Start Your Trade Show Season Right

As the New Year dawns upon us, so too rises another Trade Show season. Hopefully you are refreshed and relaxed from the holidays, and can approach the upcoming year with a fresh outlook and a positive attitude. Whether you attended one show or a dozen, now is the time to recap and review what worked and what you need to improve upon the next time around.

As a reminder, here are several essential points to consider in planning your yearly Trade Show strategy:

What do you hope to get out of the trade show experience?

• Are you focusing on promoting or launching a new product?
• Who is your target audience?
• Is it time to consider an International show, which is a great forum to reach exhibitors and attendees from all over the globe?
• Is a National show, which attracts targeted attendees from a 300-mile radius and beyond, a better approach for your company?
• Don’t discard Regional and Local shows, which attract attendees from the immediate vicinity.

When choosing a trade show, make sure that it is within your budget, in a serviceable location, it occurs at a convenient time, and attracts your target audience.

To help you in your trade show planning process, please click on the image below to help you find the right shows for your company:

Remember to choose the shows that will give you the best return on your investment!

The Top Five Reasons to Exhibit Now

Today we are featuring a helpful article from http://www.exhibitcitynews.com/:

Tips for Exhibitors in a Changing Economy 

Tradeshows are valuable sales and marketing vehicles to generate business through qualified leads and build brand awareness and relationships.

“However, with shrinking budgets and an uncertain economy, executives may be inclined to increase scrutiny of their trade show program,” says Rob Murphy, chief marketing officer, MC2.

To help marketing executives justify continued investment in tradeshow programs, MC2 has five top reasons to exhibit and maximize tradeshow participation in a changing economy.

1. Connect with more customers in less time
Tradeshows are one of the most efficient methods of marketing. It is an opportunity to connect with a lot of customers and specifiers in a short amount of time in one location. This focus translates into efficiency of time and effort, and therefore, dollars.

2. Uncertain times mean serious business
During an uncertain economy, budgets may tighten, but the need for new products and services does not necessarily stop. People attending tradeshows are serious about doing business; by not being present companies risk missed business opportunities. Think in terms of the quality not quantity of the tradeshows in your program.

3. ROI is not a luxury
Tradeshow impressions, contacts, leads and sales have measurable results with an actual value. Overall costs are easily computed. When reporting results to upper management and boards of directors, ROI is not a luxury, it is essential.

4. Showcase your brand without competitors
Consider exhibiting at a vertical tradeshow. This allows your brand to connect with a specific audience without the distraction of your competitors. For example, a high-end auto brand exhibited at the Consumer Electronics Show, which put this luxury vehicle in front of a huge, affluent audience.

5. Greater Risk in Being Absent
Consider the long-term effect of not exhibiting at tradeshows. Especially in a bad economy, being absent from key shows instantly makes you a non-player in the field.

What You Can Do Now
• Before you reduce the number of tradeshows from your budget, quantify and qualify your investment. Why are we cutting our tradeshow schedule? Why are we not benefiting from our tradeshow participation? What are we not doing right?

• Establish a process for following up sales leads to get the most out of your tradeshow experience. Are you using all the necessary tools to measure and weigh results properly? Are you gathering and analyzing the right information?

• Engage staff and clearly communicate your company’s strategy to ensure everyone is on the same page. Do you mandate staff training in order to run a well-choreographed, efficient show?

• Consider the architecture of your exhibit to enhance each visitor’s experience with your company and its brand. Are you using or incorporating rental property in your exhibit? Is your booth design consistent with your branding and messaging platforms?

Turning Booth Visitors into Leads Pt. 3

 

Not Quite Strangers, Not Quite Clients

Waiting to follow up on leads generated at a trade show, or even neglecting to do so at all is the biggest waste of time and money in the trade show process. While every visitor has your information and your pitch in mind, each one also has the same from all your competitors. If you delay in contacting the leads you gathered, you can be sure that one of your competitors already has, and you will lose any chance of developing new clients.

The first step in contacting your future clients is to sort your leads by priority. Using the information you collected from surveys, lead cards, or in meeting with attendees, you should separate them into categories similar to the following:

• Hot Leads – contacts looking to do immediate business with your company and/or have a budget in place
• Medium Leads – contacts looking to do business with your company but are missing a fixed budget and a firm timetable for purchasing
• Mild Leads – contacts possibly looking to do business with your company sometime in the future
• BBQ Leads – these are contacts that simply dropped off their business card or seemed disinterested in your products or services.

Hot Leads are the first people your sales or marketing department should contact. Your goal is to touch base with these people before your competition does. Ideally, you should contact them as soon as possible, but no later than two days after the trade show. Once your company has finished addressing your Hot Leads, you than contact the Medium and Mild Leads in turn. Give yourself about a week to make contact with these leads, but make sure not to forget about them entirely.

Don’t worry about contacting the BBQ Leads. These contacts leave you unsatisfied and yearning for a spicier Lead (as I personally feel BBQ wings do), and you can forget about them.

When contacting all levels of Leads, here are some helpful suggestions to keep in mind:

• Visitors may not remember what you told them, but they will remember what they told you
• Make all your correspondence friendly and personalized for each of your contacts
• Include any offered or requested literature, to reinforce the idea you follow through on promises
• All information should re-iterate and expand upon that from pre and in show
• If you offered both a pre and in show promotional item, include a third tie-in gift to complete your promotional marketing strategy
• If you supplied the attendees with a gift, inquire to how they are using and enjoying the item
• Address any immediate needs through a quote or by suggesting a meeting

After you have completed your initial contact steps, you will want to follow up with at least a monthly correspondence with your leads. This can be in the form of personal emails, calls, or even a company newsletter. Remember, people are more likely to start and continue business with a company that engages in regular correspondence and treats them more than just a one-trade show stand.