Event professionals have cited the need to prove results as one of the top demands in the wake of increased attention to the cost and effectiveness of meetings and business events.
Despite this prevalent need, the main finding of the 18-month Business Value of Meetings study commissioned by Meeting Professionals International (MPI) indicates that event planners are not measuring the fiscal and educational impact of meetings due to perceived difficulty.
Without a consensus among event professionals about measurement of return on investment (ROI) or return on objectives (ROO), MPI was able to begin research due to funding from the MPI Foundation made possible by an investment from AIBTM into this thought leadership initiative.
This initiative and research has explored the multiple definitions, and sometimes lack thereof, of the business value of meetings and the challenges professionals face.
“What we found was that certain companies and organizations, be they larger or in certain industries like pharmaceutical, were more likely to have begun a measurement program,” said Bill Voegeli, chief researcher and president of Association Insights.
“However, less than 5 percent of meetings were measured for business value, and the assumption of complexity was a main barrier to implementation.”
AIBTM as the primary investor and MPI, with more than 23,000 members, both want to insure that this study brings more than just data to the market. When evaluating the final findings researchers and MPI’s content development team sought to translate months of research into meaningful information.
In addition to the study’s debut at AIBTM in Baltimore, Maryland, June 21-23, 2011, MPI is developing a robust toolkit designed to help professionals build skills that can move them toward a measurement program.
The toolkit will provide solutions that will help create buy-in from senior staff, assists in setting goals and objectives for events and helps define measurement, reporting and analysis of results. It will be previewed at AIBTM and in phases post exhibition.
For professionals who have avoided the assumed difficulty of defining and measuring the impact of meetings and events, the data will ultimately bringing clarity to the necessary processes around determining the value of meetings.
