Conference News Supplements The Tech Factor Supplement | страница 13

Switching up
The team at London venue Victory Services Club shares
how they updated their tech solutions
WE HAVE SEEN
SOME TECHNOLOGY
COMPANIES CREATE
SOLUTIONS
DESIGNED ON ONE
TYPE OF VENUE,
AND AS SUCH WILL
NOT WORK ACROSS
THE BOARD.
Victory Services Club (VSC) was
one of the first UK venues to
adopt the iVvy venue
management system in 2018.
Conference News talks to the
venue’s operations director
Mark Field FIH, and event sales
manager Joanna Lunn, to find
out about their experience and
how the technology has
impacted on their team, their
clients and ultimately the
venue’s success.
When did you adopt the system
and why?
JL: I joined the VSC in April
2018 and I quickly found out
that the system being used by
the team was antiquated and
not fit for purpose, it was not
user-friendly and was really
inflexible. I’d just moved back to
the UK from Australia and I’d
heard of iVvy while I was
working at the Sydney Town Hall.
We adopted the iVvy system in
November 2018.
What impact did the system
have on your team?
JL: The system has helped us to
become far more efficient in the
way that we work and how
quickly we respond to clients
and enquiries. New enquiries
come straight into iVvy so
everything is in one place and
easy to find. In this fast-paced
world of ours, it is very
important to respond swiftly to
booking enquires and RFPs and
the system auto-generate
quotes and enables us to react
really quickly. The whole event
process, from enquiry and
contract through to the running
sheets, floor plans and invoices
are all managed through iVvy.
All client correspondence is
held in iVvy and it is also a CRM
system so we can use it to log
contact and for marketing
correspondence and
newsletters.
MF: The system is cloud-based
so the team can access it from
anywhere – so working from
home is a viable option for
them. An added bonus is that it
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13
gives us a
Technology
disaster
recovery
solution, because it is cloud-
based it is accessible from any
devices with an internet
connection. If we even had a
situation with a power outage or
access restrictions to the VSC,
the team could work remotely.
Our management reporting is
easier now too – we worked
with iVvy from the start to
ensure that the system was
capturing the details and data
that was important to us. For
example, we can see which
events are the most and least
profitable, allowing us to be
more selective when accepting
business.
JL: The system has had a huge
impact on our approach to
sales. We have increased our
proactivity - we have time to visit
agents, to exhibit at more
events and invest the time
needed to build stronger
relationships.
Where there any teething
troubles?
JL: We have the ‘live room
availability’ function displayed
on our website – which allows
organisers to see where and
when we have availability, but at
the moment we prefer to handle
bookings in person. The next
step for us will be to use the
virtual floor plan function to
drag and drop and customise
our virtual floorplans for our
clients.
Ultimately, how has it
impacted on the business?
MF: We are a very busy team,
but we can access and review
management information easily
and more frequently which in
turn means that we can shape
the business and grow it in the
right places. iVvy has helped us
to add more value to our client
relationships and has helped to
increase the revenue we
generate from events.