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ROI Survey
Scratching the Surface
A newConvene epanel survey reveals that the majority of planners use tried-and-true methods — such as post-event surveys — to evaluate their participants’ ROI at their events, but many of them aren’t mining opportunities to gather more meaningful data.
By Michelle Russell 50c+ 62b+ 78931+22+13100406080d+12223242526272
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M
ore than half of the meeting professionals who responded to Convene’s latest online survey report that they are under greater pressure both to deliver
and to evaluate their event participants’ ROI. Yet the survey responses reveal that the majority don’t go much beyond the standard post-event survey, in which they ask participants to rate their level of satisfaction with the education, F&B, and networking experienced at their events. Unfortunately, the information gleaned from those kinds of surveys does not go very far in quantifying the value of face-to-face events. Not too many planners seem to be chasing down critical information at the end of the line: the actual outcomes of attendee and exhibitor experiences at their events. Fewer than
40 percent of our respondents survey attendees to see how they’ve applied what they’ve learned at their events to their work. And even fewer — only 15 percent — go a step beyond that, to ask attendees and exhibitors whether executing on what they learned or experienced at their events had a finan- cial or business impact on the organizations they work for. Of course, corporate planners have an advantage in getting
that kind of information. As one corporate planner respondent explained: “We look at sales numbers for those that have attended the program. For management-development pro- grams, we survey their direct reports pre- and post-meeting.” And those planners whose conferences have a CME or CEU component must be more diligent about measuring ›
SEPTEMBER 2013 PCMA CONVENE 69
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