See the Future with Facebook

The future of technology that is. More specifically--purchasing event tickets with your Facebook account. Ticketing platform SeatGeek has signed Facebook up as a distribution partner, allowing sports fans and concert-goers to buy tickets directly through the world’s biggest social network. The company's goal with this partnership is to increase discovery of live events by using the power of the open web; putting tickets where fans are already spending time online.

For Facebook, this partnership serves as yet another conduit to increase its stickiness and ensure people stay on the site. It’s similar to tie-ups Facebook previously announced with Eventbrite and Ticketmaster. And for SeatGeek, known as an aggregator and secondary ticketing marketplace for resellers, it’s a major step forward in terms of encouraging other companies to adopt its primary ticketing API, as Facebook has one of the biggest reaches of any platform on earth.

How is this partnership going to play out exactly? Here are some examples. A ride-sharing company may want to sell tickets to events it regularly drives to or a record label may wish to sell to fans through its website. And a sports team may want to leverage SeatGeek to sell its own tickets through Facebook.

The first company to tap this new tie-up between SeatGeek and Facebook is Sporting Kansas City, a soccer team with an average attendance of around 20,000.  SeatGeek was already an official primary ticketing partner of Major League Soccer (MLS), and by extension Sporting Kansas City, which effectively allows a club’s tickets to be sold on any website or application of a team’s choosing, providing the website or app in question is under the organizer’s direct control or in a partnership with SeatGeek. And that is basically what today’s announcement with Facebook is all about — it will allow any company that runs events to sell tickets through SeatGeek on Facebook.

Through this open API approach, the open ticketing ecosystem will create opportunities to increase distribution, empower teams and artists to sell on the platforms of their choice, and eliminate fraud through a process of barcode verification. Basically, SeatGeek Open powers a modern box office that is mobile, flexible, and widely accessible - perfectly built for teams and artists looking to reach more fans and create richer experiences. Next time you're perusing an event to attend, keep your eyes peeled for these tickets at your fingertips and devour the details of the future with Facebook!