Event-organising industry may grow only 4-5%
The general economic slow-down and the government's budget cuts for promoting policies are deflating growth in the event-organising industry to only 4-5 per cent this year, an agency chief said yesterday.
Index Event Agency CEO Kriengkrai Kanjanapokin said business had dropped off during the first quarter.He said this was due mainly to last September's major political change and the New Year's Eve bombs in Bangkok, both of which chipped away at consumer confidence. This government has sharply reduced spending for events, with many agencies down by 50 per cent and relying on media advertising rather than holding public activities. Index Event Agency alone has booked a mere Bt1 million from government events compared to Bt120 million last year. For this whole year, the company expects its billings to grow only 15 per cent from Bt720 million last year, compared with the usual rate of 20 per cent. However, the industry this quarter tended to do a bit better, as corporate clients who were waiting for some time to get the big picture thought they should start doing something to stimulate consumers to spend money. This also means the market is expected to continue to improve next quarter. Kriengkrai said events allowed companies to make direct approaches to consumers to purchase their products. Most of the agency's corporate clients are shifting from one-time events to campaigns continuing for a period of time, say three months. Many companies need to arrange their events in more creative ways, and interactive marketing is a solution, he said. Interactive marketing features marketing strategies that allow consumers to participate in certain activities or give responses through various channels including mobile phones and the Internet, as well as to receive privileges. Interactive marketing has gained popularity among companies in Europe and the US in the past two years and is gradually expanding to Asia. In Thailand, interactive marketing is already heavily used by the real-estate, automobile, banking, credit-card and consumer-product industries. Kriengkrai said there was no official figure for total spending on interactive marketing, but his company set up two joint ventures in February and April to capture a share of the emerging segment. Inspire Image focuses on "ambience media", while 3-RD Co concentrates on customer-relations management, which includes direct marketing, call centres and database management. Index holds 60 per cent of Inspire Image and 50 per cent of 3-RD, bringing its number of subsidiaries to eight. Nitida Asawanipont The Nation
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