London & Partners, the official convention bureau for London, has announced the global business tourism campaign ‘Motivation Month’ at EIBTM. The campaign, which is set to run throughout February 2012, will build momentum towards International Confex which will take place in the first week of March 2012 at the ExCeL London ICC.

The campaign also supports the overall UK-wide ‘Britain for Events’ annual messaging, which was designed to promote Britain as a world class destination for all types of events, and is supported by the UK Government.

Tracy Halliwell, Director of Business Tourism and Major Events at London & Partners said: “London’s Motivation month really has two main objectives: the first is obviously to raise the profile of London as an incentive and business destination for 2012 and beyond, and secondly, it’s to allow knowledge sharing for the actual events and business industry. It’s vital that as an industry we learn from each other, continue to strengthen London’s business tourism and events offering. By creating this campaign, we hope that London will retain its crown as Europe’s leading destination and inspire event planners to bring future events and incentives here after 2012.”

The month will include a range of different activities including free webinars, motivational tips, networking events, round table discussions, open days and ‘lunch and learn’ industry seminars. Industry magazine Meetings & Incentive Travel (M&IT) will also be supporting the event through an exclusive survey and round table debate as well as a number of articles which will be published on meetpie.com.

Rochelle Long, Editor of M&IT, said: "Given the current difficult economic climate, it's more important than ever to recognise the real impact motivation and incentive programmes can have on businesses, staff morale and the bottom line. Meetings & Incentive Travel magazine is proud to support ‘Motivation Month’ and looks forward to sharing knowledge and best practice with the events industry and beyond."

Halliwell added: “We are aware that 2012 is a really key year for London, and that the eyes of the world are on the capital, but we’re also acutely aware that for business tourism and event planners, they are looking beyond next year and are concentrating on 2013 onwards. We want to ensure that we use this global campaign to highlight all of the events, activities and new venues which will be on offer post-Olympic and Paralympic Game – so that there’s a real tangible legacy for the events and business tourism industry.”