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Budapest embraces MPI

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Hungary exceeded expectations of the European MPI Conference while hosting the annual in event in Budapest last week: sincere hospitality, amazing value and incredible venues and entertainment make it a destination many meeting professionals may have been overlooking. The hotel venues I visited are all outstanding, varying from historic hotels like the Corinthia Budapest, converted financial buildings (Boscolo) and palaces (Four Seasons) to hotels with amazing views (Sofitel and InterContinental) [...]

by Alda Egurrola-Wienke on February 6, 2012

Elite Meetings Alliance Daily Digest – Tuesday 1/31

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It’s hard to imagine never having been to an Elite Meetings Alliance before this. Maybe I’m a changed person, maybe I’m enlightened, maybe I’m a little exhausted, but mostly – I am so utterly grateful to be with a company that enjoys what it does as much as it appreciates the people that make the company what it is. Thank you all for coming, for participating, and for creating a [...]

by Alina Itkin on January 31, 2012

Elite Meetings Alliance Daily Digest – Monday 1/30

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Hello again everyone! We hope you had another fabulous day at the Rancho Las Palmas. The sessions were jam packed and full of information. Thank you to Laura Schwartz, Midori Connolly, Daren Martin, & Shawn Seipler! To get the details on them, visit our Michelle Thornton’s blog at the link here. Big appreciative THANK YOU for blogging about us, Michelle! The Trick shot clinic got quite fancy with those shots [...]

by Alina Itkin on January 30, 2012

Elite Meetings Alliance Daily Digest – Sunday 1/29

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Where to start with the yesterday? Well for one, thank you all for coming to the hospitality desk to Shameka & I to check in. You made the process extremely easy and it was great to finally put a face to the all the names we see. If you haven’t already received your name badge, stop on by the hospitality desk today! We’ll be there from 8am-6pm in the Ballroom [...]

by Alina Itkin on January 29, 2012

Broadcasting LIVE Hybrid Sessions from EMA

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Participate in the EMA from Home! We’re here in the desert getting ready to kick off the January Elite Meetings Alliance at Rancho Las Palmas Resort & Spa and it’s shaping up to be an amazing event! For those of you who weren’t able to be here in person, you’re invited to join us for our Educational Sessions via a live webcast! This will not be your average webcast. Our [...]

by Alina Itkin on January 27, 2012

Life in the Fast Lane: Supply-Side Tips for Navigating Today’s Tight Turnarounds

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by Susan Campbell, Editorial Director While it’s true that meetings are making a comeback, that doesn’t necessarily mean coming back in exactly the same way. Since the economic downturn, both buyers and suppliers have acknowledged that the days of protracted planning have passed. By and large, today’s meeting professionals have shorter lead times to plan their events. So, what’s a hotel sales manager to do? We asked Dirk Smith, president [...]

by Susan Campbell on January 18, 2012

EliteMeetings.com 4.0 Goes Members Only

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Do you want to be rich, famous, and glamorous? Ride around in a stretch hummer limo and dance the night away with A-list movie stars?! Ah, well …. for that you would have to pay a lot of money and know some good people but great thing you know us here at Elite Meetings! We may not be able to get you into top-secret nightclubs, but we might have something [...]

by Alina Itkin on December 15, 2011

Creating Better Meeting Experiences

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Jim Ruszala, Director of Marketing, Maritz Travel Company Three Simple Steps to Create Better Meeting Experiences Designing for a more engaging experience for your meetings can significantly improve performance from both a business and attendee vantage point. Yet, this is more difficult to do in today’s world due to a host of challenges, including budgeting constraints and increased risks for attendee distractions. From the moment an attendee walks into a [...]

by Guest Writer on December 6, 2011

Hidden Gems

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Stuck in a rut of mainstream meeting-site selection? Leave homogenous hospitality behind and discover these tucked-away treasures. From open-range opulence to Spanish Colonial couture, the following offer a wealth of amenities and activities far from the madding masses. Royal Palms Resort and Spa Constructed in 1929 as the vacation villa for New York money-man Delos Cooke, the Royal Palms Resort and Spa still makes business moguls feel right at home. [...]

by Viju Mathew on December 6, 2011

Europe, Did You Know…?

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Did You Know…. You can find more than 250 Elite Certified hotels and resorts from all over Europe on EliteMeetings.com. The following hotels represent the best-of-the-best from Lisbon to London, Budapest to Barcelona, and Milan to Madrid Corinthia Hotel Lisbon (Lisbon, Portugal) Molino Stucky Hilton Venice (Venice, Italy) Corinthia Hotel London (London, England) Rome Cavalieri, A Waldorf Astoria Resort (Rome, Italy) W Barcelona (Barcelona, Spain) Corinthia Hotel Budapest (Budapest, Hungary) [...]

by Alda Egurrola-Wienke on December 6, 2011

Restorative Retreats

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“To be able to fill leisure intelligently is the last product of civilization,” said Nobel Prize–winning philosopher Bertrand Russell. Perhaps that’s why mindful meeting professionals make spa sessions their savvy selection during downtime. We bet Bertrand would have loved the list below. After all, resorts that make events easy and offer mind-body balance between business⎯well that’s just brilliant. Hotel Park City For groups that ski, Hotel Park City in Park [...]

by Viju Mathew on December 6, 2011

American Airlines Supports its’ Planners

AMR Chapter 11 will not affect the Elite Meetings Alliance (EMA) Like most of you, when AMR, the parent company of American Airlines, announced they had filed for reorganization under Chapter 11 yesterday morning it left me wondering what that meant for our upcoming event, the Elite Meetings Alliance. The film buff in me couldn’t help but conjure images of Jimmy Stewart in It’s a Wonderful Life railing [...]

by Margaret Holsinger on December 1, 2011

The Road to the EMA: Keynote Speaker Announced

In our last blog post we told you about Margaret, our resident event planner who is responsible for the planning and execution of the Elite Meetings Alliance at Ranchos Las Palmas Resort & Spa. Since then, our little Margie (don’t tell her we called her that!) has been bustling about signing contracts, locking down speakers, and doing a site visit to Rancho Las Palmas. During her visit, Margaret had the [...]

by Alina Itkin on November 30, 2011

What is SpeedRFP?

If you are interested in generating more complete and qualified group leads from your hotel’s website, then you really need to check out this SpeedRFP PowerPoint.

by Kelly Foy on November 21, 2011

EliteMeetings.com 4.0…Coming soon!

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I’m honestly chomping at the bit to release EliteMeetings.com version 4.0, but the team convinced me that we should wait to launch the new site until its fine tuned and ready for prime time. While I agree we should not launch until all of the new enhancements are complete, I simply can’t wait that long to share the great new look and feel…let alone the time-saving new features incorporated into [...]

by Kelly Foy on November 15, 2011

SpeedRFP reaches 10,000 buyer members!

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I’m very proud to share that the SpeedRFP buyer community reached member # 10,000 today. It is important to point out that to be qualified as a member, they must have submitted at least 1 RFP using the system. If you take in to consideration that each of these members likely plan multiple meetings and events on an annual basis, they represent millions of hotel guests each year. This active [...]

by Kelly Foy on November 3, 2011

High Tech Titans

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Success demands that progress be perpetual. In an age where companies can be run on smart phones, and nano-seconds feel like forever, expectations have risen exponentially when it comes to ease and efficiency. For planners, staying ahead of the curve is a constant, which is why you’ll go gaga over the following high-tech hospitality providers that make state-of-the-art status quo. Trump International Hotel & Tower Chicago Despite its ninety-two-story stature, [...]

by Viju Mathew on October 18, 2011

Curing the Tech that Ails you

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This article was written by Midori Connolly, Pulse Staging & Events Have you been diagnosed with the TechSick bug? This viral condition is akin to a hangover. The means of catching the bug is unfortunately far too easy and widespread. Wooed by the excitement and promised solutions of a new technology, meeting planners spend a significant portion of their budget on the tech. Upon implementing and using the new technology, [...]

by Guest Writer on October 18, 2011

Fairway Favorites

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Since golf and business share the same skill-set for success⎯focus, drive, and consistency⎯it’s no wonder some of the more memorable networking and deal-making opportunities land on the links. Let these ten fairway favorites caddy your next conference or special occasion and a great event is a gimme. Park Hyatt Aviara Ranked among the top resort golf courses in America by both Golf Digest and Golf magazine, Park Hyatt Aviara’s 18-hole [...]

by Viju Mathew on October 17, 2011

Tech Tenets Every Meeting Professional Should Know

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This article was written by Carole Woodward, FedEx Services, VP of Information Technology The warp speed advancements of tech devices and digital services have allowed for extraordinary innovation in the meeting and event planning space over the last decade. Much like we’ve seen at FedEx, where customers have moved from hand-written paper air bills to sophisticated online tracking systems, the meetings industry has rapidly evolved too, from presentations with overhead [...]

by Guest Writer on October 17, 2011

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