Chapter 13
At this stage, the company didn't have much money left. If they wanted to recruit more trainees, either Jiang Juyou would have to go out and find them, or the two from the new member group would have to go out and find them. Jiang Juyou thought for a moment - with this weather, going out would mean certain death for one or both of them.
"...We still need to upgrade." Jiang Juyou sighed.
There was only one path ahead of them, which was to complete the system tasks and upgrade to the next level as soon as possible. That way, she would have more loan amount available to use.
Jiang Juyou looked troubled. "Going around in circles, we still have to finish that software first."
She had originally wanted to drag it out for a while, so she could thoroughly research everything and hopefully complete all the design in one go. Otherwise, if they had to make changes or add new features after launch, she would have to spend money.
Although it wasn't her money, when money was tight it would be deducted from her account, and just thinking about this made Jiang Juyou's expression turn constipated.
When Jiang Juyou dragged her heavy body back to the office, the other three had their heads lowered, hugging their phones and slacking off. Seeing Jiang Juyou come in, they frantically signaled each other and scrambled around in panic.
Jiang Juyou said plainly: "It's fine, you don't have any work to do at the moment anyway..." As soon as she finished speaking, the three of them smiled awkwardly, but they did visibly relax.
The next second, they heard Jiang Juyou continue: "But now you do."
The three turned to look at her in unison.
"We're running an idol training company, so we can't wait until debut to improve all the features and functions. That includes fan interaction platforms and such, which you're definitely more familiar with than me, so I wanted to get your thoughts and ideas on what software you currently use, if there's anything we can reference or improve on."
Jiang Juyou had already done some research beforehand, but there was still a difference between researching something and getting feedback from actual users.
She walked over to the desk, pulled up a chair in front of them, and took out an iPad to record all of their feedback.
Li Yao was the most excited. Hearing this, her eyes lit up. "We're making our own software?"
Jiang Juyou paused. "...Yes, I'm planning to hire an outsourcing company to develop one. The monthly evaluations don't require payment for now, but in the future they definitely will. For ticket sales and such, I still want to keep control of that ourselves."
At the mention of ticket sales, all three lit up, scooting their chairs closer as they started chattering loudly:
"Tickets must be under real name registration!"
"Don't give scalpers any chance!"
"I want one-on-one chats too! Me too! Me too!"
"Can we get professional designers for the merchandise? Don't just design a bunch of ugly stuff!"
"Concert tickets especially need strict oversight!"
"Don't add too many paid features, really, too much can cause backlash!"
"Can the one-on-one chats be cheaper?"
"There should also be a space for fans to chat with each other!"
"I really have no other requests, just make scalping impossible!"
"Enhance the concert experience!"
"Yes, yes! Kick out anyone who violates concert rules!"
"Release tickets in batches!"
Jiang Juyou: "..."
Her head hurt.
"Okay, okay, slow down! One at a time!" Jiang Juyou hurried to calm down the three who had been driven mad from being fans.
She then sighed and took out her phone, looking at them. "First, concertsβ"
"Real name registration!"
"No chances for scalpers!"
"Don't even give proxy purchasing opportunities!"
The three spoke one line each, faces more serious than ever. Jiang Juyou looked at them and nodded, recording everything down.
They spent the entire morning just researching these things. Maybe it was overusing their brains, but when lunchtime came around, all their stomachs started growling.
In that time, Jiang Juyou didn't just record a lot of things, but also listened to them complain about many things, from cursing the boss to cursing the producers, from cursing the creative directors to the stylists.
She sat there, unable to leave but also unable to stay. Although they weren't cursing her, she felt sooner or later she would become the target.
After lunch, Jiang Juyou bid them farewell and returned to her room.
She sprawled in front of her computer desk, looking at the software design templates with a pained expression. "Still don't know where to start..."
Up til now, the only feature she had set up was the login interface.
"For login, two accounts need to be bound - one is Weibo, one is Alipay or WeChat...then what?"
Jiang Juyou stared blankly at the screen for a long time before adding another prerequisite: "Usernames will be the same as Weibo names after binding Weibo account."
This could reduce the risk of sabotage.
"OK! Concerts first!" Jiang Juyou forcibly pepped herself up, even slapping her face twice.
Right after she spoke, the interface title on screen changed to say Concert.
The accounts themselves were already real name registered, but how could they prevent scalping?
After all, they had said that with real name registration on tickets, scalpers would just use proxy purchasing. They had their own software for that - just leave the software running and they were set. It was hard to prevent.
Jiang Juyou narrowed her eyes and thought for a bit. "What is something everyone has that is also unique?"
"What is a concert necessity that everyone has?" Her brain felt like it would stop working soon.
It felt just within reach, but she couldn't grasp it. Jiang Juyou picked up her phone, wanting to search online again, but in the moment she picked up her phone, her eyes lit up.
"That's right, phones!"
As if a thought had struck her, Jiang Juyou hurriedly opened her browser and searched: "Does every phone have a unique serial number?"
The answer below: "Yes, every phone's serial number is different. This is for the purpose of..."
"Great, this is it!" Jiang Juyou seemed to have grabbed onto a lifesaver, letting out a deep breath.
She typed this into the interface: "The phone used to purchase, pay for, and verify entry for the ticket must be consistent. The criteria for consistency is the phone's built-in serial number."
After hitting enter to generate it, this rule was created and automatically generated a line in the privacy policy to inform users that their phone's serial number would be accessed.
Even if someone had multiple phones, it was unlikely they would have hundreds. And even if they did, it would be impossible to operate them simultaneously.
Jiang Juyou looked at the screen and shook her head, sighing. "Jiang Juyou, you really are a genius!"
With scalping handled, she still had to deal with the ticket purchasing difficulty.
For many concerts, all seats would be opened up at once when sales started, but this made it very easy for the seats to be locked in by people at the front who selected them but didn't proceed to payment.
So the best method was batch release.
"Tickets for each price tier will open in six batches, with 10-minute intervals between each batch."
"Unable to select seats. Seats will be randomly assigned after selecting ticket price tier."
"Audience members can link up, and if matched, neighboring seats can be arranged. Up to 5 people can be linked."
Jiang Juyou became more and more amazed - she really had talent for this industry.
Next was setting the pricing for each area.
Despite being called a theater, it was more like a small venue. There were a total of 2,789 seats inside, divided into floor and balcony sections.
Only some of the floor section was open right now, because there was a Y-shaped extended stage. There were spots in front and on both sides of the floor section, but only the seats directly in front of the Y-stage were open currently.
The venue was three-sided seating, with tiered seats. Jiang Juyou had gone to take a look before - there weren't many spots with obstructed views since it wasn't a large venue.
"So how much should it be priced at?"
Domestic concert pricing was generally inflated - tickets started at 500 RMB at least, but domestic concert tickets were mostly monopolized by scalpers. Trying to buy a 500 RMB concert ticket was as difficult as winning the lottery.
Their situation here was also different from other places. With monthly evaluations basically happening once a month, pricing too high would drain fans dry, but pricing too low also didn't seem profitable.
After struggling over it for a bit, Jiang Juyou asked the system aloud: "Can ticket prices be changed afterwards?"
"It's possible, with payment of a fee." The system answered her.
"..."
Profiteer.
She brought up the seating chart of the venue and pondered for a while before dividing the seats into four zones. The seats in the inner field were divided into two, with the front four rows closest to the stage priced at the highest value of $580, while the seats behind were $390.
The front four rows of the stands were $199, while the remaining seats were $89.
After all, students still made up the majority of fans, and they didn't have much for monthly living expenses, so pricing too high would weigh on her conscience.
Although she had a conscience, it wasn't much, because she made the concert for members-only purchase, which further prevented scalping.
Members could only join annually for $599 per year.
To purchase concert tickets, one needed to become a member a month before ticket sales, otherwise they would be unable to buy tickets.
Apart from being able to purchase tickets, Jiang Juyou also planned to include some other content. Those were of course included in the $599.
With this sorted, everything else would be easy to operate. She just needed to copy other concerts' rules, since the rules weren't settings and could still be amended later.
However when Jiang Juyou looked at those rules, question marks popped up above her head.
"...Filming or photographing the concert is prohibited during the concert?"
"Why?"
"Bringing light sticks is prohibited?"
"Why is that?"
"Fighting and causing disturbances is prohibited..."
"I can understand that."
Regarding concert rules, she had directly copied them verbatim. She couldn't really understand many of the rules, but if her predecessors made those provisions, there surely must have been unpleasant experiences in the past.
Jiang Juyou didn't understand, but would heed the advice.