The 2026 Cvent Excellence Awards put a well-deserved spotlight on the remarkable organizations and individuals who showcase bold ideas, sharp strategies, and impressive results across the industry.
The 14th annual customer awards program, held during Cvent CONNECT in Nashville, brought together thousands of people to honor some of the highest performers in meetings, events, and hospitality.
Highlighting the industry's best
The awards program spotlights true industry innovators — recognizing the bold ideas, brilliant execution, and measurable results that move our industry forward.
Each year, hundreds of nominations pour in across multiple categories. With over 500 submissions for this year's awards, nominees and winners consistently highlighted their innovative use of technology to enhance collaboration, drive program efficiency, and deliver exceptional organizational success.
The hybrid awards ceremony, broadcast live from Nashville during Cvent CONNECT, ensured the celebration reached every corner of the industry. "The Cvent Excellence Awards recognize customers who aren't just keeping pace with the industry — they're helping define where it goes next," said Andreas Heckmann, Chief Customer Officer at Cvent. "This year's winners stood out for the clarity of their strategy, the strength of their execution, the value of their outcomes, and the example they're setting for their peers across the industry."
Congratulations to the 2026 winners
This year's program featured winners across 19 unique categories, including exciting new additions like the Event Intelligence Award, Digital Events Visionary, Association & Nonprofit Impact Icon, and The AI Activator.
Being named a Cvent Excellence Award winner is more than a trophy moment — it's a launchpad for ongoing recognition and industry visibility. Not only did winners enjoy a well-deserved moment in the spotlight onstage during the awards, but they also enjoyed exclusive VIP experiences like a meet & greet opportunity with industry mogul and keynote speaker Bobbi Brown.
In addition to custom awards recognizing their achievements, they also enjoy global recognition in front of thousands of industry peers, elevating both their personal and organizational brands. Please join us in congratulating all of our nominees and our winners for this year's awards!
Event Professional & Marketer Winners
Marketing Mastermind
Gainsight
Gainsight redefined what high-impact field marketing can look like, using Cvent Splash to orchestrate dozens of campaigns and more than 60 events, influencing millions of dollars in pipeline, and ensuring breakout roadshow success as a standout driver of SQL impact.
Trade Show Trailblazer
Schneider Electric
Schneider Electric redefined trade show lead capture with iCapture — collecting thousands of qualified leads, improving qualification by up to 40%, and generating more than a million dollars in pipeline influence by turning every interaction into a sales-ready opportunity.
Digital Events Visionary
FloQast
FloQast, transformed its digital flagship into an undeniable growth engine with Goldcast – driving 4 times pipeline growth, surging to seventy-five hundred registrants, and engaging thousands of live attendees in a bold, high-performing event experience.
Ace of Spaces
Forvis Mazars
Forvis Mazars built a highly disciplined meetings engine — powering smarter sourcing, faster space validation, and stronger housing governance with Cvent to deliver millions in cost avoidance, source over a hundred thousand room nights, and return thirteen hundred hours to the business.
Association & Nonprofit Impact Icon
Wounded Warrior Project
Wounded Warrior Project redefined event impact, using Cvent to power over 7,000 annual events and source 20,000 room nights while reallocating millions in cost savings back to the organization and expand mission-critical support for thousands of warriors.
The Rookie
Sanofi
With Cvent at the center, Sanofi orchestrated an exceptionally disciplined global rollout—activating a deep Cvent tech stack to help manage over 2,000 registrants, keeping five integrated workstreams on track across more than 760 events, and building a scalable foundation for enterprise-wide growth in under nine months.
Pivotal Partner
Meetings & Incentives Worldwide
Meetings & Incentives Worldwide turned Cvent into the operating system behind a high-performing global events business, scaling to nearly 4,000 annual MRF submissions, driving 130% registration growth, and sourcing 95% of their hotel business through the Cvent Supplier Network – creating lasting enterprise value for customers around the world.
Power of the Platform – Flagship Event
*Please note this category featured two winners.
GBTA
GBTA redefined what a modern flagship can deliver by generating almost $6 million in revenue, scanning more than 25,000 leads, and driving thousands of meetings across its biggest, most connected convention experience yet.
SAS Institute
SAS Institute transformed its conference into a bold, AI-powered hybrid flagship - driving over 100,000 session registrations and a 92% conversion rate while accelerating pipeline across both in-person and virtual audiences.
Power of the Platform – Total Event Program
*Please note this category featured two winners.
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital
St. Jude built an extraordinary global events ecosystem, improving efficiency by 60% and reaching nearly 10,000 attendees to help life-saving research and best practices reach clinicians around the world faster.
ConnectWise
ConnectWise established a high-velocity global growth engine —scaling more than 200 events across three continents, influencing up to $15 million in pipeline, and turning every touchpoint into faster follow-up, stronger engagement, and measurable momentum.
Event Intelligence Award
NCCI Holdings
Turning event intelligence into real organizational impact with CventIQ, NCCI used AI-powered daily summaries, event ads, and engagement scoring to drive near-perfect app adoption, thousands of engagement points, and a smarter, more personalized experience for their attendees.
Cvent Advocate of the Year
Andrea Sorbello, The United States Tennis Association
With Andrea at the helm, USTA transformed Cvent into a strategic platform for growth—streamlining complex registrations, scaling events, and building the kind of cross-functional adoption that turns one advocate into an organizational catalyst.
Hospitality Professional Winners
The AI Activator
Azul Hospitality
Azul Hospitality incorporated AI across its portfolio in proposals, floor plans, BEOs, and room block management. Integrated workflows decreased response time by 5 hours, grew awarded RFPs 30%, and fundamentally changed the way their sales team operates.
The Portfolio Powerhouse
Davidson Hospitality Group
Across more than 40 upscale hotels, Davidson Hospitality Group built a unified operating discipline that raised the performance floor for the entire portfolio, driving awarded RFPs up 30% and awarded RFP value up 50%.
The Block Buster
Montage International
Montage International transformed room block management into a competitive advantage by standardizing automated booking workflows across every property. The result: saving seventy-eight hundred effort hours and increasing incremental revenue by 25%.
The Business Intelligencer
InterContinental Houston by IHG
InterContinental Houston turned data into results with weekly response performance reviews and data-driven prospecting. That discipline delivered a 10% increase in RFPs received, and a 40% increase in unique organizations sourcing.
The Group Game Changer
PGA National Resort
After a rebrand, PGA National Resort accelerated its group business using data-driven targeting to engage high-potential planners. Combined with automated response workflows that reduced response time by 25%, this helped PGA grow RFP value by 20%.
The Hometown Hero
Visit Austin
When Austin's convention center closed for renovation, Visit Austin strategically targeted planners sourcing meetings the city could accommodate without a convention center facility. They proactively offset the disruption: new planners sourcing increased by 35% and RFP value by 30%.
The Clever Collaborator
Ocean Properties Hotels and Resorts
Ocean Properties Hotels & Resorts transformed a fragmented, 58-property floor plan operation into a real-time collaboration engine. Shared digital workflows replaced email threads, collaborator invites grew over 70%, and planner sign-off accelerated across the portfolio.
Cvent Advocate of the Year
Shelley Williams, F1 Arcade
A digital-first champion, Shelley transformed how F1 Arcade showcases its space. Its new digital presence gives planners complete confidence before they ever visit the venue, with the “show, don’t tell” strategy delivering a 300% increase in interactive floorplan engagement and cutting manual layout time in half.
Ready to Step Into the Spotlight?
This year's winners have set an incredible standard — one that proves what's possible when passionate professionals pair their expertise with cutting-edge technology.
Think your organization has what it takes to be the next winner? Submissions for the 2027 Cvent Excellence Awards will open in September, so please visit cvent.com/excellence-awards to learn more about the program and fill out the form to be notified when submissions are open.
Please join us in once again congratulating all of this year's outstanding finalists and winners!
Brittany Estes
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