- Registration Reseller
The Professional Meeting Planners Network (PMPN), which specializes in small medical meetings, has spun off a new company to resell online registration services and try to make Web registration and housing more practical for smaller groups — medical and nonmedical.
Attendee Management Inc. (www.attendeenet.com), based in Wimberly, Texas, is led by independent meeting pros, including president Jeff Rasco, former senior vice president at JRDaggett & Associates, and chairman Rod Abraham, president of PMPN.
In the past, planners using online registration contracted with a registration company — typically paying a license fee, setup fee, and per transaction fees — and had to learn the software. AMI plans to buy registration transactions from the major registration providers at volume discounts (its first contract is with RegWeb, recently acquired by StarCite) then resell them to groups. AMI holds the license to the registration software, builds the registration/housing Web site for the client, and provides customer support. And while the planner doesn't need to know the ins and outs of the registration product, he or she has access to the back-end reporting functions.
“Chances are pretty good that a meeting planner is going to be able to get his or her per transaction cost at about the price they'd get if they contracted directly with the [registration] ASP, but they don't have to learn how to use the software, and they don't have to pay the licensing fee or the other up-front costs,” says Rasco.
- Event411 Folds
Online meeting and attendee management provider Event411 is out of business. The Marina del Rey, Calif.-based company had earned the high-profile job of providing online registration for the Democratic National Convention in 2000, as well as a prestigious corporate client list. The company's primary creditor, Quincy, Mass.-based online housing provider Passkey, “took possession of Event411's registration technology and some of the company's fixed assets as repayment for debts,” according to a mid-August statement, clarifying that Passkey did not acquire the company. “After thorough due diligence…it was determined that maintaining and servicing the technology as it currently exists was not a financially viable option,” the statement said.
- Web Welcome
Sending attendees a URL for your host hotel has become standard practice. Leave it to the tony folks at Four Season Hotels and Resorts to take it up a notch. Every property in the Toronto-based luxury chain will create a customized mini hotel Web site for your meeting free of charge. The template allows space for the name of the group, meeting dates, and a brief message to attendees. Each site includes hotel and destination facts, a link to a five-day forecast, and a property slide show. To see a sample, visit www.fourseasons.com/sayan/inseason.
- Follow the Bouncing Ball
EIBTM, Reed Travel Exhibitions' European meeting and incentive show, has named Corbin Ball to chair its 2003 Worldwide Watch panel. The panel is responsible for selecting, among the program entries, the one technology they feel will have the most influence on the meeting industry in the future. Ball, a meeting technology consultant, was recently named Meeting Professionals International's International Supplier of the Year and has served as a columnist for this magazine.
- www.conferzone.com
ConferZone, a Web site created as a resource for e-conferencing buyers, has published “ConferGuide 2002,” its third annual guide to Web conferencing companies. The online publication includes a Web conferencing primer and detailed information on more than 40 vendors. It costs $199 for a one-month access. The ConferZone Web site, which is free, includes a comprehensive but much less detailed database of e-conferencing suppliers in six categories — video conferencing, Web conferencing, audio conferencing, collaborative conferencing, infrastructure, and consulting/training.
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