I’ve never really been big on accepting corporate hospitality. I don’t have the slightest idea how cricket works for instance – they’re in, they’re out, they’re not out, they play for days, then draw. Mmmm… no. I have a similar problem with the ‘Corporate Golf Days’. Take a stick, a little white ball and acres of nothingness then spend the day thwacking the little white ball with the stick to put it in a hole (where it clearly doesn’t want to go). And then do it again another seventeen times before you’re allowed a beer. I don’t think so.

So either I’m not personable enough to be invited on corporate hospitality days – harsh, but possibly fair – or I avoid them because they get in the way of, god forbid, getting on with some work. But that’s just me. Or at least, that was me. I’ve changed my mind. Not about cricket or golf which are just plain silly, but I’ve had cause to reconsider hospitality as a marketing ‘tool’ from both sides – as the provider and as the recipient.

Providing the hospitality, I took a whoop of clients to the Caldesi Italian Cookery School in Marylebone .The client reaction when we sent out the invitations was good. “What? It’s not a golf day? What happened to the golf day?” “Look, I thought we’d try something different – d’you want to come or not?” “Oh, ehh, actually, yeah – sounds great…” So then I worried that everyone was being polite and they wouldn’t turn up. Actually, it was a full house – 100% attendance. That’s never happened before. We all had a jolly good time. A bunch of senior executives wearing pinnies and covered is flour is the perfect recipe for a jolly good time. I was pleasantly surprised – not just with the day itself, but with the post-event camaraderie and the feeling that we all knew each other a bit better – and it’s just good to ‘know’ who you’re doing business with. I don’t think you can or need to put a ROI figure on that, it’s invaluable.

On the flip side, I was recently invited to a day of motor racing at the Jonathan Palmer Autodrome near Bedford. I think I can safely say that it was the best ‘work-day’ I have ever had. Ever, ever, ever. My host had invited about 100 guests for the day and we all thrashed the bollocks off Porsches, Jaguars, Renaults, Caterhams and even Land Rovers under race conditions. I suspect the cost of the day would have been moderately in excess of the National Debt, which, let’s face it, is considerable these days. Not that I cared of course. I was just pleased to have been invited and unashamedly delighted that it wasn’t golf or cricket.

But how do you measure the ROI? The simple answer appears to be that all those concerned do their very best not to. “It’s a ‘thank you’ for the value we have already had from the client…”, and, “It’s slow burn for key prospects we’re hoping to develop…” In other words, bullshit. It reminded me of the many conversations I’ve had with clients about their trade show attendances and what, if anything, they achieve out of them. “Not really sure, but we absolutely need to be there…”

I suspect that with both recession and new forms of digital communication appearing daily, budget spending on events like these might be reconsidered in favour of the more tangibly measured lead generators. I think that’s a shame. However hard it may be to measure the short term impact of corporate hospitality, we still need to keep a weather eye on the longer term future of client and prospect relationships. And there’s really nothing quite like the parp and squelch of your buttocks going into the hairpin bend at 150mph to remind you that life is more important than ROI.

Scot McKee
Managing Director
Birddog Ltd.
+44 (0)20 7323 6666