March 19, 2025 • 27 mins
Third-party planners—are they the secret weapon to event success? Find out how they streamline sourcing, negotiations, and contracts!
Third-party planners can make event planning easier, faster, and more cost-effective—but do you really know how they work? 🤔
In this episode, special guest Peter Schmidt shares insider insights into how third-party planners bridge the gap between clients, venues, and suppliers to create win-win partnerships.
Topics include:
✔️ What third-party planners actually do (and why they matter!)
✔️ How they help negotiate better hotel contracts
✔️ The biggest misconceptions about working with third parties
✔️ What planners need to know before hiring a third-party partner
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🔗 Follow us on LinkedIn & Instagram for more supplier-planner relationship tips!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Event Therapy Podcast. And today, we're excited to have Peter as our special guest on to talk a little bit more about third party relationships and hotel sourcing. So welcome, Peter. Yeah. Thank you.
(00:01):
Thank you. Thank you. Great being here. Thanks for joining us. We are excited to have you here today and and learn a little more.
I mean, I think we should kind of start for those who maybe aren't familiar with 3rd party. You know, what does that look like? What what are you able to help with? Kind of what are your services that you provide in relationship building and just dive a little deeper into that? What do you do, sir?
How much time do we have? Wow. Alright. That was a lot of questions at the first here. Alright.
So a third party also called intermediary. I think you guys discussed this in previous episodes. We are, the full time planning arm of any, meeting planner that seeks, additional support, on all aspects when it comes to meeting planning. We start out with the sourcing. That's normally the contracting, reaching out to hotels, lending our expertise on the marketplace, rates, of course, renovations.
There's so much in that on that list, that we do for the meeting planners and that we know that's our job. Right? That's our business. And then it goes through contract clauses, really building up that being that insurance blanket for any meeting planner and for any meeting organization for that matter. And then seeing this whole the whole program through, making sure that all contextual terms have been upheld and moving on from then to reconciliation, if there are any.
I don't know. Like, attrition, whatever else that is there, the aftermath of any program, and then moving into the next program planning cycle. So you're the dotting the i's, crossing the t's, you know? Exactly. He's the professional in this situation.
That's what we are. Yeah. That's what we do. Exactly. We talk about this a lot in podcast.
I know I I at least do. Like, I as a hotelier, we love working with third parties or intermediaries. That's what you call them. And I and I've said this a lot on our podcast because you you really understand your customer. You understand kind of their contract term, like, things that are important to the organization.
So I'm maybe talking more about the contracting phase more than the source selection. I mean, obviously, a third party is great because you understand the various markets. And as a partner to the hotel, you're an extension really of being able to say, hey. I know a great fit, and you've done this, you know, for us before. So love it for that.
But when it comes to contracting, which I've talked about on other podcasts, I just love that you're the professional in this situation, and we can have we both kind of understand, you know, all the things that come along with contracting a hotel, and we can have a really good educated conversation that really feels like a win win, I think, for both. You understand your customer. We both understand the business. And I I I personally love that, and I think, you know, a lot of hotels, you know, obviously love that. It's a great, especially for companies that don't have a meeting planner per se on their staff.
You know? It's a great extension for you to be a part of their team. So, those are some of the things I think we've gotten into another podcast that we can dive into a little bit more today, but big 3rd party fan. I appreciate that. And you said you said a couple of key things.
You come to us as the professional for your property, right? You know the business plan, you know the rate structures, you know, peak and valleys, right, in your occupancy. We come from the other side. We really have to know who the customer is, who the stakeholders are, what the goal is of the event, what kind of flexibilities are there. So all these nuance of things where we really can fully 100% represent the customer.
And that's what we then get together and work out favorable, fair, contractual terms. And not only contractual terms, you are also working on that relationship, right? Because when stuff goes south, we all know it's about this, right? It's we have to sit down at the table together, have a cup of coffee and, discuss how we're going to move forward and actually keep harm away from the customer in order for both of us to keep that relationship alive and healthy for future business. So walk me through it.
So what from your standpoint, in an ideal world, a planner comes to you. They, you know, ideally know where they're willing to have the event. You know, let's say Chicago, for example. So they come to you. They need help sourcing that event.
What, from your standpoint, in a perfect world, makes your life easier to be able to source that event? What are you looking for? How can, you know, a lot of times on this podcast, we're not only here to help suppliers but also planners. We wanna help the industry. So if you could have your magic wish list and say anything you wanted, you know, to the planners Oh, to the planning discussion.
That was my next question. To the planners. What are you looking for? What what sets you up to be successful in your position when you're sourcing? It's a it's a great question and it obviously varies from person to person and from from interaction to interaction.
In an ideal world, I want full trust from the planner to me right out the gate because that assures clear communication. That assures there's no hesitation. Right? There is a there is that that path where you where the planner then actually feels comfortable to relate any type of red flags or things that worked out well in the past. Or, if push comes to shove, what are the flexibilities, the nuances that we have a little bit of a give and take on because it makes the sourcing process so much easier.
When you when we show up in the market, to our suppliers with a certain piece of business, The more we know and the more in-depth that RFP request for proposal, that RFP is, the more legit it really comes across. Right. And the more invested the responses are from the suppliers. Millions. I would you say that's all I say this all the time.
Yeah. You do. You do. So you're saying maybe if possible I mean, we know there are certain, you know, conferences or events that have the same date every year. So maybe there's a little flexibility on where that location could be.
But if your dates are flexible, maybe a couple different options available so that you can kind of best source that for them and give them a variety of options. Well, it's that and it's for sure, but it's also history, like historic data. What kind of level has this hotel been in from a qualitative standpoint? Right? Does it need to be a brand new hotel?
Does it need to be with walking distance to entertainment options? And things all these nuance of things that come with any RFP. Right. No one in the group is going Are they having dinners or are they gonna have dinners on their own so they need to, you know, have locations nearby that they can walk to? Absolutely.
(00:22):
Exactly. Do you have do you have resources? Let's say, somebody new, like like, you know, Liz mentioned, sometimes you're dealing with people who've never done it before. Do you guys have like, almost like a template or a form that somebody could fill out to say because I think a lot of times probably in our industry is one of the things we run into is we get caught in this trap of assuming that everybody we're working with knows everything that needs to be done. So I just didn't know if there's, like, in your world, is there, like, in case you don't know, here's are the things that we will need to know kind of a deal.
I don't have that. That's a good idea. Well, so these things are provided traditionally by the platform that you work with. Yeah. So we work with Cvent.
Okay. Leader in the industry. Yeah. When it comes to RFP processing. And there are required fields, right, as mandatory fields that you have to fill in when you go to market.
If we would leave it at that, we would be a terrible, terrible at doing our job because really what we build on is creating that relationship right at the get go. Right. And this is again the same what we're doing right here. You sit down at a table ideally or on teams and you have the conversations about the details. So that's really how you find out what the investment is off the planner.
Is this just one of them or is this a board meeting where, you know, the top brass of the organization gets together and there can't be a miss? Not that there can be misses anywhere, but you get the the intensity, right, off of certain programs versus others. So you're saying versus just sending, you know, because we do know that there's been an influx of new planners to the industry that, you know, don't know a lot of this information. So you're saying versus having a template, sending it to them and saying, hey, fill this out as a guideline. You prefer to do that in person or on the phone.
Yeah. More conversation. That information down, and it's more conversational Yeah. Till you get the information you need. I love that.
The only template I really would send out is a get to know you get to know your form. I wanna know if you're dragging, like, Pinot Grigio or your name. That's more important to me. Because if you don't know Peter and he sees you out, he's definitely gonna buy you coffee or wine. I wanna know.
Shush. Shush. A different story. No. But I love that we had a whole podcast about, like, RFPs and what kind of information hotels look for.
And what I love about third parties, and we talked about in that episode, was that you do understand the customer. You've already uncovered a lot of things that that you know what the hotels are looking for, what the destination's looking for. You've already asked those questions of your client. You understand them, especially if you've got a long time relationship with them. You know history.
That is so important. We've talked a lot about, like, when hotel CRFPs come out through Cvent, and it looks like it's out to the world. We like to call that. You know, they're not gonna spend a ton of time. It's so great to have you on this conversation.
Yeah. The same perspective is great. Because hotels get a ton of leads in a day. And when you see they're looking in your market, they're they've gone to similar properties or similar destinations. If you see in there, they need to be walkable to things.
And you know your hotel's in the middle of nowhere. You know? Like, you just sort of already know. Okay. These are things that are important to them.
This is where they've been in the past. I can immediately assess, are they gonna be in our price range? Like, have they been to similar type properties? And to me, that's the we've had conversations on budgets. I I don't like to ask people budgets.
I like to ask them their history because you can learn so much from that. And when third parties already give you all of that information, I think that's where you can give the best time and effort in a proposal because you've already, like, decided, like, okay. This is a really a great fit for our hotel, and you're able to sell even through Cvent, you know, why our property would be a great fit for your client. And that kind of information comes from somebody who understands customer and understands a hotel business or any other services that you're looking for. And for that reason, I absolutely love working with a third party.
And and obviously for selling, you know, the market. You know, you know these markets. You know these hotels, and you know the people that work in the hotels. Right? And that And that relationship already established.
Yep. And But not everybody, but two points to that platform. Right? We got this up in the past, let's say up until 2019. It was one of those things that both sides at some point like to hide behind.
Right. So I sent shit out, sent stuff out through. That's okay. We can edit that. I sent I sent stuff out through a platform and then never have to do anything else.
I get a response back. It is what I may be passing on to my customer, but I never have to interact directly with any of the supplier partners. And this is the key word, the partnership. Right? That's the key word that really has to be established on all ends.
We like to say that a lot. Yeah. But it's but it's the truth. That is the truth. And that's really how business gets done, especially after the pandemic.
I think the whole empathy movement and all that, we all have a lot of noise going on in our lives. If we can't connect directly and have a conversation over a phone back to the phones again or teams or whatever it is, I don't know if that relationship is really worthwhile signing a contract over. Right? Right. Yeah.
We talk on some of the podcast too about, a list from Elizabeth's perspective. Like, when you are told to go source multiple hotels in an area and you really are kind of sending it out to a large market, like, that we see on our side a lot of don't reach out to the customer, don't call and ask a bunch of questions. And I really respect that because I understand. When I see that, I'm like, okay. You know, they're really trying to narrow this down.
(00:43):
So if I feel like it's a good fit, it's good dates, like, I feel like it's all the things that I kinda just said, then I'm send a great proposal, but I understand that they're narrowing it down. And then from there, you know, hopefully, we make the shortlist, and then that's where that relationship, I think, can go a little bit further and the question. Like, you know, I think when it's it's sent out like that, it's kind of I'm just trying to narrow down my choices. And then once I've identified my, you know, top 2 or 3, that's when I'm going to go in and really get into the nitty gritty and figure out if this is going to work. In the beginning, I'm just trying to see is your hotel, is it, is it a fit?
Is it a match for my program? And are you somewhere within the range of what I'm looking to spend? Yeah. This is it's a very good point. That's the communication.
If I would be a supplier, a supplier partner in receiving RFPs, that's what I would be looking for. What's the depth of this, right? What do you need from really, what do you really need from me? Do you just need rates and dates? Or do you really need the full on proposal with everything detailed out, what the cost is going to be and what the hotel is going to look like while your program may be potentially on-site?
So yeah. And everyone likes to communicate differently. Some people love love the phone call. There's plenty of third parties that will say, pick up the phone, call me if you have any questions, ask the client. Like and I like when that's mentioned in Cvent, you know, how that communication should go or just client is strictly looking for your availability and what's gonna cost, and please don't reach out.
And I do like when that's in there because everybody likes to be communicated to differently, and I think that's important. And, you know, I think you and I have talked about this before. Like, you you are the type that's, like, I really just, for right now, need to know. I don't wanna get bombarded with a ton of emails. And but I also think that's a great reason to have a third party because you're not gonna get bombarded as the meeting planner with all of that information.
You are, and you're gonna take that information, and you're gonna find what's best, and you're gonna make a presentation to your client. So for sourcing, I think love all of that. When we get to contract negotiations, terms, all of those things, I find in those negotiations with a third party, like, they really understand their customer. They know how the contract signing process goes within the company. Like, I love when they immediately say, like, just so you know, Liz, this is gonna take a minute.
Like, it's gonna be a little while. Like, hang in there. Signed contract. That's alright. But that's great because we're getting asked, you know, on on the hotel side, you know, what's going on with this account?
When it you know, because we're turning away other business potentially. Yeah. So those so those things are important, understanding the process, understanding terms that are important. Important, not just something that you want to throw in there to add value. You know?
And I feel like when you have a good relationship between the hotel and the third party, those conversations go a lot better because there's certainly things that we can do to make it a win win on both of our sides. And it does not necessarily have to just be all this language that you've, you know, decided to throw in there. But I feel like we have really good conversations about that, like, where we have some wiggle room, where your client might have some just, like, this absolutely has to have. I just I just think the relationship, the conversation between the 2 of us is so much stronger than somebody who is the director of marketing for their company. Necessarily.
It's not necessarily their meeting planner. No. Doesn't understand the hotel business, doesn't understand, you know, some of the other, you know, ancillary businesses that you're gonna be working with and putting on a conference. And I just think it brings just it helps things, you know, move along the process a little bit better and brings more professionalism to the conversation and more history. And I just feel like, especially when you're taking a risk on something new.
The efficiency of the conversation. Yeah. It's just we're talking about really factual factual things. Mhmm. It makes the whole conversation shorter and crispier.
Right? Yeah. Yeah. I would love to hear your thought on this as well, because this is something that came up in another conversation that Liz and I were having on another podcast. And, I I'm gonna be honest.
I I've never had really thought of it this way. You know, I think so many of us planners are like, this is what I need. This is the information I need from the RFP and really just kind of laying it out there, thinking really only from my standpoint and not necessarily about does this hotel want my business? Right. Yeah.
And she really kind of opened my eyes on sell your event to the hotel and the RFP. You know? So speak in it to where the value that you're bringing. That you're bringing and why I should want your event. Yeah.
We talked about, like, positioning it as this is a great piece of business. Here's what we're bringing, the value, the food and beverage spend. A lot of times when you read these, it's like, we want all these things without meeting room rental, and we don't we we aren't gonna pay this. And it's it's sort of the way you concession. Yeah.
It's sort of the way you say it. For anything. Yeah. And I want you to give me everything. Well, it's like we can get to some of those things, you know, but I think right out the gate when you when you really position it, like, we don't, we don't, we don't, we won't, we won't, we won't.
I just think you have to show the value of the piece of business to the hotel that we're bringing this amount of rooms, and we're bringing, you know, this amount of food and beverage. And that's relative to where you're going. You have to keep that in mind too. Like, to a large hotel, that might not mean the same thing to a smaller hotel. And, you know, but really selling your value to the hotel so that they and then the right when you find the right hotel, the right partner to work with on this, like, you will get in return some of those things that you're looking for because it offers the value that makes sense to that particular partner.
You're so right on the offerings too, because I always say I wanna be the big fish in a small pond. Yeah. Like, I want to go I would rather be the big group like, go to a property that is built to accommodate my size event and and be the main event there versus going to a massive hotel where I'm just dime a dozen. You know? There's I mean, a big piece of what a third what my third party Yeah.
The one NHS does is we consult with our customers, right? You get a piece of business, it's we consider it raw until we source it a bunch of times and have enough experience with it. But a raw piece of business has to be there has to be a conversation with a planner on what's realistic, what are the market trends. And that's it's our business. We do this every day as part of our business plan to really understand where the market is going and where it's come from.
Right. And on that basis, we can go back legal terms and such. Right? We look forward. We look ahead.
What's going to be? We're not sourcing 2025. We're sourcing 2,030. Right. So what are the potentials?
(01:04):
What's the directions that the the legal language is going to, the market is going to? We all have experienced the the food and beverage prices and logistics and all this kind of stuff. But that's our business to know. And this is something we have to bring back to any planner. Most of many many planners know that.
Many planners are seasoned enough to know that, and can we have healthy but very short conversations about it. But like you said, there's a lot of new planners in the market that we would love to help. This is this is the weight we bring. This is the value that we bring. So that said, Peter, I'd love to hear just because I want to hear.
Okay. I'm the planner. This is the NASCAR crash coming now. The the sell me. Why why should I use you?
It's a it's a great question. We get asked that a lot. There's several different reasons. 1, I'm going to leave out for the sake of keeping it a little bit more general. Yeah.
It is in a third party's business plan to become part of your team without creating any overhead. Right? We've taken a lot of this logistics work away from you, and not only bring you back the logistics that you didn't wanna handle, but also quality that you can trust on because we have the depth in the market. And it's just global. We do this 5 100, 600 times a year.
So not only will we bring that expertise to your program, it may be 1 program, it may be 5 throughout the duration of a year that you're sourcing. But what we bring is that leverage of 500 to 600 conversations, negotiations that is legit business that has over $5,000,000 impact in the market. Right. So there's a significant amount of weight that we bring you and will help you not only with unlocking, hotels that you potentially would have not gotten into Miami Beach in February. We also bring, the financial advantages of that.
Right? Right. We can get that right down 20, $30. I'm not going to promise anything, but just to name and name a marker. Legal terms.
We can get what you want in your contract plus what we see necessary in today's contracts for future and so forth. So we can negotiate those terms into it to have really to really, eliminate any financial and legal exposures that you otherwise potentially would encounter. Right. Right. It's everything is when it's fishing.
Everything's great when the sun's shining. Right? But when it rains, you need a partner by your side who becomes your insurance blanket. Right. Right.
Somebody who stays by your side and says, I had attrition. We can negotiate attrition because we have 499 other programs that we can negotiate. Right? So we could potentially mitigate any amounts that you would owe by proposing another program. So you're saying your work doesn't stop when the contract's signed.
Oh, no. Oh, no. You're seeing it through. You're seeing it all the way to Yes. Post event kind of negotiating out of maybe some of those Yes.
Clauses that That is the value. That is really the value. Exactly. You hit attrition. You need to move a program.
You have to cancel a program. And if it's not force majeure, you know, what are the options? How can we do that? Before where I've gotten out on an attrition standpoint by saying, I'll bring my I'll sign the contract to bring my event, you know, the next year. But it's That that's good to know that, you know, it doesn't stop when you sign the dialogue.
No. That's that is I guarantee you, there is relationships that do that. And it also depends a little bit on what the customer wants, what the planner really wants. Some planners are just so independent that they say, I just need you to drop the legal terms in. Right.
So I know I'm buttoned up. Mhmm. And then the rest I got. Right? But we do we do pickup reports.
We do all sorts of communication. Milestones is the big one. Right? Where we say, alright. You have 2 weeks for your rooming list to be due.
How are we looking? Right. And and any any type of dates, due dates within agreements that we remind the customer. And so you're in mind, and kinda walking that client through, like, making sure you're hitting they're hitting their dates and contacting them. Exactly.
Well, I think it's cool you mentioned that you could leverage the other events. So, like, you are able to utilize events that, you know, it might there might be 5 different planners or 9 different planners that all sum up, you know, 250, 300 events together collectively, and you can leverage those. Whereas each one of those, planners, excuse me, are really only leveraging the events that they personally have, the right to front of the so I think that's, I think that's proving the process. Realize you could do that. Yeah.
I just Honestly. Yeah. It can do that. When you have when you have the relationship, and this is we we talked about this at the beginning. A relationship is what it comes down to.
It's really a partnership and a collaborative effort on all sides. Right? We we we kind of sit in the middle, but we really are creating the warmth all around. This is just our planners hire us. Right?
Our planners decide. Our customers decide. I wanna get represented by NHS Global Defense. This is my 3rd party. Any questions you have, direct to them.
(01:25):
They have my full authority. Right? And so there is no need for you to go back to the planner because the planner is going to be busy doing content stuff. Right. Right?
They have they have so much paint to put on that house, that what they outsource, they really need us to kind of show up for. So and we are doing this all day long, 247. Right? 7 days a week. You're an expert in it.
So that's I'm trying I'm not trying to Well, I have to tell them what my head. You absolutely But that's the that's the business. That is really the business. And that's really where all these advantages get drawn out of, in in favor of the planner and, of course, for the partnership aspects that we talked about from hotel and suppliers. It's been a huge struggle in the hotel business since COVID with so many companies that had in house experts, meeting planners on staff Yeah.
Went away. And we've been working with people who that that don't do this for a living. You know? And it Send me those emails? I will.
No. And I'll your lead list. Your lead list. Well, I would I would definitely recommend working with a third party because for everything that you've talked about on this podcast today. But, I mean, I it's just it's all the value that you bring to both sides of the relationship.
And I think that you did a great job today sharing that with all of us, so thank you. 2 really, really, really quick important things I wanna make sure that our listeners get out of this because this is therapy as we call it event therapy. Right? Number 1, I think it's awesome that you guys talk about, how you can use the history to leverage an approximate budget of what a client has. Because I think everybody who works in this industry who needs to get a two way number, that's one of their biggest pain points, one of their biggest frustrations, and asking it and having the conversation is always a challenge.
So knowing that you can utilize that history to kind of pinpoint it, you know, you might miss the marker the first time, but knowing that that's something you can use to hit, I think is really good. And then something that you said, Peter, that we all probably just totally glazed over, but I really, I really loved it was keeping the client away from the pain or something along those lines of having to avoid the client having pain. I think that's so cool to keep in mind that that that's, another peace of mind that comes with with that. Yeah. I'm glad you pointed that out.
That's so true. Because some of these are difficult questions. Negotiating is difficult. Yeah. Attrition is difficult.
You know, staying on top of I love how you said that you stayed on top of, like, very important deadline dates. Like, these are struggles that happen in the hotel business because, you know, people are not on top of those things. And so all of that is helpful to avoid for your customer ball, so for the hotels that you're working with. So We we try to control what we can control. Yeah.
No. I love that. Well, thank you so much, you know, for joining us today. I we always kind of want to end it with what would be your best piece of advice, to kind of give to our listeners, whether it's speaking towards a planner or a supplier. Doesn't necessarily have to be about this.
It can be anything in regards to the meetings and events world. No pressure. There's no there's no surprise in this, but and every season planner knows that and every third party, representative knows that as well. It is it all comes down to relationships and there need to be positive relationships. Let's not confuse business and personal.
A business relationship is what I'm talking about. Of course, it always spills a little bit over because as much as we work, but unless those relationships are established, it's it's not going to work out as smooth as everyone would like it to. It sounds like you're our 4th because that's all we always talk about every podcast. We might have different things about adding a 4th, we have 4 chairs. Well, I love how you talked about, really kind of explaining a third party and the leverage that it has, that kind of negotiating or what we like to call in the industry buying power per se around having a third party, because you are the expert in that field.
You know, we look for an AB supplier to be the expert in that field, a hotelier to be the expert in that. You are the expert when it comes to the sourcing contract and negotiation and, you know, dotting the i's and crossing the t's. So, I think there's great knowledge and power with that and something especially all planners should look at because it is going to help, like you said, the partnership. That's right. Well, thank you all for joining us today and make sure you follow us at event therapy podcast and we'll catch you at the next event.
Welcome to Event Therapy Podcast. And today, we're excited to have Peter as our special guest on to talk a little bit more about third party relationships and hotel sourcing. So welcome, Peter. Yeah. Thank you.
(00:01):
Thank you. Thank you. Great being here. Thanks for joining us. We are excited to have you here today and and learn a little more.
I mean, I think we should kind of start for those who maybe aren't familiar with 3rd party. You know, what does that look like? What what are you able to help with? Kind of what are your services that you provide in relationship building and just dive a little deeper into that? What do you do, sir?
How much time do we have? Wow. Alright. That was a lot of questions at the first here. Alright.
So a third party also called intermediary. I think you guys discussed this in previous episodes. We are, the full time planning arm of any, meeting planner that seeks, additional support, on all aspects when it comes to meeting planning. We start out with the sourcing. That's normally the contracting, reaching out to hotels, lending our expertise on the marketplace, rates, of course, renovations.
There's so much in that on that list, that we do for the meeting planners and that we know that's our job. Right? That's our business. And then it goes through contract clauses, really building up that being that insurance blanket for any meeting planner and for any meeting organization for that matter. And then seeing this whole the whole program through, making sure that all contextual terms have been upheld and moving on from then to reconciliation, if there are any.
I don't know. Like, attrition, whatever else that is there, the aftermath of any program, and then moving into the next program planning cycle. So you're the dotting the i's, crossing the t's, you know? Exactly. He's the professional in this situation.
That's what we are. Yeah. That's what we do. Exactly. We talk about this a lot in podcast.
I know I I at least do. Like, I as a hotelier, we love working with third parties or intermediaries. That's what you call them. And I and I've said this a lot on our podcast because you you really understand your customer. You understand kind of their contract term, like, things that are important to the organization.
So I'm maybe talking more about the contracting phase more than the source selection. I mean, obviously, a third party is great because you understand the various markets. And as a partner to the hotel, you're an extension really of being able to say, hey. I know a great fit, and you've done this, you know, for us before. So love it for that.
But when it comes to contracting, which I've talked about on other podcasts, I just love that you're the professional in this situation, and we can have we both kind of understand, you know, all the things that come along with contracting a hotel, and we can have a really good educated conversation that really feels like a win win, I think, for both. You understand your customer. We both understand the business. And I I I personally love that, and I think, you know, a lot of hotels, you know, obviously love that. It's a great, especially for companies that don't have a meeting planner per se on their staff.
You know? It's a great extension for you to be a part of their team. So, those are some of the things I think we've gotten into another podcast that we can dive into a little bit more today, but big 3rd party fan. I appreciate that. And you said you said a couple of key things.
You come to us as the professional for your property, right? You know the business plan, you know the rate structures, you know, peak and valleys, right, in your occupancy. We come from the other side. We really have to know who the customer is, who the stakeholders are, what the goal is of the event, what kind of flexibilities are there. So all these nuance of things where we really can fully 100% represent the customer.
And that's what we then get together and work out favorable, fair, contractual terms. And not only contractual terms, you are also working on that relationship, right? Because when stuff goes south, we all know it's about this, right? It's we have to sit down at the table together, have a cup of coffee and, discuss how we're going to move forward and actually keep harm away from the customer in order for both of us to keep that relationship alive and healthy for future business. So walk me through it.
So what from your standpoint, in an ideal world, a planner comes to you. They, you know, ideally know where they're willing to have the event. You know, let's say Chicago, for example. So they come to you. They need help sourcing that event.
What, from your standpoint, in a perfect world, makes your life easier to be able to source that event? What are you looking for? How can, you know, a lot of times on this podcast, we're not only here to help suppliers but also planners. We wanna help the industry. So if you could have your magic wish list and say anything you wanted, you know, to the planners Oh, to the planning discussion.
That was my next question. To the planners. What are you looking for? What what sets you up to be successful in your position when you're sourcing? It's a it's a great question and it obviously varies from person to person and from from interaction to interaction.
In an ideal world, I want full trust from the planner to me right out the gate because that assures clear communication. That assures there's no hesitation. Right? There is a there is that that path where you where the planner then actually feels comfortable to relate any type of red flags or things that worked out well in the past. Or, if push comes to shove, what are the flexibilities, the nuances that we have a little bit of a give and take on because it makes the sourcing process so much easier.
When you when we show up in the market, to our suppliers with a certain piece of business, The more we know and the more in-depth that RFP request for proposal, that RFP is, the more legit it really comes across. Right. And the more invested the responses are from the suppliers. Millions. I would you say that's all I say this all the time.
Yeah. You do. You do. So you're saying maybe if possible I mean, we know there are certain, you know, conferences or events that have the same date every year. So maybe there's a little flexibility on where that location could be.
But if your dates are flexible, maybe a couple different options available so that you can kind of best source that for them and give them a variety of options. Well, it's that and it's for sure, but it's also history, like historic data. What kind of level has this hotel been in from a qualitative standpoint? Right? Does it need to be a brand new hotel?
Does it need to be with walking distance to entertainment options? And things all these nuance of things that come with any RFP. Right. No one in the group is going Are they having dinners or are they gonna have dinners on their own so they need to, you know, have locations nearby that they can walk to? Absolutely.
(00:22):
Exactly. Do you have do you have resources? Let's say, somebody new, like like, you know, Liz mentioned, sometimes you're dealing with people who've never done it before. Do you guys have like, almost like a template or a form that somebody could fill out to say because I think a lot of times probably in our industry is one of the things we run into is we get caught in this trap of assuming that everybody we're working with knows everything that needs to be done. So I just didn't know if there's, like, in your world, is there, like, in case you don't know, here's are the things that we will need to know kind of a deal.
I don't have that. That's a good idea. Well, so these things are provided traditionally by the platform that you work with. Yeah. So we work with Cvent.
Okay. Leader in the industry. Yeah. When it comes to RFP processing. And there are required fields, right, as mandatory fields that you have to fill in when you go to market.
If we would leave it at that, we would be a terrible, terrible at doing our job because really what we build on is creating that relationship right at the get go. Right. And this is again the same what we're doing right here. You sit down at a table ideally or on teams and you have the conversations about the details. So that's really how you find out what the investment is off the planner.
Is this just one of them or is this a board meeting where, you know, the top brass of the organization gets together and there can't be a miss? Not that there can be misses anywhere, but you get the the intensity, right, off of certain programs versus others. So you're saying versus just sending, you know, because we do know that there's been an influx of new planners to the industry that, you know, don't know a lot of this information. So you're saying versus having a template, sending it to them and saying, hey, fill this out as a guideline. You prefer to do that in person or on the phone.
Yeah. More conversation. That information down, and it's more conversational Yeah. Till you get the information you need. I love that.
The only template I really would send out is a get to know you get to know your form. I wanna know if you're dragging, like, Pinot Grigio or your name. That's more important to me. Because if you don't know Peter and he sees you out, he's definitely gonna buy you coffee or wine. I wanna know.
Shush. Shush. A different story. No. But I love that we had a whole podcast about, like, RFPs and what kind of information hotels look for.
And what I love about third parties, and we talked about in that episode, was that you do understand the customer. You've already uncovered a lot of things that that you know what the hotels are looking for, what the destination's looking for. You've already asked those questions of your client. You understand them, especially if you've got a long time relationship with them. You know history.
That is so important. We've talked a lot about, like, when hotel CRFPs come out through Cvent, and it looks like it's out to the world. We like to call that. You know, they're not gonna spend a ton of time. It's so great to have you on this conversation.
Yeah. The same perspective is great. Because hotels get a ton of leads in a day. And when you see they're looking in your market, they're they've gone to similar properties or similar destinations. If you see in there, they need to be walkable to things.
And you know your hotel's in the middle of nowhere. You know? Like, you just sort of already know. Okay. These are things that are important to them.
This is where they've been in the past. I can immediately assess, are they gonna be in our price range? Like, have they been to similar type properties? And to me, that's the we've had conversations on budgets. I I don't like to ask people budgets.
I like to ask them their history because you can learn so much from that. And when third parties already give you all of that information, I think that's where you can give the best time and effort in a proposal because you've already, like, decided, like, okay. This is a really a great fit for our hotel, and you're able to sell even through Cvent, you know, why our property would be a great fit for your client. And that kind of information comes from somebody who understands customer and understands a hotel business or any other services that you're looking for. And for that reason, I absolutely love working with a third party.
And and obviously for selling, you know, the market. You know, you know these markets. You know these hotels, and you know the people that work in the hotels. Right? And that And that relationship already established.
Yep. And But not everybody, but two points to that platform. Right? We got this up in the past, let's say up until 2019. It was one of those things that both sides at some point like to hide behind.
Right. So I sent shit out, sent stuff out through. That's okay. We can edit that. I sent I sent stuff out through a platform and then never have to do anything else.
I get a response back. It is what I may be passing on to my customer, but I never have to interact directly with any of the supplier partners. And this is the key word, the partnership. Right? That's the key word that really has to be established on all ends.
We like to say that a lot. Yeah. But it's but it's the truth. That is the truth. And that's really how business gets done, especially after the pandemic.
I think the whole empathy movement and all that, we all have a lot of noise going on in our lives. If we can't connect directly and have a conversation over a phone back to the phones again or teams or whatever it is, I don't know if that relationship is really worthwhile signing a contract over. Right? Right. Yeah.
We talk on some of the podcast too about, a list from Elizabeth's perspective. Like, when you are told to go source multiple hotels in an area and you really are kind of sending it out to a large market, like, that we see on our side a lot of don't reach out to the customer, don't call and ask a bunch of questions. And I really respect that because I understand. When I see that, I'm like, okay. You know, they're really trying to narrow this down.
(00:43):
So if I feel like it's a good fit, it's good dates, like, I feel like it's all the things that I kinda just said, then I'm send a great proposal, but I understand that they're narrowing it down. And then from there, you know, hopefully, we make the shortlist, and then that's where that relationship, I think, can go a little bit further and the question. Like, you know, I think when it's it's sent out like that, it's kind of I'm just trying to narrow down my choices. And then once I've identified my, you know, top 2 or 3, that's when I'm going to go in and really get into the nitty gritty and figure out if this is going to work. In the beginning, I'm just trying to see is your hotel, is it, is it a fit?
Is it a match for my program? And are you somewhere within the range of what I'm looking to spend? Yeah. This is it's a very good point. That's the communication.
If I would be a supplier, a supplier partner in receiving RFPs, that's what I would be looking for. What's the depth of this, right? What do you need from really, what do you really need from me? Do you just need rates and dates? Or do you really need the full on proposal with everything detailed out, what the cost is going to be and what the hotel is going to look like while your program may be potentially on-site?
So yeah. And everyone likes to communicate differently. Some people love love the phone call. There's plenty of third parties that will say, pick up the phone, call me if you have any questions, ask the client. Like and I like when that's mentioned in Cvent, you know, how that communication should go or just client is strictly looking for your availability and what's gonna cost, and please don't reach out.
And I do like when that's in there because everybody likes to be communicated to differently, and I think that's important. And, you know, I think you and I have talked about this before. Like, you you are the type that's, like, I really just, for right now, need to know. I don't wanna get bombarded with a ton of emails. And but I also think that's a great reason to have a third party because you're not gonna get bombarded as the meeting planner with all of that information.
You are, and you're gonna take that information, and you're gonna find what's best, and you're gonna make a presentation to your client. So for sourcing, I think love all of that. When we get to contract negotiations, terms, all of those things, I find in those negotiations with a third party, like, they really understand their customer. They know how the contract signing process goes within the company. Like, I love when they immediately say, like, just so you know, Liz, this is gonna take a minute.
Like, it's gonna be a little while. Like, hang in there. Signed contract. That's alright. But that's great because we're getting asked, you know, on on the hotel side, you know, what's going on with this account?
When it you know, because we're turning away other business potentially. Yeah. So those so those things are important, understanding the process, understanding terms that are important. Important, not just something that you want to throw in there to add value. You know?
And I feel like when you have a good relationship between the hotel and the third party, those conversations go a lot better because there's certainly things that we can do to make it a win win on both of our sides. And it does not necessarily have to just be all this language that you've, you know, decided to throw in there. But I feel like we have really good conversations about that, like, where we have some wiggle room, where your client might have some just, like, this absolutely has to have. I just I just think the relationship, the conversation between the 2 of us is so much stronger than somebody who is the director of marketing for their company. Necessarily.
It's not necessarily their meeting planner. No. Doesn't understand the hotel business, doesn't understand, you know, some of the other, you know, ancillary businesses that you're gonna be working with and putting on a conference. And I just think it brings just it helps things, you know, move along the process a little bit better and brings more professionalism to the conversation and more history. And I just feel like, especially when you're taking a risk on something new.
The efficiency of the conversation. Yeah. It's just we're talking about really factual factual things. Mhmm. It makes the whole conversation shorter and crispier.
Right? Yeah. Yeah. I would love to hear your thought on this as well, because this is something that came up in another conversation that Liz and I were having on another podcast. And, I I'm gonna be honest.
I I've never had really thought of it this way. You know, I think so many of us planners are like, this is what I need. This is the information I need from the RFP and really just kind of laying it out there, thinking really only from my standpoint and not necessarily about does this hotel want my business? Right. Yeah.
And she really kind of opened my eyes on sell your event to the hotel and the RFP. You know? So speak in it to where the value that you're bringing. That you're bringing and why I should want your event. Yeah.
We talked about, like, positioning it as this is a great piece of business. Here's what we're bringing, the value, the food and beverage spend. A lot of times when you read these, it's like, we want all these things without meeting room rental, and we don't we we aren't gonna pay this. And it's it's sort of the way you concession. Yeah.
It's sort of the way you say it. For anything. Yeah. And I want you to give me everything. Well, it's like we can get to some of those things, you know, but I think right out the gate when you when you really position it, like, we don't, we don't, we don't, we won't, we won't, we won't.
I just think you have to show the value of the piece of business to the hotel that we're bringing this amount of rooms, and we're bringing, you know, this amount of food and beverage. And that's relative to where you're going. You have to keep that in mind too. Like, to a large hotel, that might not mean the same thing to a smaller hotel. And, you know, but really selling your value to the hotel so that they and then the right when you find the right hotel, the right partner to work with on this, like, you will get in return some of those things that you're looking for because it offers the value that makes sense to that particular partner.
You're so right on the offerings too, because I always say I wanna be the big fish in a small pond. Yeah. Like, I want to go I would rather be the big group like, go to a property that is built to accommodate my size event and and be the main event there versus going to a massive hotel where I'm just dime a dozen. You know? There's I mean, a big piece of what a third what my third party Yeah.
The one NHS does is we consult with our customers, right? You get a piece of business, it's we consider it raw until we source it a bunch of times and have enough experience with it. But a raw piece of business has to be there has to be a conversation with a planner on what's realistic, what are the market trends. And that's it's our business. We do this every day as part of our business plan to really understand where the market is going and where it's come from.
Right. And on that basis, we can go back legal terms and such. Right? We look forward. We look ahead.
What's going to be? We're not sourcing 2025. We're sourcing 2,030. Right. So what are the potentials?
(01:04):
What's the directions that the the legal language is going to, the market is going to? We all have experienced the the food and beverage prices and logistics and all this kind of stuff. But that's our business to know. And this is something we have to bring back to any planner. Most of many many planners know that.
Many planners are seasoned enough to know that, and can we have healthy but very short conversations about it. But like you said, there's a lot of new planners in the market that we would love to help. This is this is the weight we bring. This is the value that we bring. So that said, Peter, I'd love to hear just because I want to hear.
Okay. I'm the planner. This is the NASCAR crash coming now. The the sell me. Why why should I use you?
It's a it's a great question. We get asked that a lot. There's several different reasons. 1, I'm going to leave out for the sake of keeping it a little bit more general. Yeah.
It is in a third party's business plan to become part of your team without creating any overhead. Right? We've taken a lot of this logistics work away from you, and not only bring you back the logistics that you didn't wanna handle, but also quality that you can trust on because we have the depth in the market. And it's just global. We do this 5 100, 600 times a year.
So not only will we bring that expertise to your program, it may be 1 program, it may be 5 throughout the duration of a year that you're sourcing. But what we bring is that leverage of 500 to 600 conversations, negotiations that is legit business that has over $5,000,000 impact in the market. Right. So there's a significant amount of weight that we bring you and will help you not only with unlocking, hotels that you potentially would have not gotten into Miami Beach in February. We also bring, the financial advantages of that.
Right? Right. We can get that right down 20, $30. I'm not going to promise anything, but just to name and name a marker. Legal terms.
We can get what you want in your contract plus what we see necessary in today's contracts for future and so forth. So we can negotiate those terms into it to have really to really, eliminate any financial and legal exposures that you otherwise potentially would encounter. Right. Right. It's everything is when it's fishing.
Everything's great when the sun's shining. Right? But when it rains, you need a partner by your side who becomes your insurance blanket. Right. Right.
Somebody who stays by your side and says, I had attrition. We can negotiate attrition because we have 499 other programs that we can negotiate. Right? So we could potentially mitigate any amounts that you would owe by proposing another program. So you're saying your work doesn't stop when the contract's signed.
Oh, no. Oh, no. You're seeing it through. You're seeing it all the way to Yes. Post event kind of negotiating out of maybe some of those Yes.
Clauses that That is the value. That is really the value. Exactly. You hit attrition. You need to move a program.
You have to cancel a program. And if it's not force majeure, you know, what are the options? How can we do that? Before where I've gotten out on an attrition standpoint by saying, I'll bring my I'll sign the contract to bring my event, you know, the next year. But it's That that's good to know that, you know, it doesn't stop when you sign the dialogue.
No. That's that is I guarantee you, there is relationships that do that. And it also depends a little bit on what the customer wants, what the planner really wants. Some planners are just so independent that they say, I just need you to drop the legal terms in. Right.
So I know I'm buttoned up. Mhmm. And then the rest I got. Right? But we do we do pickup reports.
We do all sorts of communication. Milestones is the big one. Right? Where we say, alright. You have 2 weeks for your rooming list to be due.
How are we looking? Right. And and any any type of dates, due dates within agreements that we remind the customer. And so you're in mind, and kinda walking that client through, like, making sure you're hitting they're hitting their dates and contacting them. Exactly.
Well, I think it's cool you mentioned that you could leverage the other events. So, like, you are able to utilize events that, you know, it might there might be 5 different planners or 9 different planners that all sum up, you know, 250, 300 events together collectively, and you can leverage those. Whereas each one of those, planners, excuse me, are really only leveraging the events that they personally have, the right to front of the so I think that's, I think that's proving the process. Realize you could do that. Yeah.
I just Honestly. Yeah. It can do that. When you have when you have the relationship, and this is we we talked about this at the beginning. A relationship is what it comes down to.
It's really a partnership and a collaborative effort on all sides. Right? We we we kind of sit in the middle, but we really are creating the warmth all around. This is just our planners hire us. Right?
Our planners decide. Our customers decide. I wanna get represented by NHS Global Defense. This is my 3rd party. Any questions you have, direct to them.
(01:25):
They have my full authority. Right? And so there is no need for you to go back to the planner because the planner is going to be busy doing content stuff. Right. Right?
They have they have so much paint to put on that house, that what they outsource, they really need us to kind of show up for. So and we are doing this all day long, 247. Right? 7 days a week. You're an expert in it.
So that's I'm trying I'm not trying to Well, I have to tell them what my head. You absolutely But that's the that's the business. That is really the business. And that's really where all these advantages get drawn out of, in in favor of the planner and, of course, for the partnership aspects that we talked about from hotel and suppliers. It's been a huge struggle in the hotel business since COVID with so many companies that had in house experts, meeting planners on staff Yeah.
Went away. And we've been working with people who that that don't do this for a living. You know? And it Send me those emails? I will.
No. And I'll your lead list. Your lead list. Well, I would I would definitely recommend working with a third party because for everything that you've talked about on this podcast today. But, I mean, I it's just it's all the value that you bring to both sides of the relationship.
And I think that you did a great job today sharing that with all of us, so thank you. 2 really, really, really quick important things I wanna make sure that our listeners get out of this because this is therapy as we call it event therapy. Right? Number 1, I think it's awesome that you guys talk about, how you can use the history to leverage an approximate budget of what a client has. Because I think everybody who works in this industry who needs to get a two way number, that's one of their biggest pain points, one of their biggest frustrations, and asking it and having the conversation is always a challenge.
So knowing that you can utilize that history to kind of pinpoint it, you know, you might miss the marker the first time, but knowing that that's something you can use to hit, I think is really good. And then something that you said, Peter, that we all probably just totally glazed over, but I really, I really loved it was keeping the client away from the pain or something along those lines of having to avoid the client having pain. I think that's so cool to keep in mind that that that's, another peace of mind that comes with with that. Yeah. I'm glad you pointed that out.
That's so true. Because some of these are difficult questions. Negotiating is difficult. Yeah. Attrition is difficult.
You know, staying on top of I love how you said that you stayed on top of, like, very important deadline dates. Like, these are struggles that happen in the hotel business because, you know, people are not on top of those things. And so all of that is helpful to avoid for your customer ball, so for the hotels that you're working with. So We we try to control what we can control. Yeah.
No. I love that. Well, thank you so much, you know, for joining us today. I we always kind of want to end it with what would be your best piece of advice, to kind of give to our listeners, whether it's speaking towards a planner or a supplier. Doesn't necessarily have to be about this.
It can be anything in regards to the meetings and events world. No pressure. There's no there's no surprise in this, but and every season planner knows that and every third party, representative knows that as well. It is it all comes down to relationships and there need to be positive relationships. Let's not confuse business and personal.
A business relationship is what I'm talking about. Of course, it always spills a little bit over because as much as we work, but unless those relationships are established, it's it's not going to work out as smooth as everyone would like it to. It sounds like you're our 4th because that's all we always talk about every podcast. We might have different things about adding a 4th, we have 4 chairs. Well, I love how you talked about, really kind of explaining a third party and the leverage that it has, that kind of negotiating or what we like to call in the industry buying power per se around having a third party, because you are the expert in that field.
You know, we look for an AB supplier to be the expert in that field, a hotelier to be the expert in that. You are the expert when it comes to the sourcing contract and negotiation and, you know, dotting the i's and crossing the t's. So, I think there's great knowledge and power with that and something especially all planners should look at because it is going to help, like you said, the partnership. That's right. Well, thank you all for joining us today and make sure you follow us at event therapy podcast and we'll catch you at the next event.
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