In your company, are you responsible for booking venues, facilities, restaurants and organizing transportation for meetings and events?
| Keeping Up With the Changes |
Survey Apps
SurveyNow!: This app can be used with the iPhone or iPad. This app will help you to customize your questionnaires and allows for immediate feedback. You guests can answer yes-or-no-style questions and are able to type in a detailed response. They also include a five-star rating system.
iOpinion: This app can be used with the iPhone or iPad. This app is fully customizable and you can enter as many questionnaires as you like. It also provides real-time data and can quickly e-mail you the results.
Location Apps
GPS Tracking: This app can be used with the iPhone or iPad. It provides real-time data on where you are. Once you enter “friends,” you can easily find their location. It interfaces with Facebook and Twitter and allows for quick message sending.
Promotional Materials
Promotional materials can come in many forms. Sometimes they are pamphlets or letter openers and sometimes they are pens or stress balls. Regardless of the materials you choose to use, the goal remains the same…increase sales and brand recognition.
You might not know that you have a choice when it comes to these products. There are thousands of products and companies to help you select the best promotional items to relay your image and make it worth remembering.
Many of these companies have recognized the green trend and now offer biodegradable and eco-friendly products to help meet your needs. It’s not easy to think about, but far too often unused, outdated or unwanted materials end up in the trash. Sometimes guests simply choose not to take items with them because they will only clutter up their drawers or end up in the trashcan.
To help maximize your promotional materials, you might want to look into reusable items like mugs or cups, tote bags or clothing items such as t-shirts. Handing out practical items such as USB drives or tiny bottles of hand sanitizer are more likely to be used.
When it comes to handing out pamphlets or other paper materials about you company or service, you might want to think about using partially recycled, double-sided printable paper. You could even take things a step further and hand out USB drives with your information that would also serve as a reusable promotional item. You could alsoconsider creating a bar code for your guests to scan with their smart phone, which would allow quick and paperless access to everything they need to know about you.
Corporate Wellness
It is incredibly easy to get stressed out during an event or convention. “Free Massages” are two powerful words that are guaranteed to draw a crowd! Treat guests at your next event to an unforgettable experience. Your guests will appreciate your thoughtfulness in providing them with such an enjoyable and practical service. A ten-minute to half an hour chair massage is sure to help them relax and melt away their stress.
Some people call chair massage “corporate massage,” since it is such a fixture at corporate events. The perfect way to manage stress for you attendees is to locate massage chairs around your event. The positive and relaxing effect of a chair massage contributes to the well being and energy level of your attendees and therefore contributes to the success of your event as well.
Because Event Massage is done through the clothing, stations can be set up almost anywhere and will integrate smoothly into nearly any function. Also, massage is an easy and safe service that can be enjoyed by nearly everyone. There are no pre-requisite fitness levels required.
2011 Event Services Trends
There are so many new trends when it comes to event services that it is almost impossible to keep up with them all. And yet in order to stay at the top of your field, you must keep up with most of them. The following is a quick list of this years trends.
1. Web-based software increases meeting planning ease and options.
The web has been the driver for much of the technology change we have seen in the last decade. With the development of web services we have created a communication standard that enables us to work together with different web programs. It has also given us the ability to exchange attendee, exhibitor, and member data. In short, the web is providing software for nearly every aspect of the meeting planner process and it is provided in a manner that is cheaper and easier to use than ever before.
2. Guests want to be entertained.
Meeting and event venues are seeing an increase in inquiries for entertainment options as diverse as theme parties, comedians, “meeting camps” and “think tanks.” For the first time in a long time, venues are offering more than a strictly serious meeting experience.
3. Team-building is in.
The demand for team building is back and planners want unique programs that deliver within tight budgets.
4. Cost trumps green.
Being green remains important to many event meeting services planners who look for properties to have these initiatives in place. However, when asked to choose between being green or providing maximum cost savings, budgets will still take precedence this year.
5. Social Media and Connectivity is key.
Social media usage is beginning to take hold within the meeting industry. The widest use among event attendees includes Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn for networking and YouTube for videotaping sessions and posting them on-line for their colleagues. Connectivity is key when an event services company is planning an event, as well as, for the attendees once they are there. Attendees will be bringing their own laptops and smart phones. To create a consistent platform, meeting planners may want to purchase or rent iPads.
6. Planners want choices.
Meeting planners want all-inclusive packages, a la carte pricing and everything in between. They want the property and their suppliers to provide maximum flexibility to suit their guest’s needs.
SurveyNow!: This app can be used with the iPhone or iPad. This app will help you to customize your questionnaires and allows for immediate feedback. You guests can answer yes-or-no-style questions and are able to type in a detailed response. They also include a five-star rating system.
iOpinion: This app can be used with the iPhone or iPad. This app is fully customizable and you can enter as many questionnaires as you like. It also provides real-time data and can quickly e-mail you the results.
Location Apps
GPS Tracking: This app can be used with the iPhone or iPad. It provides real-time data on where you are. Once you enter “friends,” you can easily find their location. It interfaces with Facebook and Twitter and allows for quick message sending.
Promotional Materials
Promotional materials can come in many forms. Sometimes they are pamphlets or letter openers and sometimes they are pens or stress balls. Regardless of the materials you choose to use, the goal remains the same…increase sales and brand recognition.
You might not know that you have a choice when it comes to these products. There are thousands of products and companies to help you select the best promotional items to relay your image and make it worth remembering.
Many of these companies have recognized the green trend and now offer biodegradable and eco-friendly products to help meet your needs. It’s not easy to think about, but far too often unused, outdated or unwanted materials end up in the trash. Sometimes guests simply choose not to take items with them because they will only clutter up their drawers or end up in the trashcan.
To help maximize your promotional materials, you might want to look into reusable items like mugs or cups, tote bags or clothing items such as t-shirts. Handing out practical items such as USB drives or tiny bottles of hand sanitizer are more likely to be used.
When it comes to handing out pamphlets or other paper materials about you company or service, you might want to think about using partially recycled, double-sided printable paper. You could even take things a step further and hand out USB drives with your information that would also serve as a reusable promotional item. You could alsoconsider creating a bar code for your guests to scan with their smart phone, which would allow quick and paperless access to everything they need to know about you.
Corporate Wellness
It is incredibly easy to get stressed out during an event or convention. “Free Massages” are two powerful words that are guaranteed to draw a crowd! Treat guests at your next event to an unforgettable experience. Your guests will appreciate your thoughtfulness in providing them with such an enjoyable and practical service. A ten-minute to half an hour chair massage is sure to help them relax and melt away their stress.
Some people call chair massage “corporate massage,” since it is such a fixture at corporate events. The perfect way to manage stress for you attendees is to locate massage chairs around your event. The positive and relaxing effect of a chair massage contributes to the well being and energy level of your attendees and therefore contributes to the success of your event as well.
Because Event Massage is done through the clothing, stations can be set up almost anywhere and will integrate smoothly into nearly any function. Also, massage is an easy and safe service that can be enjoyed by nearly everyone. There are no pre-requisite fitness levels required.
2011 Event Services Trends
There are so many new trends when it comes to event services that it is almost impossible to keep up with them all. And yet in order to stay at the top of your field, you must keep up with most of them. The following is a quick list of this years trends.
1. Web-based software increases meeting planning ease and options.
The web has been the driver for much of the technology change we have seen in the last decade. With the development of web services we have created a communication standard that enables us to work together with different web programs. It has also given us the ability to exchange attendee, exhibitor, and member data. In short, the web is providing software for nearly every aspect of the meeting planner process and it is provided in a manner that is cheaper and easier to use than ever before.
2. Guests want to be entertained.
Meeting and event venues are seeing an increase in inquiries for entertainment options as diverse as theme parties, comedians, “meeting camps” and “think tanks.” For the first time in a long time, venues are offering more than a strictly serious meeting experience.
3. Team-building is in.
The demand for team building is back and planners want unique programs that deliver within tight budgets.
4. Cost trumps green.
Being green remains important to many event meeting services planners who look for properties to have these initiatives in place. However, when asked to choose between being green or providing maximum cost savings, budgets will still take precedence this year.
5. Social Media and Connectivity is key.
Social media usage is beginning to take hold within the meeting industry. The widest use among event attendees includes Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn for networking and YouTube for videotaping sessions and posting them on-line for their colleagues. Connectivity is key when an event services company is planning an event, as well as, for the attendees once they are there. Attendees will be bringing their own laptops and smart phones. To create a consistent platform, meeting planners may want to purchase or rent iPads.
6. Planners want choices.
Meeting planners want all-inclusive packages, a la carte pricing and everything in between. They want the property and their suppliers to provide maximum flexibility to suit their guest’s needs.
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If you have expertise in a particular area relevant to planning meetings and or events, you may submit a 400 to 750 word "how-to" article for possible inclusion in any of our magazines and/or our websites.
If accepted, your submission will be edited for length and clarity. There is no monetary payment if your item is used; instead, you can publicize yourself through a five-line biography with your contact information that will appear at the end of the article.
Send submissions to
editorial@MeetingPlannerResources.org. We will contact you if your submission is chosen.
If accepted, your submission will be edited for length and clarity. There is no monetary payment if your item is used; instead, you can publicize yourself through a five-line biography with your contact information that will appear at the end of the article.
Send submissions to
editorial@MeetingPlannerResources.org. We will contact you if your submission is chosen.