1. www.meetingscanada.com/executive M&ITexecutive Spring 2008 53
D
epending on how you look at it, the headlines splashed
across the financial pages spell either doom and gloom
or opportunity for corporate Canada. A robust Cana-
dian loonie and an anemic U.S. greenback are just the
tip of the economic iceberg. The golden age of the fledgling
21st Century is giving rise to a global economic rebalancing.
In today’s precarious marketplace, it’s not unusual to find busi-
nesses circling the wagons – tightening budgets, maximizing
head counts and improving efficiencies. Business leaders are
burning the midnight oil figuring out how to hedge their bets
against lower margins and higher risk. Darwinians will find inno-
vative ways to stretch their corporate budgets and increase prof-
its. There’s no single solution to these challenges, but a good
place to start looking is in the corporate-marketing strategy.
Technology-driven event consolidation
can aid in risk management, improve
processes and spur cost savings – crucial
strategic goals if events are taking
a chunk out of the marketing budget.
technology
track
By Susan Radojevic
PhotoGeorgeDoyle/maxximages.com

2. www.meetingscanada.com/executive54 M&ITexecutive Spring 2008
MARKETING BUDGETS
Marketing budgets typically account for a sizeable portion of
company funds. A properly executed marketing strategy,
however, pays its own way and more. The problem is, while
processes and measurement tools are typically in place for
advertising and promotion, meetings and events, somehow,
fall into a great abyss. Businesses commonly devote as much
as 23 per cent of their marketing budget to events. That can
add up to millions of unmanaged dollars. If you don’t know
how much your company spends on events and meetings,
then you can’t be sure if you’re getting value out of those
meetings, and you certainly can’t measure Return on Invest-
ment (ROI) against them. And if you don’t know who is plan-
ning those events, or why they’re being held, you probably
can’t measure Return on Objectives (ROO), either. That ulti-
mately limits the impact of your overall marketing plan.
Event consolidation (also known as strategic event market-
ing consolidation and strategic meetings management pro-
gramme) is gaining favour in the executive boardroom as an
effective solution to this quandary. Consolidation should result
in achieving three key business objectives: risk management,
improved processes and cost savings. These are crucial stra-
tegic goals if events are taking a chunk out of your marketing
budget. And key to successful consolidation is the technology
used to track, measure and evaluate events.
In the meetings and events universe, there are two kinds of
technology – the logistics kind that supports the meeting plan-
ner’s day-to-day job (registration, name badges, floorplans and
the like) and the strategic kind that supports the business by
enabling tracking and evaluation of event spend as well as mea-
surement of ROI and ROO.
STRATEGIC SUPPORT
Corbin Ball, president of Bellingham, Wash.-based meetings-
technology consulting firm Corbin Ball Associates, points out
that although the concept of event consolidation started in the
late 1980s, it didn’t have the strategic technological support
it required to make much headway in the corporate market-
place. Ball explains, “Only in the past three years have enter-
prise-wide systems been sufficiently in place to accommodate
consolidation’s comprehensive requirements.” There are a
handful of viable technology options that support consolida-
tion, and each offers its own distinct benefit.
Philadelphia, Pa.-based StarCite is an on-demand global meet-
ings-management company that brings together buyers and sup-
pliers of meeting-related services. Newport Beach, Ca.-based
Ambassadors, LLC manufactures GEM, a web-based application
that facilitates the strategic alignment of events through events-
process management, events-business intelligence and global
events-purchasing capabilities. Toronto-based company Arcaneo
shares Ambassadors’ strategic focus; its Metron technology
encompasses event-planning, execution and measurement.
The selection of a technology provider is an important ele-
ment in an event-consolidation initiative – but not the only ele-
ment. The technology should support event alignment based
on business requirements, the goals and objectives of consol-
idation and its compatibility with existing applications. Choos-
ing the technology first and building consolidation around it is
like the tail wagging the dog. Worse, implementing a technol-
ogy alone without the other components essential to consoli-
dation will inevitably doom the initiative. Dale Beckles, president
and CEO of Arcaneo, likens the many facets of consolidation,
such as financial benchmarking, policies and communication,
to parts of a house in which technology is just the ‘plumbing.’
As Microsoft’s Bill Gates once aptly explained, “The first rule
of any technology used in a business is that automation applied
to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency. The sec-
ond is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will
magnify the inefficiency.”
SAME CRITERIA
Aligning event-marketing effectively means businesses need
to apply the same criteria for managing events as they do for
other disciplines. Ambassadors president Jerry McGee believes
that to achieve a strategic consolidation, C-level executives
need to change their perception that events fall simply within
the realm of travel. McGee asserts that, in many cases, “an
event is a marketing initiative, the same way an advertisement
or promotion is, and travel is just the means to attend the
event.” He points out that most businesses wouldn’t arbitrarily
Consolidation should result in achieving three key business objectives:
risk management, improved processes and cost savings.
These are crucial strategic goals if events are taking a chunk
out of your marketing budget. And key to successful consolidation
is the technology used to track, measure and evaluate events.

3. www.meetingscanada.com/executive56 M&ITexecutive Spring 2008
assign the management of producing an advertising campaign
to an administrative assistant. There are corporate goals and
objectives to consider, ROI and ROO measurements to estab-
lish and track, and requisite skills in ad production. The same
can be said for event management, and yet the task of event
planning is often added to the ‘to do’ lists of admin assistants.
The Achilles’ heel in many Fortune 1000 companies is their fail-
ure to adequately manage event spend and measure results.
Spearheading event consolidation doesn’t fall under the
sole jurisdiction of the C-level executive. It’s imperative that
meeting professionals step up to the plate as strategists,
rather than logistics experts. Rodney Dangerfield’s famous
lament – ‘I don’t get no respect’ – is often echoed by meeting
planners. They feel, rightly or wrongly, that they are looked upon
as order takers, not valued contributors to the business. Meeting
professionals can move from the order desk to a seat in the exec-
utive boardroom if they earn it by adopting a strategic role.
STRATEGIC ANALYSIS
Beckles observes that many event planners are focused more
on logistic-success metrics rather than strategic analysis. “To
earn a seat at the table, meeting professionals need to prove
event success beyond ‘a good time was had by all,’” he states.
Top-ranking execs don’t care if the gala dinner was a hit or
the name badges looked nice. They care about the bottom
line: is customer awareness increasing?; have this year’s
events cost less than last year?; is there a discernible return
on investment? Taking the lead in initiating consolidation and
its associated technology is a significant step in elevating
event management from a logistics exercise to a key compo-
nent of the marketing strategy.
There’s a gap between the meeting professional and the
business owner, and this is partly because event management
is often missing from sales and marketing discussions. Events
are marketing-driven and every event, regardless of audience,
includes all the essential marketing ingredients: messaging,
branding and visibility. The event professional should be aligned
with marketing, not disconnected from it. As Ball points out,
“Meetings are the face of the corporation.” The right consoli-
dation technology enables analysis and measurement of ROO,
which, in turn, boosts event management out of the abyss and
into its rightful place in the marketing spectrum.
Aligning your event marketing with the business of market-
ing is a complex and time-consuming task. It’s likely that the
design and implementation of a comprehensive consolidation
will require the specialized strategic and technology services
of experienced professional consultants. They collaborate
with key executives and event management to co-create an
effective consolidation that will meet the specific business
needs of today – and tomorrow. n
– Susan Radojevic is president of meeting consolidation
strategists The Peregrine Agency Ltd.
Top-ranking execs don’t care if the gala dinner was a hit or the
name badges looked nice. They care about the bottom line:
is customer awareness increasing?; have this year’s events
cost less than last year?; is there a discernible return on investment?