Social Media Marketing
1. A Revolution
Social Media is a revolutionary shift in the way people discover, read and share information. Open your mind to its virtual possibilities to take full advantage of its potential.
2. User-Controlled Content
SM flips traditional marketing on its head – all content becomes user-controlled. It can be adapted, shared and repurposed – you no longer [...]
Travel Quiz
We often get rung up by all kinds of promotions agencies and direct clients asking for a costing on ‘a little sales trip’ to add some sizzle to a national consumer promotion, with just a few days’ notice. How hard can it be, they say, to look up a package in a travel brochure, add [...]
The elephant in the room
Fishersfile, Nov/Dec, 2011
For most of this year businessmen and politicians in Europe have been ignoring a looming financial catastrophe. There have been so many elephants in the room this past year that no wonder the designers’ most popular colour for new products has been grey.
It may be that good news is no news and that [...]
VAT’s the way to do it
To create jobs and kick start their own economies those pesky Europeans have been reducing VAT levels for their own hospitality (accommodation, licensed & catering) industries in recent months. In France it is 5.5%, Germany 7%, Italy 10%, Spain 8% and Holland 6%. Ireland became the latest in July 11 slashing 4.5% off hospitality VAT. [...]
SFO to prosecute its own employee
FMI ran another Bribery Act corporate hospitality seminar at the IET, Savoy Place recently. The big news is that the first ‘intention to prosecute’ has just been approved and of all people it appears to be an employee of the Ministry of Justice based at Reading Crown Court. You couldn’t make it up, could you? [...]
Business can be murder…
They say that the commercial world is very ‘cut-throat’ at the moment what with the US economy slowing down and Europe stumbling from one Euro crisis to the next. But it’s business as usual in Stratford Upon Avon with murder on the dance floor a regular occurrence. Of course it’s all in fun as we [...]
Hey, you’re in my room!
A recent report into corporate travel revealed that bookings for premium, 5 star hotel rooms have fallen by some 45% in the previous 12 months. The same is probably true of most 4 star hotels. No surprise there, given the current stagnation in most Western economies. Consumer accommodation lodges such as Premier Inn, on [...]
Swifter, higher, trickier
With our office but a stone’s throw from the birthplace of the Paralympics in Stoke Mandeville, near Aylesbury, we are all constantly reminded on our way into work that, thanks to various local authority signposts, the Olympics are on their way. So it comes as no surprise that when London was confirmed as the venue [...]
Corporate hospitality breathes again, but…
Event buyers must be more cautious about accepting rewards from suppliers following the publication of guidance notes for the new Bribery Act today.
John Fisher, managing director of sales incentive schemes agency FMI, said that while the industry can ‘rest easy’ when it comes to fam trips, educationals and small scale gifts, buyers who accept reward [...]
Facilitating business
Shady dealings, conversations in corridors, shameful faces… but this time it’s about the legislators of the new Bribery Act, not about criminal activity. Watchers of this ongoing charade will be aware that we were told that the all-encompassing Bribery Act will NOT now come into force in April 2010 because they missed the deadline for [...]
Was the Savoy facelift worth it?
At £220million of expenditure and three years being closed the recent revamp of the Savoy Hotel had better be good. This was the challenge that faced the Fairmont Hotel Group who manage the property. It is always difficult to get upgrades right in the hospitality industry as sometimes the reason people still frequent ‘fading facilities’ [...]
You scratch my back…
It is right and proper that suppliers of large infrastructure projects should not be able to gain long term contracts by giving bungs to public service bureaucrats. There was widespread concern in 1997 when it was alleged that the UK Government had provided cash kickbacks of over £1billion over many years to a Saudi Prince [...]
Flying down to Rio
There cannot be many jobs where part of your working week is to be landing on Corcovado, in Rio, by helicopter. Gerry York, our ops director, took this picture on his moibile phone of one of the seven helicopters we chartered to take the Cadbury incentive winners group to see the Christ the Redeemer statue [...]
Move on up
In keeping with our current event management ‘discovery’ of using anything on wheels we recently completed a multiple city tour of the UK, giving the nation’s games retailers the chance to have a go at the new Sony PlayStation 3D Move games system.
The facility we used was a 16 ton truck which had been [...]
Dis-incentive travel
Just like Mark Twain, the death of incentive travel has been somewhat exaggerated. Some five years ago I predicted that incentive travel was dying out and needed to be put out of its misery. Five years on, as a promotional tool to encourage higher performance, it is certainly not defunct but groups are a [...]
Mitigation or VAT avoidance?
Getting ready as chairman for the upcoming FMI Group seminar on TOMS (see Masterclass, 17 June, www.meetpie.com/events) I am amazed that so much is not known by so many. Those in the events industry will recall that the EU decreed way back in 1987 that corporate group travel events to EU countries should be treated [...]
Iceland strikes again
Can destinations hold a grudge? Possibly.
Three years ago we delivered an incentive to Iceland that was ravaged by a huge storm that continued throughout the entire weekend. It was a great trip which has now become the stuff of meteorological legend within the client’s industry sector.
Fast forward three years to April 15th this year when [...]
Coach trip
If the client cannot come to the conference, we can always take the conference to the client. This was the basis of the Sony Ericsson Insider Tour which started yesterday. Distributor time is precious so how do you get ’share of mind’ when they find it difficult to even give you the [...]
Frankfurter? Yes, please.
Wrote a rather scathing piece in M&IT(March issue) recently about how badly hosted buyers tend to be treated by the trade exhibitions industry. The main criticism was the online bullying of delegates once they agree to be hosted as a buyer and the collection of your business credit card number by [...]
Remember your school days?
Had reason to investigate getting hold of 20 visas to Russia for successful qualifiers to a sales incentive to Moscow for later this year. Despite ‘glasnost’ you will be pleased to know that communist bureaucracy is well and truly alive and kicking. The first application from the 60-something sales director was returned as [...]
March – A club to be a member of
For almost every profession there is an association or a club. In fact for most, there are several, all competing for your subscription. A recent survey though for the event management industry revealed that 73% of event organisers do not value their membership at all and question what benefits they get from it. But I [...]
M&IT awards
Sat on the journos’ table at the M&IT awards where they distributed meetings and incentives awards for stuff done during 2009. Geoff Hurst, England and West Ham, he of ‘only hat-trick ever scored in a World Cup Final’ fame, did short talk about his involvement in the 2018 World Cup bid to bring it to [...]
IMEX
Got a lot of feedback about our article in a trade mag about what a pain going on hosted buyer trips is. Ray Bloom, IMEX creator, wrote in to say he would treat me well if I wanted to go to IMEX. Trouble is it is usually the same old people, whom I love dearly, [...]
Right first time?
Had my Merc serviced in Oxford. I like Mercedes dealerships, free upmarket coffee machine, TV, daily papers etc but what bugs me is they never have any spare parts available. Which means having already told them I needed a new coin-box, I now have to take the car back in two weeks time when they [...]
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