Individual and Organizational Characteristics Influencing Event Planners’ Perceptions of Information Content and Channel Choice

Abstract

The meetings and convention industry is one of the fastest growing sectors of the tourism and hospitality industry with expenditures in the billions, highlighting event planners’ critical role in the purchasing and decision-making process. Event planners are a piece of the organizational buying puzzle and have the power to not only search possible meeting and event venues but also prevent sellers or information from reaching members of the decision-making group. Therefore, this research evaluated the factors (individual and organizational) that influence event planners perception of information content and channel choice decision through a series of descriptive, t-test, analysis of variance, and post hoc analysis. Personal interactions were found to be the most valuable channel, while meeting room information content is found to hold the greatest importance and influence for making decisions. The results of this study have important implications for destination marketing organizations, such as convention and visitors bureaus.

KEYWORDS:

• event planners
• organizational buying
• information content
• advertising channels