The future of online reservations for small event spaces – Meetings Innovation Report

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Businesses can now expand their use of online platforms to book small meetings in creative venues, as they now have the ability to send messages directly to venues in real time and integrate compliance requirements.

Greg Oates, Skift

The future of meetings and events

The last few years have seen an increase in online platforms to book small meeting spaces in creative venues, including sites such as Bizly and Spacebase. They are designed to relieve the headaches associated with the manual request for proposal (RFP) process by offering instant direct booking capability and non-negotiable lowest rate guarantees.

“No one wants to use RFPs for small meetings today; they are universally hated by suppliers and buyers, ”Ron Shah, founder of Bizly, told me. “Suppliers typically have less than one percent conversion, and buyers always have to wait indefinitely to hear from them. And then there’s all this negotiation that has to be handled manually, whether by email, phone, or whatever. It just sucks for everyone.

However, corporate customers want additional personalization and compliance systems built into these platforms so they can be used enterprise-wide more often. Jumping on that, Shah relaunched an expanded Bizly website this month with a new instant messaging center, so planners can speak directly with site staff, and a new built-in compliance mechanism. This could potentially kill the RFP for hosting small meetings of less than 100 people. Read the full story of Skift here.

– Greg Oates, Meetings Editor

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Next Generation Event UX

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A face-to-face request is 34 times more effective than an email: New research in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology suggests that people tend to overestimate the power of their persuasive force via textual communication and underestimate the power of their persuasive force via face-to-face communication. Learn more about Harvard Business Review

Destination disruptors

The Sydney Culture Essays: Every city has to do it. Many Sydney business, academics, community and government leaders have published the new Sydney Culture Essays to position the city’s role as a global innovator. Check out the article by Lyn-Lewis Smith, CEO of Business Events Sydney: The role of culture in attracting bright minds to Sydney. Learn more about The Sydney Culture Essays, produced by The Committee for Sydney

Los Angeles wants its Everyone’s Welcome campaign to connect with Global Millennials: Los Angeles is part of a trend in major cities around the world as they try to distance themselves from the less welcoming rhetoric coming from parts of their country. Learn more about Skift

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The Skift Meetings Innovation Report is hosted by Skift Editor Greg Oates [[email protected]]. The newsletter is sent by email every Wednesday.

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