Ticket Tailor launches first TV ad with Channel 4! We speak with Head of Marketing Olivia about her pitching experience
We recently won a Channel 4 competition, meaning you'll be seeing a Ticket Tailor ad on your screens during a prime time CH4 show this September!
Big big biiiig news! 🎉 Ticket Tailor has been selected as a winner in Channel 4’s recent competition giving away £600k worth of advertising air time to finalists. Out of 200 applicants, we made it through to the final five, meaning you’ll be seeing a Ticket Tailor ad hit your screens during a prime time show this September. Our ad will also be run during a four-to-six week campaign across 4OD 😎, meaning it could reach over 2 million viewers in total. We’re very excited, to say the least.
We’re also really proud to say that we were the only SaaS winner of the competition. (Saas = ‘Software as a Service’; in other words, we’re the only business of our kind to make it to the final five!)
The competition, which is in partnership with B Lab UK, was open specifically to B Corporations (or ‘B Corps’). That is, businesses that have been verified by B Lab UK to meet high standards of social and environmental performance, transparency, and accountability. The overarching mission of the competition is to “leverage the power of advertising to actively support positive consumer behaviour change”. Nice 🙌.
Ewan Douglas, Head of Sales & Business Development, at Channel 4 Sales, says:
“The quality of entries for our B Corp competition has been off the scale, and all the businesses who were shortlisted should be very proud of their final stage pitches.
“The winning pitches stood out for the judges having successfully showcased how TV will supercharge their marketing plans - amplified in the storytelling of their products, the creative execution of the ad itself, and the positive role of their business in their own communities and wider world. We're thrilled to support business as a force for good, and open up TV advertising to companies of all sizes.”
Now, we pick the brains of Olivia Parker, who joined Ticket Tailor as Head of Marketing in 2022, and who worked really hard to prove to Channel 4 and B Lab UK why Ticket Tailor deserves airtime on your teles this September. Let’s go 🎤.
Exciting times, Olivia! How did you first hear about Channel 4’s B Corp competition?
It really is! I first heard about the competition in B Lab UK’s newsletter back in March. As soon as I read about it, I knew it was an opportunity that was too good to miss. Within five minutes of receiving the email, it had also been forwarded to me by Donald, our Head of Sales, Jonny, our Founder, and George, Our Managing Director. So it was instantly clear that we were all aligned and knew this was something we had to apply for!
The opportunity to have a national TV ad on Channel 4, with a focus on amplifying purpose-driven businesses, felt like such a natural fit for Ticket Tailor.
Definitely! Tell us a bit more about what excited you so much about the competition…
This is the first time Channel 4 and B Corp have ever run a competition like this, which in itself is very exciting! We see it as an opportunity to build brand awareness at scale, and to amplify our message, which is that there is a more affordable, ethical, and climate-conscious alternative to mainstream ticketing platforms – Ticket Tailor!
As a certified B Corp, we’re always looking for meaningful ways to spread our message – that ticketing doesn’t have to come at a cost to people or the planet.
This competition wasn’t just about free media space; it was about aligning with a broadcaster that shares our values and is using their platform for good. That’s exactly what Channel 4 is doing here.
Plus, there’s just something quite magical about bringing your brand to life on TV – who wouldn’t want that?
100%! 🙌 Can you tell us about your experience pitching at Channel 4’s offices?
It was an amazing – and quite intense – experience! On the day, it was just myself and the Creative Director from our brilliant creative agency, OCD Studio, who headed to the Channel 4 offices in London. We had 10 minutes to pitch to a room of media moguls – this was our golden opportunity to explain exactly what Ticket Tailor is, what we do, and what sort of impact winning the competition would have for us.
We also needed to make it really clear why being a B Corp is so important to us, go through our advert storyboard, and explain things like how we’d considered accessibility and sustainable production when creating our ad. Like I say, intense!
After pitching, we were peppered with questions for around 20 minutes, which challenged everything from how our customer support would cope with increased demand to whether we felt our ad creative really reinforced our USPs. (And as if all that weren’t enough, I was then filmed for around 10 minutes answering questions to create footage that could be used across social media 😅.)
So yep – quite a rigorous process, making it feel even more incredible that we were selected as one of the final five.
Ultimately, I really loved getting to share all the good things we’re doing at Ticket Tailor, and explaining how a TV campaign could not only unlock our next stage of growth and boost brand awareness among our diverse audience of Event Creators – but also help to show that fairer, more ethical ticketing really does exist.
You nailed it! 👏 What does winning this opportunity mean for Ticket Tailor?
Over the next two-to-three years, we’re focused on scaling brand awareness in a way that positions Ticket Tailor as the leading independent ticketing platform that puts people and the planet first.
Due to being a whitelabelled platform, ticket-buyers often interact with our tech, without even noticing our brand. Which is exactly what Event Creators want. Quite rightly, they want to put their brand front and center – but that does mean it comes at a cost to our own brand awareness. Take market-leader Eventbrite, for example. Everyone knows them because they’re also an event discovery platform and their branding is definitely more overt.
With all this considered, we’re so excited to now have this incredible opportunity. TV will help us to reach millions of viewers, which we’re sure will boost brand awareness, and will hopefully also get word-of-mouth going leading to more and more sign-ups.
As a self-funded business, TV has always felt too risky an investment, but this opportunity derisks it for us, allowing us to test a really powerful channel. And the fact this is all within the context of being a B Corp makes it even more meaningful.
The more tickets we sell, the more impact we can have – from better, more affordable ticketing for Event Creators to our charity donations, and more.
Speaking of positive impact – as a certified B Corp, how does Ticket Tailor stay true to its social and environmental values?
What’s key here is that, as an independent, bootstrapped company there is no external pressure to grow. We choose to grow and we want every ticket sold on our platform to have a positive impact – we call this Growth on Purpose.
With this mission and ethos, we’ve managed to build some really important elements into our business model, which helps us stay true to our overarching values.
For example, our Penny for the Planet campaign sees us donate 1p for every ticket sold through our platform. So, naturally, the more we sell, the more we donate! (Over £500k and counting.)
We’re also constantly held accountable by our Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) committee, and our Giving back committee. Not forgetting B Lab UK itself – to hold our B Corp status, we have to produce an annual impact report, and go through a full recertification process every three years.
We're proud to be a carbon neutral platform, too. We work with Inhabit, a fellow B Corp, to measure and offset our carbon emissions each year across all scopes.
Not only that, in 2024 we launched a Climate Impact Tracker in all customer Dashboards. So when our users log in they can see both their personal Penny for the Planet donations as a result of their ticket sales, as well as the total carbon footprint of their event ticketing (which we offset!). We feel this helps bring transparency and visibility to these important, and often overlooked, aspects of event ticketing.
What kind of impact do you think advertising on Channel 4’s platforms will have on the business?
Firstly, it’s safe to say the entire team is overjoyed! We collectively feel our ad will help to accelerate growth by driving mass awareness and credibility, helping us to compete with market-leaders Eventbrite and Ticketmaster. That’s why this is all so exciting – we do feel the results of this campaign will be really positive. And who knows, perhaps this is just the start of our TV future!
What does the phrase “business as a force for good” mean to you?
It means recognising that every business has a choice: to grow at the expense of people and the planet, or to grow in a way that actively benefits them. It’s about embedding values into your decision-making, even when that means choosing the harder, potentially less profitable path.
Being a force for good isn’t passive; it requires intentionality, and must be built into your business model from the ground up. Leadership plays a crucial role, it has to be championed by senior teams to influence strategy, culture, and everyday decisions.
This is the core of what being a B Corp represents: using business as a tool for positive impact.
At Ticket Tailor, we see ourselves as more than a ticketing platform. We’re part of a growing movement proving that better business is possible.
And I believe businesses play a huge role in leading the way to a better future.
Hear, hear! ✊What advice would you give to other B Corps thinking of applying for something like this in the future?
I say go for it! What have you got to lose? Yes it’s an investment of your time – but even if you don’t win, the process of applying, refining your pitch, reconnecting with your values, and telling your story can be incredibly motivating.
And one valuable thing to bear in mind – there’s a real appetite among consumers and platforms like Channel 4 for businesses who are walking the talk. So you really do have a lot to gain.
Finally, what does winning the competition mean to you? 💛
Personally, winning this competition has been one of my greatest career achievements to date. I’m so proud of myself and of Ticket Tailor – being selected for the top five out of 200 applicants is just incredible. And all of this feels even more meaningful as I’m about to go on maternity leave! It’s given me such a confidence boost at a very emotionally (and physically) challenging time.
We’re loving that answer, Olivia. Thank you so much for all your hard work – we couldn’t have done it without you!
Keep an eye out on Channel 4 and 4OD for our ad this September! To let us know what you think, drop us a comment on our socials:
Read Channel 4’s latest press release about the competition >