Survey of 2,200 Meeting Professionals Reveals Key Planning and Execution Metrics to Improve Event ROI
October 12, 2015 – TYSONS CORNER, Va. – Cvent, Inc. (NYSE: CVT), a leading cloud-based enterprise event management platform, today released results from a recent survey of more than 2,200 executives, planners and marketers that provides insights into how meeting professionals around the globe budget, target attendees, create content, market events, enhance onsite experience, collect feedback, and measure return on investment (ROI). The study showed an overwhelming 94 percent of c-level executive respondents believed their events were effective upon completion.
“Meetings and events are critical for organizations to engage customers and prospects, and executives have placed a significant emphasis on increasing attendance, staying on budget and delivering engaging experiences,” said Chuck Ghoorah, co-founder and president of worldwide sales and marketing at Cvent. “This study is a must-read resource for meeting professionals because it will arm them with industry insights to help them make informed decisions, spend more efficiently, and prove ROI. Having this valuable information will also create opportunity for them to have a seat at the table with c-level executives as key stakeholders become more strategic in their approach to events.”
Keys to Event Success
- Spend Where It Matters:
- Twenty one percent of respondents spend more than 50 percent of their marketing budget on meetings and events; nearly half (45 percent) of respondents indicated that they allocate 6-25 percent of their annual marketing budget to meetings and events.
- While events can be expensive to host, many organizations recover costs through registration fees (61 percent), sponsorships (51 percent), and exhibitor fees (33 percent).
- Simplify With Mobile On-Site:
- Of those who hosted a conference/trade show, almost half (43 percent) used an event-specific mobile app to keep attendees informed of event details and to keep them engaged before, during and after the event.
- For respondents who did not have a mobile event app, 54 percent said they plan to use one in the future.
- Embrace Social Media:
- Meeting planners are encouraging their attendees to engage on social media, with 65 percent of those surveyed using a designated event hashtag for social media content related to their conference or trade show.
Making the Event Count
Many organizations look at their ROI to measure the success of meetings and events. Respondents also used the following metrics when measuring the ROI of an event:
- Revenue from registrations (37 percent)
- Revenue from sponsorships (32 percent)
- Number of new leads (25 percent)
- New business won directly (21 percent)
- Customers retained (16 percent)
With a focus on driving ROI, meeting and event planners are increasingly leveraging technologies such as e-mail marketing software to drive attendance, mobile apps and social media to better understand engagement during the event, and online survey tools to collect post-event feedback.
For more details on these and other findings from the survey, please log onto cvent.com/EventBenchmarks to download the study and see how your organization’s meetings and events compare.
About the Survey
Over 2,200 people were surveyed in May 2015 for the Global Event Industry Benchmarks Study. Ninety seven percent indicated that they or team members they manage are involved in planning or marketing meetings and events. Majority of those surveyed were planners (58 percent), 21 percent were marketers and 21 percent were executives. The highest percentage of respondents (25%) said their organization hosts between 6-15 events per year. Over half of the respondents directly plan conferences and trade shows; training and workshops; and internal meetings.
