Official statistics on event venues usually vary between 750 and 10,000, depending on definition criteria. Although in the case of Germany these are estimated at 4,000 to 5,000, 80% of which being hotels.
The wide and in some cases confusing range of venues does not make the selection process any easier for bookers. Consequently, event planners are faced with the task of how to find the venue best suited to their purposes as quickly and easily as possible. With regard to search channels, the Internet clearly currently has the edge on the rest.
The results of the survey “Veranstaltungsplaner.de-Studie 2006” conducted last summer by the German association of event organisers in Bad Kreuznach showed (multiple replies were possible) that around 88,5% of event bookers use search engines, city websites, individual travel tools and online meeting portals. Word of mouth and recommendations came in second place (80,4% of respondents), followed by hotel guides and catalogues (62%), hotel brokers (approximately 40%), trade magazines (just under 22%) and others (5,7%), the last category including personal contacts, trade fairs, tourist boards, etc.
It was also found that 25,8% of event professionals use fax machines to request quotes, 40% the Internet (online booking), 78% e-mail inquiries, and almost 83% telephone calls. Although the majority of event organisers use the Internet to search for meeting venues, most of them then prefer to phone.
According to the experts, as processes are optimised the Internet will become increasingly more popular for event booking.
