Montréal Measures What Matters As ImpactAIQ’s first innovation partner, Business Events Montréal is helping pioneer a smarter way to uncover and communicate the lasting value business events bring to communities, industries, policy and progress. ImpactAIQ: Bringing Impact Canadian Circular Economy Summit Case Study: Canadian Circular Economy Summit Into Focus Associations and destinations increasingly recognize that conferences can generate significant social, environmental and intellectual value, but measuring those outcomes isn’t always easy. Enter ImpactAIQ, an AI-powered platform developed and co-led by #MEET4IMPACT and technology company Gevme to help event organizers better understand, measure and communicate an event’s impact and, eventually, its legacy. The process starts with information organizers already collect, including program details, objectives and surveys. Business Events Montréal can add attendee and stakeholder interviews, media coverage and other qualitative inputs, allowing ImpactAIQ to identify patterns, gaps and outcomes that conventional post-event surveys may overlook. The 2025 Canadian Circular Economy Summit brought more than 900 delegates and leaders from some 20 sectors to Montréal to share solutions and accelerate circularity. “The platform allows us to create a customized impact framework from scratch, or we can integrate it with something like the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals,” explains Charlotte Laurin, Manager, Strategic Alliances and CSR, Business Events Montréal (Tourisme Montréal). “The ImpactAIQ platform brings to light what isn't seen by satisfaction surveys and it offers recommendations around that unseen impact.” Just as important, planners do not need to learn another technology. Business Events Montréal manages the platform and guides the process, ultimately providing event organizers with a clear report they can use to demonstrate value to members, sponsors, exhibitors, funders and other partners. “It's not about making planners work harder. It's helping planners organize their strategic process, showcase their 'why' and improve the narrative,” Laurin adds. 26 | Ignitemag.ca | Sponsored Feature Co-hosted by the Circular Innovation Council and Circular Economy Leadership Canada (CELC), the event generated collaborations and concrete projects, while the City of Montréal used the occasion to launch its three-year Circular Economy Action Plan. Business Events Montréal mapped the summit’s existing objectives and measurement activities onto a scalable impact framework, supplementing them with surveys and on-site interviews. The resulting report documented 638 business-to- business and business-to-government meetings and, equally important, captured what some of those encounters actually produced. About #MEET4IMPACT Montréal-based #MEET4IMPACT combines industry expertise, impact methodologies and technology with the goal of making events a stronger engine for social progress.
