This year is sweet but not easy for the event management industry in the Philippines. Although, we still have one quarter
left before we say goodbye to 2018, the trends may not change for this coming
three months.
Several factors contributed to this atmosphere.
Inflation and Instability
The economic outlook of the country is in a
precarious position. This must be addressed or else we will see a drop in the
number of business events that will be implemented.
As we experienced in the past, the high cost of
staging business events are not advisable. Companies are more inclined to find
other means of affordable marketing activities.
The digital space is so attractive that most of
the budget will go there if this rising prices and inflation will go unabated.
Data Privacy and Creative Lead Generation
It is still in its infancy but more education and forums
must be conducted to appreciate the law and allow event management companies to
strategize on how to follow the law, and at the same time, perform two of its
most important tasks – Lead Generation and Client Engagement.
Consumers are wary of sharing their data. The law was
created to protect them. Event management companies that do marketing
activities that solicit data from the clients must create programs that will
prevent abuses and misuse of the data.
More ASEAN Players in the Philippine Market
Competitions are getting stiffer. The increasing number of
business event management companies, travel agencies venturing to event
management, event management freelancers, and the biggest threat, the entry of
ASEAN event management players in the country.
Competition is good. It allows all companies to be on their
toes, and provide better value to the target market. However, local companies
are at the disadvantage, foreign players are bringing a large stash of cash, a
firepower that is hard to compete against.
This difficult situation is aggravated by the government’s
lack of protection, and incentives that will give some fighting chance to local
business event management companies.
In Conclusion
The road to success of the event management companies in the
Philippines is stiff and narrow.
Filipinos always take pride of enduring the hardships and
winning the fight. In this case, the underdog myth is never going to happen. It
will take more than faith to succeed and survive next year.
As our ASEAN neighbors gear up for bigger things next year,
we need to address these three challenges as a country. The synergy of
government and private companies are more than ever needed and critical to
change the course of the industry next year, and in the near future.
- Friday, September 28, 2018
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