Fill your event calendar with corporate clients you called yourself

Every company with staff and clients holds events: a new year reception, a kick-off, a client day, a product launch, a training day off site. Most of them went somewhere last year and will go somewhere next year. New business for an event agency or a venue is about being the name they think of when they start looking, and that moment comes months before the event itself.

The market: many organisers, events in every company

The supply side is fragmented. Eurostat business statistics count 2,092 enterprises in Belgium and 1,552 in the Netherlands in 2023 whose main activity is organising conventions and trade shows (NACE 82.30). Most are very small. On 1 October 2026, CBS counted 1,790 Dutch businesses in this activity (provisional figures), of which 1,435 were one-person businesses and 70 had 10 or more people working. Venues, caterers, hotels and audiovisual companies sell into the same budgets.

The region is strong in international meetings. According to the 2024 ICCA ranking, the Netherlands hosted 295 international association meetings and kept eighth place in the world, with 94 in Amsterdam. The UIA, which counts differently, put Brussels first among cities in 2024 with 388 international meetings, about 7% of 8,859 worldwide. These rankings cover association congresses, not the company events most agencies and venues live on.

Companies also use events to learn. In the European training survey, Eurostat reports for 2020 that 36.9% of Belgian and 46.1% of Dutch enterprises with 10 or more persons employed used conferences, workshops, trade fairs or lectures as a form of staff training. That is a buyer group worth calling: HR and learning teams who need a room, a programme and a day that works.

Decisions follow the event. A small company often lets the owner or an office manager choose on trust and price. Larger companies compare several venues or agencies, ask for a proposal and involve marketing, HR and finance. Big conferences may go through purchasing with a formal request for proposals.

Who you call and what you ask

The people who book corporate events:

• Marketing or communication manager: client events, launches, trade fair presence.
• HR manager: staff parties, kick-offs, training days and team days.
• Office manager or executive assistant: shortlists venues and often makes the first call.
• Event manager: at larger companies and associations, owns the conference calendar.
• Owner or managing director: at smaller companies, the one who decides.

Trigger events that make the call relevant: an annual event that returns on a fixed date, a new marketing or HR manager, a merger or a new office, a product launch, a company anniversary, an event that disappointed last time, and a venue that closed or became too small.

Discovery questions that work in this sector:

1. Which events do you organise every year, and when do you start looking for a place?
2. How many guests do you expect, and what format do you have in mind?
3. What went well last time, and what would you change?
4. Who decides on the venue or agency, and who holds the budget?
5. Which dates are fixed, and which can still move?

Event buyers plan in seasons, so timing matters: read the best time to cold call.

What slows a calling team down in this sector

• The familiar place. "We always go to the same venue" is common. The real question is whether it still fits the guest count and the goal.
• Long lead times. Big events are booked many months ahead. If you call when the date is close, the choice is already made.
• Several decision makers. The assistant who shortlists is rarely the one who signs. Marketing, HR and finance may all have a say.
• Seasonal peaks. The end of the year and the start of the year are busy for events and quiet for buying conversations.
• Price comparisons. Proposals are easy to compare per guest. A good conversation is about the goal of the event, not only the price.

What it can bring you: efficiency, money and more

For an event agency or venue, the measurable step is the site visit or briefing. What you can track is how many calls lead to a conversation, how many conversations to a visit, and how many visits to a signed event.

Example with assumed numbers: one caller, one month, and an assumed value of 15,000 euros for one corporate event. These are not benchmarks; replace them with your own figures.

Efficiency is something you can measure too. Time how long it takes today to note an outcome and plan the next step. If one key and an automatically planned follow-up save two minutes per attempt, 600 attempts save about 20 hours a month. Check that against your own week rather than taking it on trust.

The bigger gain is often in the follow-up. A buyer who said "call me in March about the summer event" is worth a lot if somebody calls in March. Read how to ask for the meeting and how to follow up sales leads, or try it yourself in the interactive demo.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

1. Eurostat: Enterprises by detailed NACE Rev.2 activity (sbs_ovw_act), NACE 82.30 Organisation of conventions and trade shows, 2023
2. CBS StatLine: Bedrijven; bedrijfstak (81589NED), SBI 8230 Organisatie van congressen, beurzen, 4th quarter 2026, provisional
3. I amsterdam: Amsterdam solidifies top position in 2024 ICCA ranking
4. Travel Tomorrow: Brussels hosts more international meetings than any other city (UIA 2024 figures, June 2025)
5. Eurostat: Enterprises providing training by type of training and size class (trng_cvt_01s), CVTS 2020