”

Fully focused on entertainment, tmDeals will reach consumers interested in value-priced tickets and make sure they get emails about the events in the location they are interested in. The key to the success of tmDeals is the ability to focus on entertainment tickets and ensure the information delivered to consumers is relevant. Consumers will also be able get the latest deals from tmDeals with full integration in to the key social networks via dedicated Facebook and Twitter accounts helping them keep up to do date with the latest deals and discount tickets.

For those fortunate enough to live or be in the UK, feel free to check out some of these hot deals:

• Buy one get one free for We Will Rock You in London’s West End
• £20 tickets for Question of Sport for dates in Birmingham, Cardiff, Manchester and London
• Buy one get one free on tickets to T4 Stars in London
• 30% off tickets for Alan Carr’s latest tour for shows in Newcastle
• Buy one get one free on tickets for the Moscow State Circus for dates in London

Contests? You bet. There will also be fantastic opportunities to win tickets to see awesome venues such as the Red Hot Chili Peppers live and Cirque du Soleil.

Live Nation Entertainment seems to be hopping aboard the daily deal highway, like others, in the hopes of turning financials around. Publicly traded on the NYSE, the shares peaked in 2007 in the mid $20’s. Over the next two years, the share price plummeted, losing 90% of its value, literally teetering on the edge of bankruptcy.

Since then, the balance sheet has been cleaned up dramatically. Latest numbers show that Live Nation has returned to cash flow positive, although baseline earnings per share are still negative. The company employs about 6500 workers of which my sources show the top five take home over $32 million annually. In my opinion, that’s a LOT of bacon to be taking off the table for a company with earnings still in the red.

It’s interesting to note that insider buying of shares has accelerated in the past six months with a 2:1 buyer to seller ratio. Unfortunately for those buyers, the stock has lost 20% of its value during that same time frame. Currently sporting a lofty $1.8 billion market cap, LYV is having an outstanding day (as is the overall market) trading up about 6% at the $9.52 level as of this writing. Moving forward, it will be important for Live Nation to capture as much daily deal revenue as possible. Cash flow positive is certainly a successful step, however, shareholders will need to see some positive earnings to further justify the huge corporate paydays.

Stay tuned with us at Daily Deal Media as we follow this story down the daily deal highway.

About Ticketmaster:

With operations spanning 19 countries, Ticketmaster is the world leader in event ticketing and ranks among the top five eCommerce sites globally. Ticketmaster is a division of Live Nation Entertainment. Live Nation Entertainment is the world’s leading live entertainment and eCommerce company, comprised of four market leaders: Ticketmaster, Live Nation Concerts, Front Line Management Group and Live Nation Network. Ticketmaster has over 26 million monthly unique visitors. Live Nation Concerts produces over 20,000 shows annually for more than 2,000 artists globally. Front Line is the world’s top artist management company, representing over 250 artists. These businesses power Live Nation Network, the leading provider of entertainment marketing solutions, enabling over 800 advertisers to tap into the 200 million consumers Live Nation delivers annually through its live event and digital platforms.

Source: www.livenation.com , new media age