The IMEX meetings industry juggernaut continues to gather speed, with attendance figures for IMEX America, in Las Vegas in October 2014, showing increases across the board, and adding up to a record.
The fourth edition of the show that has stayed loyal to the Sands Expo drew 2,909 hosted buyers from 52 countries.
The figures represent an eight per cent increase on 2013. Seventy per cent of the buyers came from the US, six per cent from Canada, five per cent from Brazil and 3.5 per cent from the UK. Chinese hosted buyers accounted for two per cent of the total, as did buyers from Mexico.
Exhibitor numbers were up eight per cent, 2,900 from 150 countries – 200 more than in 2013, while the show’s stand footprint increased by 13 per cent. Admittedly, the figures come direct from the organiser, but such is the standard of Ray Bloom’s Regent Exhibitions’ currency that absence of a formal independent audit doesn’t seem to deter exhibitors.
A new ‘appointment profile’, first trialled at IMEX in Frankfurt back in May 2014, provided an online function allowing buyers in Vegas to create up to five short event profiles – mini RFPs (requests for proposals) – to provide exhibitors with a specification on budget, size, scope, theme and date for a particular meeting or event.
Forty-five per cent of all hosted buyers, according again to the show’s stats, took advantage of the new function. The difference for exhibitors is that the method allows them to prepare in advance for almost half of the one-to-one appointments based on knowledge of a specific piece of business the buyer is looking to place.
Bloom’s team claimed 53,000 pre-scheduled appointments were made between buyers and exhibitors, a figure comprising both one-to-one meetings as well as booth presentations (also chosen by the buyers).
The ‘selfie’ photo, left, illustrates the rush to get into the exhibition on Day One, by which time a dozen other industry events had already taken place under the show’s auspices, including several sets of industry certification programmes, the CIC Hall of Leaders Gala, Association Evening, Site Nite North America, the first ever CEIR IMEX America Golf Classic, the Site Young Leaders Conference and the IMEX Challenge.
Smart Monday, the pre-show education day, attracted 1,000 meetings professionals to 39 development sessions.
Powered by MPI, the programme combined a keynote, education seminars and workshops. There was also an Association Focus and Association Evening plus the first instalment of the PCMA Business School. Topics spanned Strategic Planning, Project Management, Stakeholder Management, Implementation, Financial Management and Human Resources.
Storytelling is a watchword trending in the industry and Steve Gross, Executive Director and ‘Chief Playmaker’ for consumer brand Life is Good’s Playmakers programme, opened Smart Monday with a keynote extoling the power of play. “When people get together through meetings and events it is critical to deliver playfulness which helps them engage, connect and explore, to enjoy being there…in the now,” he said.
Sessions were also delivered from a long list of the industry’s leading acronyms: MPI, ECM, GBTA, GMIC, HSMAI, IAPCO, ISES and SITE.
Interactive sessions, case studies and networking all formed part of the Association Focus for association executives. And there was an Association Evening reception the MGM Grand.
Stand out events at the show included MPI daily keynotes, the Executive Meeting Forum attended by high level representatives from Coca Cola, Microsoft and Wells Fargo, and the live satellite interview with Global CEO of SAP, Bill McDermott, the man who dramatically turned around the fortunes of the world’s largest software company.
McDermott was not slow in accepting a challenge to become a spokesman for the meeting industry and spoke eloquently of the sector’s strengths and values. Bloom and his team can be proud to have delivered such an impressive and big hitting advocate to the stage and the pledge was to assist McDermott in every way possible to lobby hard in future too.
McDermott, addressed a packed room via remote video technology from New York on the day he launched his autobiography: Winners Dream. He spoke passionately about the power of face-to-face meetings and live events to generate economic growth. The contribution was, indeed, a rallying cry to other CEOs around the world.
IMEX America delivers its education in a variety of formats, from intimate campfires to ‘Hot Topic Tables’ and ‘Meet the Expert’ clinics.
Inspiration Center speaker Debra Zabloudil, President and CEO of The Learning Studio, Inc told those attending her session: “Success takes time, but time passes regardless. So you may as well get started making progress towards your goals, no matter how small the steps. There really is no time like the present.”
IMEX MD Paul Flackett described the show’s education sessions as “mines of information and inspiration”.
“The competition in our meetings world is fierce and being one step ahead is no longer good enough,” Flackett added.
“Some 30 years ago when I joined up with Ray Bloom to begin the tradeshow odyssey I was advised that tradeshows were in decline and that technology would conquer all. Well I am glad that this advice was ignored – trade shows have embraced technology as a means of ensuring that their core value of face-to-face meetings grows ever stronger with an increasingly higher quality of delivery.”
A pick from the many contributions on the technology theme was the contribution by Event Farm’s Brennan McReynolds, one of the speakers at Tech Hub. Many technologies are designed to promote interaction, but most fail when it comes to events, he believes. “The purpose of lots of tech is engagement,” he said. “But if I’m staring at my phone you can’t tell if I’m texting my girlfriend or on some event-specific mobile app.”
Pushing the case for using Near Field Communication (NFC), McReynolds explained how NFC enabled simple interaction between electronic devices – allowing event organisers and attendees to make contactless transactions, access digital contact and connect badges with a single touch.
And he gave the example of a recent concert event, where NFC-enabled tablets were placed in spheres that hung from the ceiling. As the band being promoted at the event played, the spheres were lowered to crowd level and the audience was invited to tap them to download an mp3 of the band’s music.
There was also a tech start up competition at the Tech Hub, with new technology companies competing against each other for the prize for the most compelling new product or service for the meetings industry. Thirty companies entered and 10 made the finals. Speechio, an app that allows speakers to improve their presentations, and the audience to share knowledge, took the first prize.
It is still possible to catch some of the content from the 180-plus sessions via the IMEX website.
The IMEX charity Challenge, which took place prior to the show opening in Las Vegas, saw 46 volunteers and sponsors build a healing garden at The Shade Tree shelter for women, children and their pets.
Song Division composed a song for The Shade Tree and a group of women and children from the shelter provided an inspirational introduction to the first MPI keynote on Smart Monday.
This was first published in issue 78 of CMW. Any comments? Email Zoe Vernor
