The Forrester Wave: All-In-One Event Management Platforms, Q4 2024 report reveals a market adapting to post-pandemic realities. Leading vendors are expanding their focus to support smaller field marketing events and deepening their data integration capabilities.
Four companies emerged as “Leaders” in the evaluation: RainFocus, Cvent, SpotMe, and Bizzabo. Each has distinct strengths:
- RainFocus stands out for its complex event capabilities and deep tech stack integrations.
- Cvent maintains the broadest feature set, bolstered by recent acquisitions, including Reposite and Splash.
- SpotMe excels in industry-specific solutions, particularly in life sciences.
- Bizzabo differentiates itself through strong marketing and engagement features.
Swoogo and vFairs earned the “Strong Performer” label, while Stova, Swapcard, RingCentral, Cisco, Splash, and 6Connex are “Contenders.”
Forrester selected the 12 event management platforms based on clients’ “significant interest,” their capabilities to support in-person, virtual, and hybrid events, and their annual revenue of over $10 million.
The results are similar to the 2024 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Event Technology Platforms report released in March. At the time, Gartner did not evaluate the SpotMe platform, but it has now made it into the top four for Forrester’s report.
What It Means for Planners
According to the report, about three-quarters of event registrations are for in-person or hybrid events, confirming a strong return to face-to-face gatherings. Also, the fastest-growing segment is small in-person events with fewer than 200 attendees, while virtual events are becoming simpler and shorter.
The findings suggest three key considerations:
- Platform selection should align with your event mix, especially as smaller events grow in importance.
- Data integration capabilities should be a primary consideration, not an afterthought.
- Maximizing ROI to connect event technology with marketing and CRM systems is crucial.
Prioritizing Data Management
All the top-performing platforms are focused on maximizing event data value. With increasing restrictions on audience data collection, events have become “possibly the single most valuable source of zero- and first-party data.”
“The majority of large enterprises continue to deploy and use overlapping event technologies running in functional silos,” notes the report, highlighting a consolidation opportunity as event budgets remain flat or decline for most organizations.
Customer Feedback Is Important
Forrester considers customer feedback, but it is not part of the Forrester Wave™ ranking. Bizzabo is the only company recognized as a customer favorite. RainFocus and SpotMe are recognized for above-average feedback. The remaining nine didn’t excel as a crucial factor for software supporting business events. To assess customer feedback, Forrester speaks with up to three customers of each vendor and considers input from previous research.
What’s the Final Score?
The report helps event technology users select the right all-in-one event management platforms. It weighs a company’s vision as equal to the strength of its offering. While a company’s vision is important to potential clients, who are, in a way, also investors, this equal weighting may not always be appropriate.
Cvent ranks highest in the strength of its offering, scoring 4.56/5. RainFocus follows closely at 4.4. Both are ahead of Bizzabo (3.7), SpotMe (3.5), and Stova (3.16) when looking at the criteria separately.
Regarding strategy, RainFocus leads with a score of 4.7, followed by Cvent at 4.4. SpotMe and Swoogo are close behind at 4.
The following ranking results are based on the combined strength of offering and strategy scores.
- RainFocus: 9.1
- Cvent: 8.96
- SpotMe: 7.5
- Bizzabo: 7
- Swoogo: 6.6
- vFairs: 5.5
- Stova: 4.6
- Swapcard: 4.58
- RingCentral: 4.52
- Cisco: 4.48
- Splash: 3.32
- 6Connex: 3.20
Unique scores that stand out include “budget management,” for which only RainFocus and Cvent score top marks. In “environmental sustainability tracking,” only RainFocus gets top marks, while SpotMe and vFairs get anything other than the lowest score.
