Hotel and convention venue decision-makers who have received StarCite RFPs overwhelmingly prefer the StarCite Marketplace to electronically access and respond to corporate meetings electronic requests-for-proposal (eRFPs) when compared to other options, according to research findings released today by the Integrated Technology Research Corporation (ITR).

As the volume of eRFPs in the meetings industry rises and eRFP applications such as StarCite, OnVantage and others proliferate, ITR conducted the first study ever to help measure user experiences of StarCite Marketplace compared with various other eRFP providers.

ITR’s independent research found that twice as many survey respondents said that they use StarCite Marketplace (96 percent) compared with OnVantage MarketView (48 percent) and with eRFP tools other than StarCite or OnVantage (52 percent.)

They also use StarCite more frequently, with 48 percent of those who use both StarCite and OnVantage indicating that they used StarCite “more than once a week”. Eighteen percent said they use OnVantage “more than once a week”.

Respondents also have more history with StarCite than any other eRFP provider – 73 percent said they have used it for one to more than two years. Forty-three percent have used OnVantage for one to more than two years.

“We believe that those who have received eRFPs from the StarCite MarketPlace are a powerful representation of the corporate meetings supplier community. This research shows that corporate meetings suppliers unequivocally prefer StarCite to electronically solicit, access, and win new business,” said Michael Boult, president and chief executive officer of StarCite.

“From identifying and responding to qualified new business leads to delivering an effective experience that facilitates usage of the tool, suppliers clearly favor StarCite, use it far more than any other option, and see it as an indispensable element of their business development strategy.”

Survey respondents expressed a greater degree of satisfaction with StarCite than with any other eRFP provider. Ninety percent of hotel and convention suppliers said they were “satisfied” to “very satisfied” with their StarCite experience, compared to 76 percent for OnVantage and 80 percent for other eRFP tools.

ITR also found that respondents were more pleased with the StarCite user experience than other options. For example, 71 percent were “very” or “somewhat” satisfied with the ease of login and registration when using StarCite. For OnVantage, the result was 43 percent.

“These results clearly demonstrate that the suppliers surveyed recognize that StarCite is an extremely valuable demand generation channel for corporate meetings business,” said Bob Bennett, vice president, product marketing for StarCite.

“They confirm that with over $2 billion in revenue opportunities and 43,000 eRFPs distributed to users in 2005, StarCite is viewed as one of the most effective electronic marketplace available. At the same time, the high levels of supplier participation on the StarCite Marketplace mean that corporate buyers can feel confident that they are accessing the deepest pool of potential options for their meetings business.”

Integrated Technology Research Corporation (ITR) was commissioned by StarCite to conduct an unbiased, third party research study that would provide insights and identify trends within the growing corporate meetings eRFP industry.

The survey was conducted online through ITR’s survey website, itrsurveys.com, between December 5 – 11, 2005. The survey population included approximately 12,000 hotel and convention venue decision makers, of which 1,161 responded.