Conference Software

Find Meeting Planning News, Tools and More at MeetingsNet for Free!

Wednesday, November 18, 2009 by Cvent Staff

Need information about implementing a Strategic Meetings Management Program? Are you looking for tips on negotiating contracts? Or maybe you just need to check out the latest food & beverage trends for events? MeetingsNet is the perfect resource!

MeetingsNet’s websites and magazines are conducting their annual subscription drive and invite all professionals with meeting planning responsibility to sign up for free subscriptions to Corporate Meetings & Incentives (now including Financial & Insurance Meetings), Association Meetings, and Medical Meetings. Religious meeting planners can get more information about obtaining a subscription to Religious Conference Manager.

MeetingsNet also publishes the popular MeetingsNet Extra, delivered every Tuesday to your inbox with newsbreaking stories, and MeetingsNet Tech Extra, a monthly newsletter that takes the mystery out of meeting technologies. It just takes a few minutes, and planners have the option of signing up for digital or mail delivery.

Visit MeetingsNet to subscribe today!

How Reliable is Your Registration Software?

Monday, November 9, 2009 by Elizabeth Elko

Some questions you need to consider before making a decision regarding online registration software include:

"What would the effect be of losing an entire day or two of data?"

"Ultimately, what are the costs incurred if the events don't happen successfully due to system outages?"

One thing that we take very seriously at Cvent, and that warrants mentioning, is the stability of our system. Since our inception in 1999, we've never experienced unplanned outages and are proud to say that we're the only registration software vendor that truly delivers 99.9% up-time to our users.

A majority of the other vendors out in the market can't promise this high level of reliability, but Cvent is here to relieve you of any worries you have about accessing valuable registration data - or worse - losing that data permanently.

Happy Birthday, Cvent Blog! The Top 10 Posts of Our First Year

Friday, October 9, 2009 by Sarah Larkins

One year ago, Cvent Meetings & Events blog was born! We've certainly grown—we're now over 1,000 posts strong!

To celebrate, I decided to take a look back at some of the year's highlights with a recap of our 10 most popular posts. Enjoy!

• How to Add Attendees—Not Expenses—to Your Event You can roll out an expensive marketing campaign or turn to discounted event prices to encourage registration, but you don't always have to do so.

• 3 Benefits of Banquetology Usually you'd think that bigger is better when it comes to catering at meetings and events. But in fact banquetology's "less is more" concept can be quite beneficial to planners in a number of ways.

• What to Include in Your Invitation Reminder Emails What can you do to increase your invitation response rate? Reminder emails are the answer.

• 3 Centerpiece Ideas to Save the Environment and Your Budget One area of meeting spend that can definitely get out of hand quickly is that of decor. It's also one that can be very wasteful, especially when it comes to centerpieces. Can you really save on centerpieces and be eco-friendly?

• How to Create a Custom Meeting Request Form In your already busy world, handling multiple meeting requests can get overwhelming. That's why meeting forms can be an invaluable tool in your Strategic Meetings Management program.

• 3 Caterers Offering Gluten-Free Menu Options One growing dietary concern among event guests is the need for a gluten-free option. Luckily, event caterers are hearing the call from planners to offer gluten-free meals.

• Creating Name Badges Doesn't Have to Be a Pain The task of creating name badges can be a time-consuming one. Event registration software such as Cvent makes it so much easier.

• 3 Ways Team Building Events Benefit Your Organization and Staff While professional networking, training and education are all key facets to your events, the benefits of team building to your employees and the organization as a whole should not be overlooked.

• 2009 Top 10 Meeting Trends Benchmark Hospitality International has released its Top 10 Meeting Trends for 2009, as observed at 30 award-winning properties.

• 3 Reasons Why Michael Scott Needs Cvent for The Office It's great that Michael can use Evite to quickly create an invitation and get some data on who is attending and who is not. But a 0.2 percent response rate? He could do better than that.

How to Maintain Company Standards and Consistent Branding in Event Websites, Emails and More

Wednesday, September 23, 2009 by Cvent Client Services

Larger organizations tend to have many users for their online registration software, and most of the time these users are located in different offices. This may cause difficulty in maintaining an organization’s standard of branding for events. Cvent offers a number of features to help address this.

Using Cvent, users can create and save event templates with their organization’s look and feel for the various types of events that they host. Once created, users can then easily clone a suitable template over and over for future event websites, invitations, etc.

Account-level email templates are also extremely helpful in these circumstances. Standard emails that may be used across multiple events can be set up at the account level for users to send to their specific targeted audiences. This will standardize the terminology and branding of an organization across its account.

Just because your email marketing is standardized doesn't mean it will be formal and cold. Through the use of data tags, these emails are also tailored to each individual that receives it, maintaining that personal feel. This is very helpful when sending out newsletters, announcements and invoices.

Administrators on accounts also have the ability to control the visibility and permissions of their users. This allows organizations to uphold the certain standard to which they are accustomed.

We've seen these features in action at large organizations. One client has even developed their own Cvent user guide with their organization's standards. They have found that using event templates and account-level email templates has helped them maintain their organization's branding and standard of communication.

Business Execs and Planners Agree: Face-to-Face Meetings Build Better Relationships

Tuesday, September 1, 2009 by Sarah Larkins

The news is in, and face to face meetings are coming out on top. In the past week, I've come across a number of studies in-person events, and overall, it looks like most business people are agree with what meeting planners have been trying to stress over the past year: Meetings Mean Business.

First, I came across some research by British Airways, which found that 95 percent of business people believe that face-to-face meetings are essential to build long-term relationships.

Then, I read a Forbes Insights study that surveyed over 750 business executives on whether virtual meetings can take the place of face-to-face contact. The answer? Definitely not.

Though many companies have reduced their travel and meeting budgets, and just over half the respondents to Forbes' study said they travel less for business today than they did back in January 2008, the executives still "expressed an overwhelming preference for face-to-face meetings, with more than 8 out of 10 saying they like in-person contact more than virtual."

Additionally, 85 percent of respondents said they prefer in-person, face-to-face business meetings and conferences because they build stronger, more meaningful business relationships. Respondents also said that face-to-face meetings are best for persuasion (91 percent), leadership (87 percent), engagement (86 percent), accountability (79 percent) and decision making (82 percent).

Finally, I just read about the HSMAI Affordable Meetings National and Event Technology Expo pre-conference survey, in which meeting planners attending the Washington, DC event next week said that today's meetings technology cannot duplicate certain key elements of face-to-face meetings. Socializing and and networking spontaneously, training effectively via live and personal interaction, and engaging in real-time conversation that is not interrupted by technical glitches are among the benefits that in-person conferences hold over virtual ones.

"While the 'always on the job' mentality of meeting planners tends to rely on the latest technological tools for marketing, presentations and networking, there is clearly a 'man over machine' mindset when it comes to other elements of meetings and conferences," said James Houran of 20|20 Assessment, which independently analyzed the HSMAI pre-conference survey, according to Plannerwire. "Thus, the popular push for more teleconferences or Internet-based meetings, even for smaller groups, may ultimately not meet critical needs of attendees."

California Venue Spotlight: Ontario Convention Center Updates Its Technology

Wednesday, July 22, 2009 by Katie Hollar

In January 2009, the Ontario Convention Center (OCC) in Ontario, California, introduced new technological capabilities for webinars and web-casting. With existing services such as VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol), DS3 and Wi-Fi Internet services, the Ontario Convention Center was already on the cutting edge of conference technology. But now, with the introduction of webinar capabilities, presenters at the OCC can distribute conference information to remote viewers and listeners in real time.

"Adding these to our existing services allows our clients greater flexibility," said Bob Brown, the general manager and CEO of the Ontario Convention Center. "With budgets being cut, travel may not be an option for companies right now. This gives them a viable alternative to conduct their business without breaking the bank."

The Ontario Convention Center offers planners over 225,000 square feet of flexible meeting and exhibit space to host both on-site and remote attendees.

View more information about the Ontario Convention Center on the Cvent Supplier Network

Cvent is Great for All Events from A(zkatraz) to Z

Friday, July 10, 2009 by Sarah Larkins

User conferences, association meetings, corporate gatherings, Harry Potter fan conferences? Yes, Cvent's online registration software is versatile enough to handle all kinds of guest registrations, including those of Harry Potter fan conference Azkatraz 2009.

Held July 17-21, just two days after the much-anticipated Harry and the Half-Blood Prince hits theaters, Azkatraz attracts fans from all over the world and at least 40 states to over 150 hours of event programming. Focused on J.K. Rowling's book series and the Warner Brothers' films, the event agenda includes presentations by TIME Magazine book critic Lev Gossman, Emerson Spartz of Mugglenet, and actor Chris Rankin, who plays Percy Weasley in the movies.

Azkatraz is the sixth in a series of events organized by HP Education Fanon, Inc. Almost all of the event organization, from registration to event chair meetings, is coordinated by volunteers online via Google, Yahoogroups, Skype, and, yes, Cvent!

Just check out the online registration page:

They made use of some of Cvent's great features to customize the event for their needs. For example, they added a custom field to their registrant information page for Badge Name:

And used the "Tell-A-Friend" feature to invite guests to forward the invitation:

Also added were various attendee-specific questions:

As well as some event-specific ones:

Just an example of how conferences come in all shapes and sizes, and Cvent can accommodate them all!

Cvent Featured in MeetingsNet!

Friday, May 15, 2009 by Cvent Staff

Cvent was recently profiled in MeetingsNet!

Check out an excerpt from the article: "Meetings technology provider Cvent has made a flurry of announcements recently that include major partnerships that enhance its Supplier Network of more than 75,000 hotels and venues, budget-friendly tools for organizations building a strategic meetings management program, and an integration with Cisco’s WebEx webinar technology. Long known for its expertise in online registration for meetings and events, Cvent has upped the ante with more than 100 feature upgrades."

Read the full article online! And don't forget to sign up for our May 20 webinar with MeetingsNet, "Deal or No Deal: Best Practices for Booking Meetings in a Tough Economy."

Watch Our Strategic Meetings Management Webinar Online!

Monday, April 27, 2009 by Cvent Staff

Did you miss our webinar on "Making Meetings Management More Efficient"? No problem—now you can watch it online!

In the Cvent-sponsored webinar, you'll hear from industry experts Christopher Davis, executive editor of Business Travel News; Kari Kesler, partner, Strategic Management Solutions, LLC; and Anil Punyapu, vice president, enterprise sales of Cvent. They'll discuss how to optimize your meetings process, giving advice on tracking, reporting, and incorporating cost-saving strategies such as the use of meeting cards and strategic meetings technology.

If you have questions about starting a Strategic Meetings Management program, or are looking for a way to maximize a return on investment for your meetings, this webinar is sure to help! Watch it now at the Cvent's news room.

Cvent Featured in ITBusiness.ca!

Friday, March 20, 2009 by Sarah Larkins

Cvent's online registration software and Supplier Network were recently featured on ITBusiness.ca! The article "Software tools help event planners get hard results" describes how Cvent's event planning tools can help planners host meetings easily, effectively and accurately despite shrinking budgets.

Some Cvent clients in Canada, such as Ottawa-based Netrunner, Inc., shared how Cvent helped streamline events and save money.

Valerie Yersh, vice president of events and marketing at Netrunner, noted in the article that Cvent's reporting function was useful for sending just the financial updates to the sales department, without having them access all of the other logistics information. When it came to costs, Cvent's customizable event website tool was her top money-saving feature.

"The Web site development function allowed us to launch the event without having to pay a fortune for back-end Web development," she said in the article. "We found creating a Web site would cost around $15,000."

Read the full article here at ITBusiness.ca.

Encouraging Alumni Donations with Event Registration Software

Monday, March 2, 2009 by Cvent Staff

We recently blogged about the importance of donations to non-profits, associations and foundations. Donations are also very important to educational organizations, whose meetings and events, it seems, may be more apt to weather the economic storm.

Meeting planners working with alumni can easily take fundraising efforts to the next level by adding a donation option to their event registration. They can even ask about donations from those who cannot attend. Redirect invitees to the How to Donate section of your website after declining an invitation, or include a regret question asking them if they would be interested in donating to your alumni fund. This way, you'll reach alumni who simply cannot make it to your event (due to schedule or location conflict, etc.) but who want to give back to the organization nonetheless.

During tough economic times, it's important for planners to use all their resources to get in touch with alumni and find those interested in donating. Thanks to Cvent's comprehensive set of event management tools, it's easy to customize your event registration and make sure you're reaching out for support at any time possible.

Creating Name Badges Doesn't Have to Be a Pain

Friday, February 27, 2009 by Cvent Staff

Catering, audio-visual equipment, floral services—the list of things your meeting or event may require goes on and on. One thing that nearly every event is sure to need? Name badges. After all, networking is a big component of most events. If your attendees don't know each other's names, making connections is certainly hard to do.

Unfortunately, the task of creating name badges can also be a time-consuming one. Planners have to figure out how to design a label, incorporate mail merge fields into the design (that's assuming you already know all about the mail merge itself), and generate a label. Event registration software such as Cvent makes it so much easier.

Using Cvent, you can select what information—email address, first name, last name, title, etc.—appears on the name tag. Add your organization's logo, and edit the font size, type, color and style.

Then, just select the contacts for whom you want to create a name badge and print.

Don't make the task of creating name badges more difficult than it needs to be. Cvent's fast and simple feature for name badge creation is another example of how the software can meet all your event management needs.

Event Planning Tips: Stay Ahead When Staff Size Decreases

Wednesday, February 18, 2009 by Cvent Staff

One of the many unfortunate effects of the down economy has been staff cutbacks. Aside from losing trusted colleagues in light of tightened budgets, staff reductions also mean your workload increases, though the hours in the day certainly do not.

Luckily, meeting and event planners can meet the challenge to do more with less thanks to technology such as Cvent. Cvent's online event registration software accomplishes the extra work you have on your shoulders by drastically cutting the time spent on manual tasks.

For example, Cvent consolidates your attendee or member records in one location, collecting this data from them as they sign up for meetings and events. This information is pre-populated for returning customers, allowing them to view and update out-of-date contact data. Using Cvent, keeping track of registrant information is easily accomplished without demanding any of your time.

Consider the cloning feature of Cvent's event and Request for Proposal (RFP) management tools. You can easily access past events or RFPs and, with a few quick changes, re-use them for your current event. There's no need to "reinvent the wheel"—you'll save time by doing all the major event work just once, leveraging it later for similar events or RFPs.

These are just a few of the ways Cvent can save you time in your event management. Though your meeting planning staff may be limited, there's no need to feel overwhelmed. Sign up for one of our online demos today to learn more about using Cvent to meet the demands of a heavier workload without falling behind.

How to Be an Effective Event Planner

Wednesday, February 4, 2009 by Cvent Staff

We recently came across an article on the "8 Habits of Highly Effective Planners" at MeetingsNet. All of them are certainly great habits to pick up, but there are a few especially notable ones that we can identify with.

• I nurture relationships with good suppliers and cultivate new ones.

Leveraging your relationships with preferred suppliers is not only a good business practice, but it's a great way to get the best rates possible. Especially in today's buyer's market, working with suppliers with whom you have existing deals, or with whom you can leverage past rate history in future negotiations, is the best way to get more bang for you buck.

• I ensure my expenditures are aligned with my firm's goals, hold myself accountable for analyzing their value, and measure cost-reduction related to each program.

In today's economy, monitoring your meeting spend and analyzing your expenses is an absolute must. If you don't keep track of where you're spending money, you won't be able to identify areas to cut costs and save. Plus, as organizations begin to look at meeting planning departments with a critical eye, it's important to stay accountable to upper management, both on what you're spending and what value you're adding to the company.

• I make the best possible use of technology to improve personal and departmental efficiencies.

There's never been a better time to break out of old, time-consuming event planning methods and implement cost-saving technology for your meetings. From online event registration to web based site selection and RFP management tools, event software providers such as Cvent can save money and increase event attendance—undoubtedly two key goals of any highly effective planner.

Read more about the 8 Habits of Highly Effective Planners at MeetingsNet.

Manage Membership Renewal Through Cvent Software

Thursday, January 29, 2009 by Cvent Staff

As a member-based organization, you have a lot more on your plate than planning meetings and events through Cvent. Another important responsibility: managing your annual membership renewal campaigns. Did you know that Cvent, the leader in online event registration software, can help your association do this, too?

Membership renewal through Cvent is easy and efficient. You can arrange for all your contacts to be notified of renewal just by organizing your contacts into lists based on renewal dates (i.e. those whose membership expires in January, February, etc.). Then, you can easily send targeted emails to members in a timely and efficient manner.

The process for renewal is easy. First, create and launch a professional, appealing website using Cvent. You can provide background on your organization, list key association contacts, detail membership advantages, etc.

Rather than clicking "Register Now!" your current/potential members can click to renew/subscribe.

After reviewing their contact information, they can submit select their membership fee and fill out the payment details.

A few simple steps, and renewal is complete. Contact Cvent today to find out how our software can be leveraged for more than just your association events.

Attendee Management Tip: Increase Registration with Early Bird Discounts

Friday, January 23, 2009 by Cvent Staff

In a recent post on tips for attendee management to increase registration, we mentioned that bundling pricing can be a great strategy for encouraging multiple registrations. But what if you're just looking for registrations, period? Or perhaps you're targeting many clients who work for small organizations, and thus don't have more than one employee for whom event attendance makes sense?

You can incentivize this target audience as well. One way to do this is to offer other price discount options such as early bird rates.

With Cvent's online registration software, you can set such time-related discounts for your admission items. Just enter the discounted price and specify a date. Any guests who registers prior to this date will pay the discounted early bird price.

Time-related discounts are a great way to draw in registrations. After all, most people are most open to paying for something when they know they're getting a deal.

Another tip for making the most of your early bird offer? As you approach your discounted registration deadline, consider extending the "Register by" date by a few weeks. Extending the early-bird rate will bring the event to your invitee's attention again. Plus, it will grab a whole set of registrants who realize they should take advantage of a second chance at a great rate.

Attendee Management: 5 Tips for Increasing Your Registrations

Tuesday, January 20, 2009 by Cvent Staff

Now more than ever, meeting planners are on the lookout for ways to increase attendee registration. With a few simple but effective changes in your attendee management strategy, you'll have event registration numbers up in no time.

• Don't spam. Utilizing email campaigns for your event marketing can get a response rate of five percent to 15 percent, compared to the one percent to two percent response rate of paper campaigns. Yet no email campaign has a chance of success if it doesn't even get through to your event invitee's inbox.

Carefully consider your email invitation's subject line and content so as to avoid getting stuck in a spam filter. Online registration software such as Cvent boasts an email content analyzer feature that scores your email deliverability and risk of getting caught in filters.

• Take advantage of free marketing. Event planning software can do wonders when it comes to event promotion. But don't forget the many free avenues to garner publicity, like social networking sites, free press release engines and more.

• Go online. The Internet is the go-to place for information these days. Don't be left out! Create an attractive, professional event website to offer invitees online registration and event details, and to keep attendees up-to-date on the latest agenda.

• Bundle prices. Offering bundled fees for multiple event registrations encourages organizations to sign up several attendees. Attendees will be hesitant of registering more than one attendee at full price. By offering a volume discount, you'll entice organizations to sign up two, three, four or more attendees.

• Brand your event. From a color scheme to a catchy slogan, your event should be branded with the key "take-away" for your attendees. Make sure your attendees know the benefit of coming your event, and shout it from the rooftops on your email invitation, event website, follow-up survey and more.

Keep Online Registration Numbers High!

Friday, January 16, 2009 by Cvent Staff

Times are tough, and you've no doubt seen many changes happening with your meetings and events. Are you concerned about keeping your registration numbers up?

Just like you, your potential event attendees are dealing with stricter budgets. It's getting harder and harder to justify money spent on elaborate conferences and events. You can, however, convince cash-strapped attendees to click "Yes" on your event invitations.

Be flexible with your attendees by offering them multiple registration options rather than one, all-inclusive entrance pass. By setting up your online registration with various event session and track options, you'll draw in attendees who can't justify the price of a ticket to your conference or meeting as a whole, but can certainly attend a few of the most valuable (in their eyes) events on your agenda.

Offering multiple registration options is easy with online registration software such as Cvent. You can add sessions, specifying names, start dates and times and more.

Set fees and amounts that are appropriate for each session.

When your attendees register, they can select to register for the entire event or just one or two of your sessions. This feature will not only allow you to keep the registrants whose budgets no longer allow for an entire event registration, but also gain those who may have never met your admission fee in the past.

Meeting Planners Resolve to Re-Tool Their Meetings Programs

Thursday, January 15, 2009 by Cvent Staff

According to a MeetingNews survey, the majority of meeting planners (29 percent) have set a New Year's resolution to re-tool their meetings program in 2009. Many planners said that getting more familiar with event technology was one way to do this. Others cited efforts such as "improving the electronic invitation process" and "increasing my skill level in the use of technology as it relates to planning, promotion, implementation, follow-up and evaluation of our meetings."

Online registration software such as Cvent can help you meet these meeting planning goals and more. From email invitations to event follow-up surveys, Cvent's extensive toolset can address all of your needs. Plus, Cvent's dedicated customer care team is available 24X5 to assist in the creation, management and analysis of your meetings and events, and can also offer insider tips and best practices for making your events a success.

Make sure that your 2009 resolution is kept. Learn more about event management with Cvent by signing up for one of our online demos today.

What to Look for in Software for Event Websites

Friday, January 9, 2009 by Cvent Staff

Now that you know how to what makes an event website professional and effective, how do you go about actually creating one? Selecting event registration software such as Cvent can help. What should you look for in an event management solution when it comes to event websites?

• Customizable pages. Color and text are important for capturing your event attendees' attention, so make sure your event software lets you be creative with your pages. With software such as Cvent, you can set background and text colors, select button colors and styles, specify time and date formats and more.

In addition to being able to change the color, useful software for creating event websites should allow you to customize items such as graphics. Adding your corporate logo and color schemes promotes brand awareness.

• Organized page tabs. Rather than overload your invitees with event information on the first page of your website, create separate pages for the event summary, agenda, attendee list, speakers, etc. Using Cvent, you can create multiple event pages, then organize these pages in a logical order under separate tabs.

• Ability to update. Your event isn't static, so why would your event website be? Valuable event website software will allow you to keep adding and editing your event website after the initial launch. You can keep your attendees up to date on agenda items, session speakers and more.

A final note: one of the most important things to look for in your event website solution is a user-friendly interface. Especially if you have no knowledge of HTML or experience in website construction, pick a software solution like Cvent that offers easy-to-use tools and free customer support. Creating and launching event websites becomes a no brainer for any user.