Cebu hosts conference for ‘most lucrative’ MICE market

Cebu’s biggest hotels and resorts are putting their best foot forward in the next four days for an international conference that mines tourism’s most lucrative market—conventions, meetings and large-group events.

About 200 delegates started arriving for the conference, which will be opened tomorrow by Tourism Secretary Alberto Lim and Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia at the Cebu International Convention Center.

While the United States remains the favored destination for this type of tourism—which goes by the acronym MICE for “meetings, incentive, conventions, exhibitions”—the Philippines has its own advantages, said foreign experts.

Banking on the natural warmth and hospitality of Filipino hosts, and already attractive travel destinations, the Philippines can be at par with other MICE destinations in the world, said several resource speakers at a press conference yesterday for the Philippine MICE Con 2011.

“How to capture that market? Truly that’s going to be tough job. One way though is to make sure that you are visible in the market place,” said Bill LaViolette, managing director of I&MI Media in France.

He said the Philippines should be more aggressive in promoting destinations like Cebu using the Internet.

“Buyers nowadays check out the Internet for information. They check blogs and reviews to learn about a certain place,” he said.

The MICE market is considered the most lucrative type because a visitor spends four times more here than during travel for a holiday or other purpose, said LaViolette. He is scheduled to speak about how to evaluate and track print and electronic media to maximize return on investment.

The Aug. 10 to 13 MICE Con will have delegates officially booked at deluxe and first-class hotels of Imperial Palace, Marco Polo Plaza, Radisson Blu Hotel, Shangri-la’s Mactan Resort and Spa and the Waterfront Cebu City Hotel and Casino.

For local flavor, one of the first special activities today is a visit to the Cebu provincial jail for early delegates to watch the “dancing inmates” made famous by YouTube exposure of their Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”.

Two days are allotted for plenary sessions and one day for networking.

Other foreign resource speakers, who are already in Cebu, said Cebu can improve its standing by being more visible in the market place, establish long lasting personal relationships with MICE markets as well as empower and educate associations that are responsible for the continuous bidding and promotion.

According to Corbin Ball of Corbin Ball Associates, USA, the US is the top destination for meetings in the world followed by United Kingdom and Germany.

“There is, however, a lot of interest in other destinations. The Philippines has an advantage of being in the most strategic location the world. The infrastructure, hospitality and going out in the market like these MICE Con can have great impact,” Ball said. Cebu first hosted a similar event in 1993, the Philippine Incentive Marketing Conference with the theme “Creating the dream.”

“We have been getting a good volume of visitors from these segments,” said Patria Aurora Roa, who was then Department of Tourism regional director for region 7.

“When we hosted it for the second time in 1998 the theme was ‘Fulfilling the dream.’ We have been getting a lot of these markets here already and with this conference we hope to achieve more through the conference,” Roa said.

A group of 170 executives, employees and dealers of Megaphone, Russia’s biggest telecommunications company, have been in Cebu since yesterday for an incentive tour, confirmed DOT Regional Director Rowena Montecillo.

As of yesterday, 53 foreign and domestic buyers confirmed their attendance in the MICE Con, including delegates from China, India, Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam and Thailand and about 89 sellers.