Tessitura Unpacked: Cutting Hick’s Law Down to Size on Your CYO Pathway
Hick’s Law is the fancy term for choice paralysis. The more options you give, the longer it takes for someone to decide — and sometimes they’ll abandon the purchase all together.
This is why it takes you forever to pick something to watch on Netflix.
Performing arts orgs are at a natural disadvantage here.
Think about it: audiences have thoughts of possible combinations to choose from when considering one production with five dates, multiple price zones, and shifting prices.
For someone new to your org — or new to the arts all together — it can feel overwhelming. They don’t know what to choose so they get the most bang for their buck. Choose Your Own Subscriptions only magnify this.
There’s a clever way to make it easier to Create Your Own package in Tessitura.
One of our favorite purchase pathways is the Chicago Symphony’s because they offer two CYO Packages by assigning two Performance Groups to concerts in Tessitura — simplfying the decision-making process.
Here’s how it works — they assign two clear categories:
By Genre: You see simple options like CSO Classical, CSO at the Movies, CSO for Kids. Once you pick, the pathway only shows concerts that fit your choice.
By Date: For people who plan around their calendars, concerts are grouped by timeframes—September 18, November 24, and so on.
🎥 See the pathway in action below:
This small but smart design choice is easy to implement. It respects how different buyers think. Some want to choose based on the type of experience. Others plan around their calendars. By offering both pathways, CSO makes it easy for more people to say yes.
When you’re setting up your own ticketing or subscription pathways on TNEW (or any system), ask yourself:
Can people easily find the option that fits how they make decisions?
Are you showing every possible concert at once, or are you breaking them into digestible choices?
Is the pathway designed to help them get to “yes” quickly?
Audiences don’t want to scroll through endless options. By grouping concerts by genre or date, CSO makes it easy for people to find what fits and move forward.
📸 Janosch Diggelmann, courtesy of Unsplash.
