About MeetingEasy™
How it Works
MeetingsEasy™ allows planners to research facilities and services within an entire city, request and receive proposals, plan, save and update meeting details quickly. Built in the Web 2.0 spirit, the program provides planners their own password protected space on the web, so they can return at any time during their meeting planning process to modify their RFP, book new services, or request additional information. A Meetings Concierge is available during regular working hours to help new users walk through the system or answer any other questions that may arise.
MeetingsEasy™ automatically distributes information to your selected suppliers in a chosen city through the Destination Marketing Organization, each supplier responds individually, and the program collects and collates the proposals, for the planner's review online. Suppliers are broken down into 26 categories including hotels, restaurants, caterers, attractions, museums, outdoor activities, audio-visual specialists and more – virtually all the services required during the course of a meeting.
How MeetingsEasy™ Came To Be!
Early in 2006 while employed by Ottawa Tourism, as Director of Convention Sales and Marketing, Tom Price had an idea! "There has been so much advancement in using the web for individual travel why not harness it’s collaborative powers to plan meetings and events?" With the understanding that the Internet could provide a single dynamic communication platform for planners, tourism bureaus and suppliers, a new web based meeting planning process was born. After intensive focus group testing and input from a variety of professional planners and suppliers a prototype was built.
MeetingsEasy™ is now on its third version and has been running successfully in Ottawa for over 2 years, facilitating the communication process for hundreds of proposals annually. It is currently being licensed to a growing number of cities across Canada, and is well on its way to creating a national standard for web based meeting planning.
MeetingsEasy™ won the National Awards for Tourism Excellence, "Innovator of the Year Award" in 2006 from the Tourism Association of Canada.