Business Events Leaders’ Summit – speaker soundbites

“The long-tail can only really be answered years after the event has taken place when ideas presented and connections made lead down the line to breakthroughs that save lives, change society or redefine best practice and policy.”
Associate Professor Dr Deborah Edwards, University of Technology Sydney

“Festivalisation is one way to look at your meeting design to ensure delegates stay engaged through that deep, immersive and experiential way.”
Jeannie Lim, Singapore Tourism Board

“The most competitive destinations are really trying to create deep partnerships with events and the organisations which hold events in their cities and this is becoming a major new differentiator between the more traditional bidders and those who are really in it for the long-term”
Martin Sirk, Chief Executive, ICCA

“Convention Bureaux and DMOs are having to become much more client-focused, more joined-up in their services and more varied and savvy about what they can do for their conference clients.”
Lesley Williams, Director, Market Development at BestCities Global Alliance

“What Business Events Sydney asked us to do was to first of all scope out what those beyond tourism benefits might be and secondly to measure them.”
Associate Professor Carmel Foley, University of Technology Sydney

“We were always in danger of losing funding. And actually we turned it round and said convention bureaux are a really useful tool to build economic growth”
Tracy Halliwell, London & Partners

“We can be out there really pushing Britain’s reputation as a global destination to hold fantastic events across the UK and actually in turn support those sectors that we need to grow for greater development in the future”
Kerrin MacPhie, VisitBritain Business Events

“That’s where the power lies for us because we get out of this debate about being simply about logistics, simply about bed nights, which can fluctuate greatly. But actually if we are this powerful tool to build economic development, we’re at a completely different conversational level with policymakers.”
Carina Bauer, IMEX Group

“The end game, the ultimate benefit, is nothing less than driving Scotland’s economic and social transformation through business
events”
Neil Brownlee, VisitScotland Business Events

“It needs to be a conference discussion that’s wider than the venue and it needs to have connectivity with stakeholders that are going to see the importance of events in making the city come alive”
John Sharkey, SMG

“I think for me one of the biggest opportunities is around how you actually mainstream the opportunity that’s presented by business events into broader economic objectives”
Paul McCafferty, Scottish Enterprise

“Events are a huge opportunity for everybody to create content, and content builds knowledge and content builds engagement, which gives you that community”
Ian Hyland, Business & Finance Media Group

“We have the knowledge hubs for tech but where do we go to find the events? This is a radically new, continually developing sector. But we can’t go to the ICCA database and find tech conferences all the time”
Sam Johnston, Dublin Convention Bureau

“The team Glasgow approach where all stakeholders work together underpins securing and delivering great events; our ambition is to take this to the next level.”
Peter Duthie, SEC