Is your head spinning with all this talk about RFPs and DMCs? As an occasional (or even first-time) event planner, you may not be aware of the entirety of the ecosystem that exists to serve your needs. To get you started, here's some event planning lingo!

• Event - In the context of eventRFP, an "event" can be anything from a small sales meeting to a week-long incentive getaway. It is sometimes used interchangeably with "meeting".
• Provider - A local company that provides expert services in destinations around the world.
• DMC - Destination Management Company. This special breed of provider offers logistics, activity planning, and vendor sourcing services, and can truly be a "one-stop shop". DMCs are especially useful for unfamiliar or exotic destinations.
• RFP - Request for Proposal. An outline of an event that is sent to a provider to initiate the event planning process.
• Proposal - A proposed schedule of events and activities, with pricing, from a DMC or other service provider.

If you are not a full time meeting planner, you may be unaware of these highly capable providers, or may think that they're only for bigger events or companies with bigger budgets. They offer a full breadth of ground services from transportation and hotel accommodations to custom designed theme events and excursions, and you can use them for all or only part of your event's goings-on.

DMCs have offices and personel located in your destinations, so they are aware of the local highlights and pitfalls. These providers can advise you, recommend activities and vendors, handle logistics, and often save you money through their local knowledge and connections.

Our database is full of DMCs and other service providers that are eager to recieve your RFPs, and with several providers competing for your business, you can be sure they will recommend their best offerings at competitive prices.

Many sourcing tools require you to fill out lengthy forms before sending an RFP, and even require information that isn't applicable to your event. With eventRFP, most fields are optional so you can get the RFP process started quickly and add details later. If you have an existing RFP document already, no problem! Just upload your RFP and send it off to your selected providers with a couple of clicks.

Your RFPs are sent directly to the providers you have chosen, empowered with their own eventRFP dashboard. Providers can quickly respond with a proposal or message via their dashboard and you can be rest assured your RFPs do not get lost in cluttered inboxes.

Additionally, the eventRFP support team works closely with providers to ensure they respond promptly to RFPs.

As you receive proposals from providers, eventRFP will automatically present you with side by side comparisons. Some proposals can easily be 50+ pages long -- compare "apples to apples" as eventRFP places the transportation options on page 2 of Proposal A next to the transportation options on page 23 of Proposal B.

Quickly see how each proposal stacks up against others. Even put together your "ultimate" proposal by marking the best options in each proposal.

Easy to use.

EventRFP has been designed from the ground up to be easy to use, yet still extremely powerful and efficient. Where other tools have crowded, confusing screens with paid placement ads, eventRFP maintains a clean, streamlined interface. Whatever you'd like to do, everything can be accomplished with a few clicks of the mouse or taps on the keyboard.

Organized, practical dashboards make it simple to create and manage multiple events at the same time. With a quick glance, see the status of every event or effortlessly pull up a correspondence from a certain stage in the planning process for a given event.