Hotel site selection is by far, our most popular service. That is due in large part to the fact that it costs our clients nothing. This is explained in more detail below.
- What is Hotel Site Selection?
- Why is it better than booking hotels by myself?
- How is VenueQuests hotel site selection service different from others?
- Why isn't there a fee for the service?
What is Hotel Site Selection
The hotel site selection service exists to allow you to outsource the process of researching hotels, calling/emailing hotels, reading proposals, fielding follow up calls, and making sense of all the differences between hotels and group proposals. We act as your procurement representative and learn all that there is to know about your travel or meeting requirement. We then obtain availability and proposals from all the hotels that would like to do business with you and your company, and present those offers in one easy to read, side-by-side comparison so that you can choose which one is best for your program.
Why is booking my meeting through VenueQuest better than booking it by myself?:
1. Fast Response - We have a distribution network that gets the request out to every hotel in your destination as fast as possible, so that we can get you the information you need right away.
2. Excellent Rates - When a hotel sees a request from VenueQuest, they know that our distribution network delivered that request to every one of their competitors at the same time and if they want to earn the business, they have to offer a competitive deal and offer it fast.
3. Privacy - We don't share your contact information with anybody, so your day does not get disrupted with phone calls from all the sales managers who sent proposals wanting to know if you have questions, if you have an update, when you will make a decision, what they can do to earn the business, etc. You just have one point of contact who is looking out for your best interests and not trying to sell you anything.
4. MeetingRewards - Each of our clients earn MeetingRewards points for each hotel room used by members of their groups and meetings. Those points can be redeemed for gift cards, travel services or charitable donations.
How is VenueQuest different from other meeting planning and hotel site selection companies?
Although all hotel site selection companies exist to connect meeting planning and group travel clients, with the hotels that can host their events, there are significant differences in each of their business models that can affect the options clients can choose from.
Unlike many of our competitors, VenueQuest has created a business plan that does not permit any preferred agreements or marketing arrangements between our company and hotels or hotel management companies. This allows us to honestly tell our clients that we are presenting all hotel options on equal footing. Many of our competitors have preferential agreements with particular hotel companies guaranteeing them certain concessions or incentives for convincing clients to book their meetings in those hotels. At VenueQuest, our job is to represent our clients and their best interests, so we do not permit any outside influences that might alter our recommendations.
Other differences:
- Accountability Agreement: Every team member at VenueQuest is required to sign an Accountability Agreement when they are hired. Besides committing to what should be obvious business principles like returning calls on time, representing the interests of clients and respecting all vendor relationships, they also commit to a minimum number of hours of continuing industry education each year and a minimum number of hours of community service.
- MeetingRewards: As far as we know, we are the only meeting planning company that gives rewards to clients for booking their meetings through our service.
Why isn't there a fee for this service?
We do not charge any fees to our clients for hotel site selection services because we are a licensed and endorsed travel agency and can therefore collect a commission from the hotel you choose on each room they sell to members of your group. The hotel industry has a long standing relationship with the travel agent industry and they expect that a large number of reservations and groups will come through agencies, so the cost of commission is built right into their business plans. Therefore, rates do not go up because a client is represented by an agent. On the contrary, we can usually secure better rates than a client can by themselves because of the high volume of business we transact with hotels all across North America.
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