Successful Meetings - September 2008 - (Page 13) multi-day programs; but when we provided $25 gas cards for a committee meeting we believe it helped ensure attendees made the trip,” MAR’s Butts says. Remote conferencing and virtual meeting technologies are finding stronger demand as fuel costs rise. According to the latest annual FutureWatch survey by American Express and Meeting Professionals International of 1,643 industry buyers and suppliers, more than one in three corporate and association planners are looking for alternatives to live meetings. Technology giant Accenture has installed 13 telepresence conferencing “The decision to participate in even free events depends on the cost to travel there—so the more locations, the greater the chance that they’ll participate.” —Cindy Butts, Maine Association of Realtors rooms at its offices and plans another 22 telepresence rooms by the end of the year, according to the New York Times. The virtual meeting technology replaced 240 international trips and 120 domestic trips in May, translating to potential millions in savings for the year, company executives estimate. “Only in the last two years has the technology gotten to point where it really makes sense to use it,” Alan Minton, vice president for marketing at Bloomington, IN-based Cornerstone Information Systems, told the New York Times, estimating that online conferencing has cut his company’s travel costs by 60 percent. —Corrie Dosh SUCCESSFUL MEETINGS SEPTEMBER 2008 http://worktopia.com/CorporateSolutions http://worktopia.com/CorporateSolutions
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