Meeting News - November 19, 2007 - (Page 8)

Inside the Meetings Industry Edited by Elizabeth West elizabeth.west@nielsen.com Ener gy Cities’ Alliance to Power Global Inter est In Their Destinations Partnership underscores increasingly popular strategy of marketing to specific industries Pattaya, Thailand—A new global alliance of diverse destinations was announced at the annual International Congress and Convention Association exhibition on Oct. 30. Aberdeen Convention Bureau (Scotland), Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority (United Arab Emirates), Calgary Telus Convention Centre (Canada), and Perth Convention Bureau (Australia) united under the Global Energy Cities Alliance in a cooperative marketing venture to attract energy industry groups to their destinations. Abu Dhabi, the clear leader of the alliance from an energy perspective, produces 9.2 percent of the world’s oil and 4 percent of natural gas. The balance of the alliance comprises both emerging energy cities as well as traditional strongholds. Western Australia has $60 billion worth of energy-related projects, either in development or planned over the next decade—largely to feed China’s ravenous demand. Aberdeen’s stakes lie in the U.K.’s North Sea, where intense oil and gas exploration and production rival that in the Gulf of Mexico. An estimated $500 million is currently committed to energy-related corporate infrastructure in the city. Calgary—home to the majority of Canadian oil and gas production companies, pipeline operators, and drilling companies— drives more than $75 billion of the $108 billion in major energy-related projects in the province of Alberta. “Given today’s competitive environment, it is increasingly evident we need to develop alliances that enable the partners to leverage collective knowledge and skills to give them a marketing edge,” said Christine McLean, Perth Convention Bureau’s director of corporate services, who added that the group is more 8 MeetingNews Corp. Travel Managers Tackle 2008 Issues Munich—More than 1,200 corporate travel buyers and suppliers met Oct. 21-23 for the Association of Corporate Travel Executives’ Global Education Conference to address topical issues and unveil a couple of introductions. Besides Americans’shrinking ability to travel overseas due to the weak U.S. dollar, an internal ACTE survey shows other pressures the business travel industry will face in 2008. ACTE predicted that their members’ firms will see an increase in travel spending rivaling the 8-percent increase in 2007. Much of the rise in spending will come from higher prices, it said. And, for the first time, the survey included procurement personnel, who increasingly oversee travel programs. One prominent topic at the conference was the push to increase compliance with internal business travel policies. Another was the range of actions ACTE could take to dissuade cities and countries from funding environmental conservation initiatives through greater taxes on traveler-oriented servcontinued on page 10 The leaders of the Global Energy Cities Alliance expect their partnership to inject some fuel into their meetings business. than about exchanging sales leads. “The ultimate aim is for associations and [corporations] around the world to recognize our cities as dynamic leaders offering clients a network of like-minded destinations that can assist in delivering high-caliber conferences.” A major element of the alliance is a dedicated website that will give planners access to a collective support package with links to partner websites. The partnership is not unlike the one created by the Milwaukee; Portland, OR; and Pittsburgh convention bureaus last year, in which the organizations banded together to attract association business. Their efforts netted some success in garnering business in a major sector of the meetings industry, as the CVBs helped address specific association needs, such as year-over-year location requirements. At least part of this success was the signing of multiyear contracts with groups willing to commit their programs to each of the participating destinations in the alliance. It remains to be seen how such alliances will shake out in courting industry-specific groups. But the energy cities alliance is eager to find out. Marcia Lyons, general manager of the Calgary Telus Convention Centre, said, “What attracted us to the alliance was its uniqueness,” and added that it is a great strategicmove. —Elizabeth West Suppliers Discuss Leveraging Customer Data Las Vegas—A few hundred hospitality industry marketing executives convened in mid-October in Las Vegas for the Travel Distribution Summit of North America, where they discussed improving their customer relationship marketing through customer data gathering, management, and integration. Bob Gilbert, executive VP of Intrasight Inc., a relationship-marketing firm for travel/hospitality, chaired the series of presentations and workshops. He said the hospitality industry is quickly realizing the importance of utilizing customer data and activity to deliver personalized, customer-triggered messages that result in loyalty to an individual hotel or resort or even a chain. Lisa Phillips, a consultant to the Pinehurst Resort, in Pinehurst, NC, told attendees that a priority should be segmenting customers to grow specific niches and incremental revenues. “Besides paying close attention to maintaining data integrity, we must also focus on information that’s important for marketing, such as geographic, demographic, and psychographic data.” Ryan Green, senior manager of customer loyalty at Southwest Airlines, added, “A data warehouse can be a hospitality company’s most valuable asset.” www.meetingnews.com November 19, 2007 http://www.meetingnews.com

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Meeting News - November 19, 2007

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