Meeting Web Sites The Evolution
The Internet has brought unprecedented change to the meeting industry. During the past seven years, new ideas, tools, and radically different business processes have bubbled up from hundreds of meeting-focused dot-coms, selling everything from abstract management tools to meeting space auctions to virtual trade shows. After the dot-bomb of 2000, however, many companies unplugged; the ones that survived are concentrating on core businesses and refining existing systems. Many of the pioneering industry portals are alive and well, but considerably matured from the early days of the Web. This is an excellent time to look at this amazing evolution.
Site Selection/RFP sites
- PlanSoft and Mpoint
PlanSoft (www.plansoft.com) led the way in digitizing the site search process. Launched in 1997, it was the first industry Web site to feature a comprehensive database of hotels and suppliers coupled with an online request for proposal (RFP), and a “hot dates” section of distressed inventory. In September 2000, the company changed its planner site to www.mpoint.com to differentiate it from the 30-plus industry Web sites using PlanSoft's site search engine. Still the most comprehensive database of meeting facility information on the Web (with more than 40,000 hotels and more than 30,000 suppliers), activity continues to grow. It also offers an array of articles, checklists, and news features as well as a meetings consolidation system, job board, and other tools.
- EventSource/ProcurePoint
EventSource started in early 1996, offering online RFP tools and a strong meeting facility database. Innovations include the first online meeting auction in 1999 — a novel way to buy and sell group space. Also, about the same time, the company rolled out Compass, a basic tool set to track hotel spending. This year EventSource changed its name to ProcurePoint Travel Solutions (www.procure point.com), redesigned its site, and refocused its business plan. The company now provides tools to buy hotel space for group and transient travel. It offers an updated version of auctions (now called “open bidding”). Bids, responses, and meeting spend can be tracked; a database of 12,500 meeting facilities is included.
- AllMeetings/GetThere
Conceived in 1997, All-Meetings started as an online site information and RFP tool. Unique features included the ability to estimate the cost of a meeting, including hotel, F&B, airfare, and other travel costs. In 2000, AllMeetings merged with GetThere (www.getthere.com). With the resulting GetThere DirectMeetings product, the company focus shifted from a public Internet site to a corporate intranet tool. Later that year, Sabre Holdings purchased the company and merged it with its subsidiary Sabre BTS, which had already brought the Sabre booking engine to the corporate desktop. Today, the GetThere product is an end-to-end procurement tool, covering site selection, invitations, registration, and travel booking. A unique offering is the ability to fully book meeting space, catering, and sleeping rooms online, rather than through an RFP process.
- StarCite
In early 1999, StarCite (www.starcite.com) evolved out of McGettigan Partners, providing a range of online meeting procurement tools (a site selection and supplier database with more than 53,000 listings, RFP management, and a system to track meeting spending). Among its contributions to cyberspace: using the Web to resell canceled meeting space. Today, planners can send and analyze RFPs and manage budgets and meeting logistics while suppliers receive, manage, and respond to RFPs and market their offerings in enhanced listings — all online. Partner companies facilitate online registration and travel booking. Custom versions allow companies to oversee travel policy compliance, procurement, and reporting.
- MeetingPath
Funded by a consortium of 10 convention and visitor bureaus, primarily in Massachusetts, MeetingPath (www.meetingpath.com) is the principal lead-distribution system for those organizations. While it has the kind of searchable database found in many sites, MeetingPath's StarDates section is unique, posting short-term (up to 36 weeks), day-by-day hotel sleeping room inventory.
Association Sites
- MPINet and MPIWeb
MPINet was the industry's first online forum. Started in January 1994 by Meeting Professionals International on CompuServe, it grew to more than 2,200 subscribers in two years. For many participants, it was their introduction to the Internet, and it is regarded as one of the strongest online communities for meeting professionals. In 1996, MPI migrated to a Web-based offering (www.mpiweb.com), a sprawling, content-rich site that has gone through a number of iterations but still has navigation challenges. Enhanced services are expected soon. MPI has been unsuccessful so far in bringing the MPINet community with it. Currently, the most dynamic industry listserv is the MIMlist (www.mim.com).
- IACC
The International Association of Conference Centers site, www.iacconline.com, started in 1996 as a directory of member centers, but it has evolved as one of the best examples of an online association management system for our industry. Members can update their online listing, pay dues, register for meetings, communicate with other members, subscribe to a listserv, submit news, and post and find jobs. Students can sign up as interns.
Registration/Housing Sites
- CardinalWeb
Cardinal Communications (www.cardinalweb.com) and its spinoffs (RegWeb, the Meeting Industry Mall, Smart-RFP) were the first to build an online hotel RFP, to build template-driven Web sites in the meeting industry, and to provide template-driven association management Web sites to MPI chapters and other associations, as well as one of the first to build an active job board. RegWeb is among the top full-featured online registration products; B-there, seeUthere Technologies, and Event411 are other current leaders.
- Passkey
Launched in 1996, Passkey (www.passkey.com) led the way in allowing all parties — planners, bureaus, and hotels — to use the Web to monitor and manage group sleeping room inventory in real time. Many of the online registration companies have developed housing modules, but Passkey was the first to do so and is the leader for citywide meetings.
- Cvent
One of dozens of online registration firms on the Web, Cvent was the first to build and market advanced audience profiling and one-to-one marketing concepts. Cvent was followed by SeeUThere, RegWeb, and Event411 offering similar products.
Miscellaneous
- MeetingsNet
Established in 1996, MeetingsNet (www.meetingsnet.com), the information portal for several Primedia publications, was one of the first Web sites for the meeting industry press and the first with free searchable archives.
- Eventweb
In 1996, Doug Fox created one of the first e-zines for the meeting industry (www.eventweb.com). This weekly meeting technology e-mail publication has 8,000 subscribers.
- MeetingJobs.com
MeetingJobs.com (www.MeetingJobs.com) was the first online job board dedicated to the meeting and special event industry. In 2000, the site expanded and allied with a mirror site on Mpoint.com. A new array of options became available, including interactive e-mail boxes to connect job posters and seekers.
- CorbinBall.com
Humbly submitted as the Web's most comprehensive meeting technology site, with thousands of up-to-date categorized links, more than 80 articles, 14 free Excel meeting planning software tools, and a free e-mail newsletter distributed to 5,000-plus subscribers.
Corbin Ball, CMP, is a speaker, consultant, and writer focusing on events and meeting technology. With 20 years' experience running international citywide technology meetings, he helps clients worldwide use technology to save time and improve productivity. Contact him at his Web site, www.corbinball.com.
Take Out
Key links: www.mpoint.com
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