You benefit

• Complement your overextended staff with extra hands, on a temporary basis.
• Provide expertise in such highly specialized areas as promotion, marketing, budgeting, exhibit sales/logistics, travel and hotel arrangements, and more.
• Bring fresh ideas to your in-house meeting department to give you another perspective.
• Maximize your staff resources by utilizing their specialized strengths and skills toward the larger organizational goals
• Prevent staff burnout
• Stay abreast of the latest trends
• Your meeting is more efficient & easier to service. Vendors offer you better deals.

Your Members & Attendees Benefit

• An energized, challenged and rewarded staff better meet the needs of your constituency
• Gain from fresh ideas and a new perspective
• Development of new programs

Hotels and Vendors Benefit

• Use of the latest technology
• Your meeting becomes more attractive to hotels and vendors
• Utilizing known professionals with national relationships with excellent an reputation

Meeting planning consultants can create the most on-target programs. Consultants can…

• Help define the objectives of your meeting.
• Develop a central theme for your promotion and programs, as well as work with media to cover your events.
• Find professional speakers to address your group.
• Provide complete on-site management.
• Plan the “social-side” of your event, such as parties, menus, liquor control, spouse programs, etc.
• Prepare a post-meeting critique to help you evaluate your meeting and determine what improvements/changes to make in the future.

Meeting planning consultants can help you avoid expensive mistakes. They can…

• Assist in drafting a budget before you make any expenditures and help you to monitor that budget before, during, and after your meeting.
• Draw from their years of seasoned experience to assess your needs realistically and show you how to fine-tune your meeting to best suit your financial and programming objectives.
• Provide you with financial management services, such as collecting fees, holding money in escrow, approving and paying bills, etc. (typically for associations).

“As organizations seek to control and reduce spending and as they work to improve output, outsourcing of functions is now a major trend.” — —The Meeting PROFESSIONAL, MPI 2005

… and, no, it doesn’t cost them their jobs.

In the months prior to a meeting, an in-house planner usually needs more staff than his/her budget allows. Sometimes there is a short-term project that requires more time and attention than a single planner can devote.

There are many ways in which an independent planner can serve as an adjunct to your own staff. You set the terms, the extent of the independent planner’s involvement, and the duration of his/her contract. You determine the degree of autonomy or interdependence on you and your staff.

Consultants are there to make you look good. They won’t cost you your job. Making a smart decision to outsource will convince upper management that you are a smarter manager! You’ll come out ahead because you’ll get the job done even though your department may be understaffed and overworked! You will also have the time to implement any long-awaited new programs.

Meeting planning consultants bill for their services in the same way as other professional consultants; hourly, daily, per project, or on an annual retainer. Just as you pay your attorney or accountant to help you solve business problems, so will you pay a professional meeting consultant.

A knowledgeable and capable meeting consultant is experienced in managing special requirements and can maximize your return on investment.

You are paying for the consultant’s time and experience in having done these things before, or, in some cases, for the consultant’s time and effort in determining how your particular problem/challenge can be better handled. It is important to make sure that you and your consultant have the same basic understanding of the scope and nature of your meeting and the tasks at hand.

You will find that the consultant saves you money because he/she knows how to accomplish the tasks that need to be performed for your meeting more economically and in a shorter amount of time, resulting in a better managed meeting. To learn more about how to earn rebate money to pay for Conference & Logistics Consultants’ services, please visit our Commission Rebate page.

Associations and Non-Profits:

• Volunteer committees charged with producing meetings and conventions or selling exhibits
• Senior staff who are looking for innovation and new ideas
• Busy staff who need extra hands to get the job done

Corporations:

• Executives and officers responsible for producing board and other meetings
• Sales managers who plan sales conferences and incentive programs/trips
• Administrators who work on staff meetings and company outings
• Personnel departments conducting training sessions
• Meeting planners who find themselves temporarily short staffed