51st ICCA Congress

International Congress and Convention Association.

Twitter: #ICCA12

Session sponsored by:

Dealing with overload of RFPs

October 24th 2012

International Congress and Convention Association.

Twitter: #ICCA12

•What is the situation today?

•Best Practices

•What about tomorrow?

Dealing with overload of RFPs

International Congress and Convention Association.

Twitter: #ICCA12

RFP Distribution model

What is the Situation Today ?

• Professional planners• Occasional planners

• Open source distribution channels

• Media• Venues’ integrated eRFP

• + 251 Hotel Chains • + 1000 Congress &

Convention Centers• + 1000 CVBs….

EMEA + North America = +300 000 planners!

Bedouk’s Network, CVBs, Hotel Chains, Meetingbroker (Cvent and Starcite), Miceplaces, SpeedRFP….

+ 300 channels

+ 1 Million RFPs !

Conversion rate from 0 to ???

International Congress and Convention Association.

Twitter: #ICCA12

What is the Situation Today ?

International Congress and Convention Association.

Twitter: #ICCA12

What is the Situation Today

• It is complicated…

Tight deadlines

Should you rate/filter RFPs?

Majority of the demands handled offline in many regions, how to reach them?

Same RFP multiple sources

Commission YES? NO?

International Congress and Convention Association.

Twitter: #ICCA12

Use channels – with RFP’s standard limitation– requesting from planners the list of « already

contacted venues »– With fixed fees (negotiated!) = less expensive

than a commission (from 3 to 10%!)

Follow up, follow up, follow up…Use leads to build your Data Base

Best Practices

International Congress and Convention Association.

Twitter: #ICCA12

What about tomorrow?

International Congress and Convention Association.

Twitter: #ICCA12

1. How is your organisation dealing with eRFPs?• Good practice vs Bad practice?• Conversion rate?• How do you deal with regions differences?

2. If you can invent a new model to generate Requests/Leads would it be any different? How?

3. Is this a step before the real-time booking system? YES/NO Why?

What about tomorrow ?

International Congress and Convention Association.

Twitter: #ICCA12

Thank you !

Safe Travels Home !