Ticketing has historically been a difficult and unfair process for fans that simply want to experience their favorite artist live, from hidden fees to astonishing resale costs. But DICE, the independent ticketing and music discovery platform, has been on a mission since 2014 to get people out more by breaking down those barriers of going out.
Fans trust DICE for its upfront, all-in pricing (which was recognized nationally by President Biden last year), mobile tickets securely locked to smartphones, and fan-first features like the Waiting List to protect consumers from the secondary market. As such, DICE’s “Weirdly Easy” global campaign came from a simple product truth: DICE makes going out easy. So easy, that it’s weird how everyone else is making it painful.
The goal was to target fans — current and prospective DICE users in the UK, US and Canada — across multiple earned, paid, and owned touch points including social, press, and out-of-home, with unexpected, subversive content to bring attention to what can be seen as the least exciting part of going out: buying a ticket.
Plan of action: Puppets and ticketing went hand in hand when DICE’s Creative Studio — a new in-house content creation unit — brought together a diverse group of creatives from around the world to capture how DICE is the “Weirdly Easy” alternative for frustrated live event fans. The unlikely pairing would demonstrate how DICE is so easy to use, even a furry puppet of DICE’s brand mascot, The Fan, can land a ticket to an incredible “Furgazi” show.
Execution: Weirdly Easy launched in October 2023 as a social media-driven brand campaign starring The Fan in a series of films that depicted in relatable (if weird) scenarios the excitement of finding your next show, connecting your Spotify or Apple Music to the app, making plans with your friends directly on DICE, and getting tickets to a sold out show through the Waiting List, all with ease. DICE’s creative was intentionally blunt, lo-fi and unrefined, separating the brand from the corporate world of its competitors and removing the expected polish of an agency's output. The end result would look like something a fan could have made.
Key features: These four videos of the Fan using the DICE app in everyday life launched DICE’s YouTube channel. The view-through-rates strongly overperformed for both organic and paid, indicating that prospective DICE users were captivated by the mascot and wanted to watch the films to the end.
When it came to out-of-home creative, DICE worked with photographer Elizabeth Renstrom to shoot The Fan in its bedroom. These images were displayed in popular gig locations including Camden, Peckham and Clapham, integrating an additional media format to target DICE’s key London audiences.
DICE also incorporated physical elements — distributing limited edition products to entertainment, music, and lifestyle journalists and influencers. This included a Weirdly Easy two-piece jigsaw illustrated by Junwoo Park, a t-shirt created in collaboration with artist Leomi Sadler, and a set of temporary tattoos by San Francisco’s Mikey Poster.
In tandem, DICE partnered with venues to share the weird and wonderful things they’ve found left behind after gigs for a media story. UK venues Village Underground, EartH, and Troxy have found everything from a signed Justin Bieber keytar to cut-outs of Tony Soprano, a life-sized fiber-glass dolphin, 12 boiled eggs in a box, and more.
Through DICE’s integrated media approach, Weirdly Easy highlighted DICE’s industry-disrupting product to a diverse range of live music fans. It also marks DICE’s biggest marketing campaign, reaching an impressive 62.9 million impressions, garnering 8.98 million video views, eliciting 655,000 clicks, and generating 110,000 engagements. When it comes to platform performance, TikTok achieved 0.92% CTR (benchmark is 0.7-0.8%) and YouTube achieved 61.1% CTR (benchmark is 30-50%).
These staggering numbers reflect the widespread impact of DICE's efforts in revolutionizing the live industry and putting the fan experience at the forefront. By developing fan-first content where puppets showcase how weirdly easy it can be to purchase tickets to see your favorite artist live, DICE positions itself as a clear alternative in ticketing by tapping directly into alternative culture.
