On 30 October, the Pussycat Dolls played a stadium in São Paulo, with tickets on sale at Eventim. The next day, the three members took the stage at the Tokio Marine Hall for a pocket show "for invited guests only". The announcement from 30e, the tour's promoter, warned: "There will be no ticket sales!"
To get in through the advertised door, you had to prove you were a fan. Budweiser, the official beer of the promoter's shows, created the Fan Captcha (Fã Captcha), with creative by Africa Creative: in place of the test that tells people from robots, a six-question quiz about the group, against the clock. Under the contest rules, 600 pairs of tickets were awarded by ranking of correct answers and, in case of a tie, by the shortest time. Itaú, the bank that presents the tour through Itaú Live, gave its customers the chance to play a day earlier and again when the contest opened to everyone. "Double the chances", the post said.
- Fan Captcha: instead of the anti-robot test, a quiz.
- Six questions about the group.
- Against the clock: time counts.
- Ranked by correct answers; in a tie, the fastest wins.
- Prize: 600 pairs of tickets for an invited-guests-only show.
The idea is good
It is worth saying this before anything else, because it is true. The Fan Captcha got three things right that matter in a sponsorship activation: real scarcity, access that money cannot buy and the feeling of being recognised. Carol Pascoal, VP of Marketing and Communications at 30e, told UpdatePop that the experience "recognises a relationship that already exists between the fan and the artist. It is access that is not for sale, but that comes from this bond built over time".
That is exactly it.
From the quiz to purchase history
In the activation, access was organised around six questions, in one afternoon. After the show, Itaú itself described on Instagram how people got there: "There were those who danced, those who made noise in the fandom, those who used #MeNotaItaú and those who nailed the fan-captcha." The yardsticks were trivia, social media buzz and being a customer of the bank.
The promoter has another yardstick: purchase history. It shows who came to five editions in a row, who travelled from another state, who bought for the same artist's previous tour. It is a bond measured in years, by people who paid to be there.
That history is scattered across the ticketing platform, the website sign-ups and the activation lists, and what reaches the promoter depends on the contract with the ticketing company and on the buyer's consent.
The superfan buys earlier, better or exclusive
Here is the difference in design. For a promoter, giving superfans free tickets can mean giving up revenue from people who would have bought anyway, and purchase history shows who that group is. What you offer them is access, in three forms:
- Earlier: a presale window only for those who came back, opening before the general sale.
- Better: the section closest to the stage, early entry, the upgrade that is not shown to everyone.
- Exclusive: the soundcheck, the meet-up, the small show. The pocket show is the extreme version.
Your own window can sit alongside the sponsor's. In the sale for Simple Plan, whom 30e is bringing in May 2027 with Itaú Live, the Eventim page opened the "Artist Presale" on the same day and at the same time as the presale for Itaú Private and Personnalité customers. Eventim's terms of use provide that, "at the determination of the Event Promoter", some events may have an exclusive presale, accessed by a code or by data validation at checkout.
How to set up your own
At the scale of a Brazilian festival, the mechanic can be adapted:
soundcheck, meet-up, the closest section and the early window
hypothesis to test
- Set the yardstick: how many editions count as "came back". Two? Three? The number changes the size of the group. Set a limit that fits the access you want to offer.
- Split by affinity: whoever bought for a specific artist hears first when that artist is confirmed in the same city.
- Look at the step from the second to the third purchase. In a study by Please & Thank You, a US company that sells VIP programmes, only 20.1% of those who had already bought twice made a third purchase, and, past that step, the chance of coming back rises sharply, reaching 80.6% by the tenth purchase. It is a point worth testing with an early window.
- Talk through the channels you own: email, SMS and WhatsApp, with a personal message.
- Measure: keep one group out of the activation and compare the purchase rate of the two groups after the sale.
And what about people outside the community?
This is the most interesting part, and it is still a bet. The first hypothesis is that a visible window, sold out by the community before the general sale, makes the rest of the audience want to be inside next time. The second is that superfans, invited to bring someone, will bring new people.
As far as I know, there is no published Brazilian measurement of this effect. The test can include a referral code for superfans: count how many first-time buyers came through it. If the hypothesis is right, the number shows up. If not, you find out with a small activation.
It does not have to be a pocket show
The Pussycat Dolls case involved 30e, a brewer and a bank. More than half of Brazilian festivals, 56% of them according to Mapa dos Festivais, draw fewer than 15,000 people. As an idea, the case is inspiring. At that size, the mechanic can be adapted without a closed show: a 24-hour window, a better section or a personal invitation for those who came back.
At your next on-sale, who gets in first: whoever holds the sponsor's card, whoever aced the quiz or whoever has already come back five times?
Read also: How many times has this fan come back? · The next edition starts today