Chapter 5 Selling the Corporate Meetings Market

1. Chapter 5 Selling the Corporate Meetings Market Convention Management and ServiceSeventh Edition (478CSB)

2. Competencies forSelling the Corporate Meetings Market • Identify factors that corporate meeting planners consider when making a site selection. • Describe the different types of corporate meetings. • Identify characteristics of corporate meetings that are important for selling to the corporate market. • Identify who typically decides where to hold a corporate meeting. • Describe the tools salespeople use to locate corporations and to find information about the meetings they hold.

3. What Corporate Meeting Planners Look For • Quality food service • F&B functions are major contributors to success of an event • Very important to planners and attendees • Adequate meeting space • Service • Most important element in repeat business • Enough guestrooms • Prefer to use only one host property (continued)

4. What Corporate Meeting Planners Look For (continued) • Convenient location • Downtown, airport, and certain suburban properties • Attractive location • Consistent with image of the corporation • Especially true for incentive meetings • Security • Prefer to meet away from busy areas • Often prefer to be the only group in the hotel

5. Types of Corporate Meetings • National and regional sales meetings • New product introduction/dealer meetings • Professional/technical meetings • Management meetings • Training meetings • Stockholder/public meetings • Incentive meetings

6. Sales and New Product Introduction/Dealer Meetings Sales Meetings • One of the largest sectors of the corporate meetings market • National attendance about 150, duration 3-4 days • Regional attendance about 50, duration 2-3 days • Meetings may involve new product introductions, sales training, or morale building • Good source of repeat business for hotels • Generally staged by the sales and marketing department of each division of a company (continued)

7. Sales and New Product Introduction/Dealer Meetings (continued) New Product Introduction/Dealer Meetings • National and regional in scope • Method of creating enthusiasm • Vary greatly in size and duration • Attract top company management, stockholders, and the press • Excellent chance to "show off" the property and attract new business

8. Professional/Technical and Management Meetings Professional/Technical Meetings • Often take seminar and workshop formats • Lecture and demonstration by consultants, educators, and/or vendors (continued)

9. Professional/Technical and Management Meetings (continued) Management Meetings • May be regular events, or in response to specific situations • Usually small in size, but premier facilities are required • Attendees are prospects for divisional or company meetings • Geographical location varies greatly • Commonly last two days

10. Training and Stockholder/Public Meetings Training Meetings • All levels of corporate personnel require training • Training meetings in hotels account for the largest number of corporate meetings • Attendance is usually less than 50, average nearer 30 • Duration is usually 3 days • Special requirements: A/V capability, minimal distractions, adequate light, prompt service • Rarely require prestigious locations • Trainers tend to return to hotels where everything worked out well (continued)

11. Training and Stockholder/Public Meetings Stockholder/Public Meetings • Meetings for nonemployees • Public relations and industrial relations hold exhibits and meetings (continued)

12. Incentive Meetings • A meeting is included in 80 percent of all such trips • Attendees and planners look for first-class service and accommodations • Bookings usually guaranteed • Participants use all of the facilities of the hotel • Usually indicates high revenue

13. Characteristics of Corporate Meetings Cycle/pattern Lead time Geography Kinds of sites Attendance • Mandatory • Highly predictable • Use of rooming lists and VIP lists common Duration: average 3 days (continued)

14. Characteristics of Corporate Meetings (continued) Exhibits Meeting room requirements • Especially need breakout rooms near larger rooms Repeat business Multibooking potential One meeting—one check: master account Meetings business brings other business

15. Cycle/Pattern and Lead Time Cycle/Pattern • Irregular • As-needed basis • Usually midweek Lead Time • Short compared to associations • Incentive meetings: 8–12 months to 2 years • Annual sales meeting: 8–12 months • Most others: 3–6 months • Crisis meetings: virtually no lead time

16. Geography and Kinds of Sites Geography • No pattern • No reason to vary site to attract attendees, since attendance is mandatory • Convenience is most important geographic criterion Kinds of Sites • Variety; depends on purpose of meeting and position of attendees • Each property has the right features to host some kind of corporate meeting

17. Repeat Business and Multibooking Potential Repeat Business • Training meetings • Crisis meetings (continued)

18. Repeat Business and Multibooking Potential (continued) Multibooking Potential • Same meeting program may be repeated in several locations • Good for • chains, • hotels with cooperative agreements with hotels in other cities, and • hotels that use independent hotel representatives • More difficult for independent hotels to attract corporations that repeat meetings

19. Techniques for Selling Corporate Meetings • Sell the decision-maker, not a go-between. • Start at the top of the organization chart. • Pay attention to tomorrow’s decision-maker.

20. Corporate Meeting Decision-makers • Full-time meeting planner • Company president • Marketing and sales executives • Advertising and sales promotion managers • Other corporate executives: corporate relations; public relations; industrial relations; communications • Passenger traffic/corporate travel managers • Procurement (purchasing) managers • Training director • Meeting specialists/third-party planners

21. Tools for Finding Corporate Meeting Planners Special Meetings Publications • These publications offer advertisement space, sales-lead services, and rental lists for direct mail • Successful Meetings • Meetings & Conventions • Meeting News Business Publications • Reach some important prospects • Readership is much broader than target market(s) (continued)

22. Tools for Finding Corporate Meeting Planners (continued) Trade Directories and Publications Trade Associations • Their executive directors can give you important leads Lateral Referral and Penetration • Local suppliers could recommend the property • Large companies have many divisions to penetrate • Hotel employees may have leads for meetings business

23. Trade Directories and Publications • Research the industries of past clients • Dun and Bradstreet’s Million Dollar Directory • Standard and Poor's Register of Directors and Executives • Ward’s Business Directory • Meeting Professionals International Membership Directory • Science and Technical Societies in the U.S. and Canada • Directory of Corporate Meeting Planners