CEMA Event Marketing ROI Benchmarking Survey

Section A - Respondent & Organization Profile

1.What is your first name?

2.What is your last name?

3.What is your email address?

4.Which best describes your primary role?

Corporate Event Marketing (in-house)

Agency Event Marketing

Consultant

Association Event Professional

Other (please specify)

9.Event Types You Actively Measure (select all that apply)

Other (please specify)

Section B - Current State of ROI Measurement

10.How would you describe your current relationship with event ROI measurement? (select one)

Very consistent and well-governed

Mostly consistent, some gaps

Situational and event-by-event

Inconsistent/ad-hoc

We rarely measure ROI beyond basic metrics

11.For your flagship customer/user conference, how mature is your ROI measurement?

12.For partner/third-party events, how mature is your ROI measurement?

13.For internal enablement events (e.g., SKO), how mature is your ROI measurement?

Section C - Metrics, KPIs, and Cadence

16.Do you track immediate outcomes and longer-term impact on a defined cadence?

Yes, day-after +30/60/90-day reporting

Yes, but only at one follow-up interval (e.g., 30 days)

Yes, but timing varies by event

No, we mainly report once per event and move on

17.How frequently do your attribution models or ROI definitions change (e.g., MQL, SQL, touch weighting)?

18.To what extent do you use industry benchmarks (where available) to judge event performance?

Section D - Tech Stack, Data Quality & Ownership

19.Which systems feed your event ROI reporting? (select all that apply)

CRM (e.g., Salesforce)

Marketing automation (e.g., Marketo, HubSpot, Eloqua)

Event platforms (registration, mobile app, scanning)

Business intelligence/data visualization (e.g., Tableau, Domo, Power BI)

Data warehouse/lake (e.g., Snowflake, Databricks)

Spreadsheets (Excel, Google Sheets)

Other (please specify)

20.How well do these systems integrate for event measurement purposes?

Very well - mostly automated and reliable

Moderately - some automation, some manual work

Poorly - heavy manual effort and exports

Not at all - primarily manual/spreadsheet-driven

22.Who owns event ROI methodology and definitions in your organization? (select all that apply)

23.To what extent is Finance a partner or an impediment in event ROI work?

Section E - Pain Points & "Impossible" Metrics

25.In the last 12 months, did you run an event you believe was successful but struggled to prove its value to leadership?

No

If yes, what made it hard to prove?

Section F - Toolkit Needs & AI Use

27.Which formats are acceptable within your organization? (select all that apply)

28.Current use of AI for event ROI (select all that apply):

Not using AI yet

Using AI for survey/sentiment analysis

Using AI to summarize event performance/reports

Using AI to detect anomalies in data

Using or piloting agents/bots specifically for event metrics

Other (please specify)

29.If you could wave a magic wand and fix one thing about event ROI in your organization, what would it be?

Thank you! You're Shaping the Future of Event Marketing!

Thank you for sharing your expertise. Your insights will directly influence the ROI framework and toolkit we're building for our community.

What Happens Next:
August 2026:  Preliminary findings will be launched with a panel session at CEMA Summit 2026 in Toronto, Canada.

Questions? Contact insights@pcma.org

Together, we're elevating event marketing to its rightful place at the strategy table.

This research study has been made possible by Choose Chicago.