Tips for meeting the new year head on
To help you make a fast start to the new year, we asked the FCM Meeting & Events’ leadership team share their predications and insights for the year ahead. As the sector is poised to have another strong year with high demand across the breadth of the industry, a range of factors are set to influence and transform the coming 12 months.
The three key trends FCM Meetings & Events see shaping 2024 are the increasing adoption of AI technologies, budget maximisation and the absolutely importance of planning ahead in the current tight market.
The FCM M&E specialists explore these influences, and more, in this article designed to help your organisation stay agile, adapt, plan and thrive in 2024.
Simone Seiler – Global General Manager
Moving into 2024 we expect to see more businesses consolidating their travel and M&E programs into one, by way of large market procurement channels. The trend to combine programs with one trusted TMC, with experience in both areas, is being driven by a desire for better overall budget management, the ability to leverage suppliers and the efficiencies it can deliver. With our full suite of specialist services, FCM M&E is excited about the benefits we can provide to our customers through program consolidation and brand new technology offerings. One example is our just launched, world-class booking and comparison platform for the MICE industry called FCM Venue Finder. The user-friendly platform effortlessly delivers seamless venue sourcing – with a global inventory of over 200,000 spaces, event management bookings, and cost control to simplify the dynamic world of meetings and events.
In 2023 we started to see the return of demand for academic travel and this will continue to grow in 2024. Specialist interest groups, study program travel and global immersion programs are back on the agenda for schools and universities, with FCM M&E using its global expertise in group travel and risk management to facilitate these groups.
More generally, the industry is still facing constrained supply, however we anticipate more planes and new venues to come on line in 2024. Overseas travel continues to grow, especially the incentive market with groups becoming more confident to branch out beyond APAC. Popular destinations include the UK, east and southern Europe, the Greek islands and newer less obvious locations such as Malta, Poland and Estonia.
High demand and short planning lead times continue to impact on M&E options for customers not looking further ahead. To take advantage of the best rates and to secure the destinations and venues customers want, they need to be planning for 2024 and 2025 now.
Another M&E trend that is non–negotiable for customers, is focussing on delegate wellbeing in a very tangible way – including taking into account things such as travel times, including interactive breaks for people to connect, incorporating meditation sessions and offering authentic ways to connect with local destinations and cultures.
Cathy Broaders – Leader of Creative Services
The industry will continue to explore the use of AI and intuitive technology, and its potential to enhance the meeting and event experience. From a creative point of view, AI will continue to provide FCM M&E with exciting tools and opportunities to reimagine meetings and events in a range of ways. In the right hands, AI can help us to deliver creative and non-traditional events which incorporate more interactive elements to help capture and maintain delegate engagement. These tools, combined with an increasing use of augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR), will help us boost creativity and personalisation to drive positive engagement with a diverse blend of delegates – all while making content more accessible to all.
I see one of the biggest advantages of harnessing AI for customer events, as being its ability to deliver hyper-personalisation. We will increasingly have the ability to personalise each delegate’s experience at an event by using AI from the registration process, all the way through the event, by actively curating their journey and targeting their interests. Along with AI is the rise of intuitive technology such as delegate Apps, which enable organisers to design a portable and customised, self-serve portal to streamline processes from beginning to end. These tools can also engage with delegates in creative new ways to further enhancing the in-person experience, while offering businesses a tangible return on their meeting or event investment.
Livia Carrier – Head of Events
After experiencing very short meetings and event lead times in 2022 and 2023, there is a sense that we are now finally getting back to more of a balanced approach with yearly planning. Customers are starting to book further out, but they are also very focussed on wanting tangible outcomes from their investment and quick results, such as a boost in sales if they are holding a sales conference.
We are now experiencing customers with an appetite for live international events, especially when it comes to conferences and incentive events. European destinations remain popular, as does Fiji, while domestically Cairns, the Gold Coast and Tasmania are in demand for their short flight times. Flight and hotel availability, still remain the tightest I’ve ever seen. So planning ahead is essential for customers, or you will be stuck with selecting a destination due to availability – not choice.
Attendee wellbeing is a trend which is here to stay. Apart from mental and physical short breaks during an event, we are seeing more customers wanting to incorporate healthy delegate options including zero alcohol beer, wine and mocktails, as well as healthy menus. There is also a trend towards shorter conferences of say three days, instead of four, to minimise the impact of having employees out of the office.
It’s no surprise that budget pressure is probably the biggest factor impacting on organisations when planning meetings and events. One very simple, but effective, option is to plan outside of peak event and travel seasons times to get more value for money.
Sheri Veenstra – Head of Group Travel
The number one factor influencing group travel planning for customers in 2024 is pricing. This is being driven by land and air inventory prices, with airlines still managing restricted capacity, routes ad availability. Airfare prices across just about every airline are also reflecting increased taxes and fuel costs.
Despite these challenges, we’re seeing a return to group international travel especially within the APAC region, some parts of Europe and the sub-continent. We are seeing university and academic groups travelling again, with study tours and immersion programs once again being an essential part of their curriculum.
Japan is especially popular and extremely busy, something also hampered by the fact that they are about a year behind Australia in their recovery from the past few years of closures. So you can expect pressure on flights and ground inventory to remain high into 2024.
The best advice I can offer customers is to plan their group travel well in advance. We can book and hold inventory including hotel rooms for years in advance, with customers having the flexibility to confirm group numbers closer to the travel time. Plus airfares can be held for around eleven months in advance. This allows us to take a more considered and strategic approach to planning group travel for our customers that offers the best value and the best experience.
Brendan Valmont – M&E Group Product Manager
The trend to embrace more digital products and technology will continue in 2024. The most talked about tech is AI which will increasingly be used to deliver the benefits of automation, content creation, data analysis and personalisation, however the exciting area will be utilising its intuitive capacities.
Generative AI products for example, can produce a report in minutes that would previously have taken weeks. These efficiencies will allow the FCM M&E team, and customers, to focus more time on creating and fine tuning dynamic and engaging delegate experiences.
There is also an emerging trend to incorporate augmented reality into event delivery, to create immersive experiences. We all have short attention spans today, so this tech allow attendees to use their own smartphone to access new and creative experiences designed to help keep them engaged with the event content.
For event organisers, adopting AI and other new technologies can help to differentiate their event. It will be important moving into 2024 to focus on designing creative, engaging and personalised events, with the help of AI to recommend event sessions to attendees by utilising data and personal information.
Katie Fraser – General Manager Operations
AI is being widely talked about as changing the sector in leaps and bounds, but that still remains to be seen. It certainly has uses for creating content, including video and voice over content, but it does lack that element of human emotion and nuance. It has the potential to improve efficiencies, support customers and enhance attendee experiences – but it needs to be assessed on a case-by-case basis.
The development of new event technology is another growth area, with many questions yet to be answered about where it will take the industry. FCM M&E is harnessing integrated event management software to streamline both the planning experience and the delivery. The key is understanding how this tech can be integrated effectively, such as using it for efficient delegate registration and linking it to an attendee app to enhance engagement, recommend event sessions and offer networking opportunities.
For our customers, the focus is on creating meetings and events for the different ways that people consume content today. The ‘stand and deliver’ type events of the past are being replaced by a desire for more experiential content – using sound, sight and smell to create an immersive experience. There is also a trend to get the most value from the face-to-face, connection time at an event, by providing content that can be consumed post-event. This is tied in with the need for customers to see a tangible ROI, especially as supply, demand and inflation are all impacting on budgets.
Andrew Yell – Product, Supply and Strategy
The biggest change we are seeing as we move into 2024 is that customers are starting to look at overseas destinations again. Though airfares are still expensive, we are regularly quoting on both a local and an overseas event option, especially for destinations with around 14 hours flying time that don’t include a stopover and therefore have a reduced risk of delays.
Domestic destinations remain popular along the east coast from north Queensland (Port Douglas, Qld islands and the Gold Coast) down to Melbourne, with small and mid size groups attracted to Tassie for the range of experiences that it can offer. The industry remains very busy and customers need to book a long way in advance to secure venues, especially in the peak domestic months of May/June and September/October.
Customers are moving away from big windowless conference rooms to venues offering natural light and different ways to engage with delegates. More meeting and event customers want to deliver less content, but more connection. They are looking to include wellness and social spaces, and places where attendees can connect and have ‘accidental’ meetings. At the same time the sustainability credentials of partners and suppliers are important, so we are seeing suppliers promote what they are doing in this space.
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