Cvent Event Management

Costs are offset by benefits

Pros:

Reporting is an excellent feature that allows real-time reporting on almost anything you can think of (there are tons of standard reports built into the system, but you can also create custom reports). Being able to provide stakeholders with a link to run reports on-demand saves a lot of time on the planner's end. The event website is easy to edit and keeps attendees up-to-date with information (thereby cutting down on calls and emails with questions). Emails can be set up to be sent out automatically upon certain parameters being met.

Cons:

Cost is a bit higher than other event management platforms, but tends to have very few glitches (if any) and provides excellent management of events from a couple of people to thousands. I have worked with other platforms that could not handle large groups without crashing, so the consistency in performance is a comfort. Oftentimes, you'll find the cost of the platform is offset by time savings.

Cvent has been a game changer!

Pros:

When we set out to find a new event management tool, we met with several vendors. None could meet our needs. Then we found Cvent. Cvent checked all our boxes and more! The sales staff was extremely helpful and bent over backwards to help us test our specific use cases. They were a wealth of knowledge and gave us confidence in the product. We've now been using Cvent for over a year and we couldn't be happier. It's streamlined our processes, improved the user experiences, and gives us all the reporting we need easily. There team was with us every step of the way during our integration phase and made it a breeze. I highly recommend this tool!

Cons:

Cvent was such a drastic improvement from our previous solutions, so it's hard to speak to anything negative! The tool does SO much so it can be daunting to learn everything and get your webpages looking nice. However our support teams have been a great resource. Cvent also has many help articles that are a great reference point.

My Review of CEM

Pros:

Cvent Event Management makes it super easy to schedule and reschedule virtual, in-person and hybrid events in one place.

Cons:

The vendor ensures there no issues for 24/7 through version control and bug fixes.

Complicated System with Missing Functionality

Comments: Overall, I have been very disappointed in the service. Not easy to learn and Cvent should not have released a new version with very basic and essential capabilities missing.

Pros:

Cvent is nice in that it has thought of many of the different scenarios planners need to communicate, offer registration for and track for each event. The integrated credit card processing makes handling the financial aspect of meetings much easier.

Cons:

This software is extremely difficult to learn and use. Cvent is also switching from a legacy system to a new one. If you use the legacy system, not only are you wasting your time learning a system that will be eliminated, but your events will disappear after the change as they can't be transferred. Yet the new system is missing very essential functionality making its use very limited. None of this was clearly communicated during the sales process. The app feature is very overpriced and extremely limited in its capabilities. Also, the system is not a full life-cycle system. There are no features to help centralize the actual planning of the event - it does have RFP and budgeting features, as well as registration, but completely ignores room set, a/v programming, etc. Doesn't eliminate having other documents and spreadsheets outside of the system for organizing events. So, I would not consider it an "event management" system.

Alternatives Considered: Bizzabo

Reasons for Switching to Cvent Event Management: Bizzabo noted it was not capable of both pushing and pulling information from our CMS.

Overall a great platform with several integrated solutions

Pros:

I like that the management portion of the platform integrates with all of their solutions and tools across the platform.

Cons:

Currently, my least favorite part of the event management portion is the reporting feature. It is hard to create the reports we need with the limited flexibility. Our internal team has a hard time understanding reports.