The Trade Show Chronicles - Takeaway
- Julien Rio
- Jun 10, 2024
- 10 min read
I did not want to end the Trade Show Chronicles without giving you some actionable takeaway.
Every business is different, and everyone's story is unique. What Andrew went through may not apply to your own situation and his approach might not be the right one for your company. It really is for you to figure out what makes most sense to achieve your goals and reach your targets.
Yet, the backbone of every good trade show strategy is always the same and the different pieces that compose this strategy remain very similar. In this section I will review some key elements from Andrew's story that you could apply directly to your next trade show. The goal is to give you short and practical tips that could forever change your trade show management. Up to you to cherry-pick what is relevant to your unique situation.
Always plan in advance - 6 months is not too much to prepare your team for a trade show. But do not waste this precious time with procrastination: the temptation of saying "I have plenty of time, I can worry about this later" can be strong! Start with a checklist of all the things you will need to organize, and setup a calendar to spread these tasks over the given timeline.
Budget everything - a good budget is a clear and early budget. Before arranging anything else, figure out how much money you allocate to this event and break it down into categories (booth rental, marketing, on-site expenses, logistics, etc.) to see whether you can afford attending the show. The best method to do this is to use past budgets from your previous shows.
Record expenses - to avoid overspending you must know control your expenses. Don't wait until the last minute to collect all receipts and figure out how much you spent. Expenses recording must be an ongoing process and should be included in your budget sheet to easily identify whether you are overspending.
Inform your network - people attract people. There is a reason why people avoid empty shops or restaurants: we tend to be attracted by places already populated with people. Reach out to your existing networks of customers, prospects, partners, suppliers and invite them to come pay you a visit. All your booth needs is a sparkle to ignite a big fire.
Update your signature - you and your team send tens if not hundreds of emails each day. Having a banner in your signature costs literally nothing and put your show participation in front of many people's eyes.
Be smart about your message - informing people that you will exhibit at a show is great. But telling people "Come visit us booth ABC" does not have much of an impact. Highlight the reasons why people should visit your booth and focus on communicating those. Are you showcasing new products, innovations? Offering discounts, exclusive offers? Are you planning some games or contest?
Build a booth promotion page - if people are indeed interested in visiting your booth and wish to find out more, don't send them to your website. Chances are that your website will not answer any of their questions. Build a standalone "booth presentation page" instead. A very targeted page that explains who you are, why you participate in the event, how to find you, what you will present, why people should come visit, etc. Give people the ability to request an appointment with you.
Set targets - defining objectives serves three purposes: motivating your team (people tend to be more productive when they have a quantifiable goal), giving a clear direction for everything that follows and enabling you to estimate your success.
Select the right booth - choosing a booth is never an exact science, but some elements never change. Try to be in the most relevant section, always prefer a large alley, pick a booth with multiple openings and find yourself close to major perks and attractions. Some people consider it is better to be on the right side of the entrance based on human behavioral patterns.
Pick your carpet - thick carpets will be comfortable for your visitors but a nightmare for your staff. Prefer thin carpets with good under padding. In terms of color, find something that relates to your brand and clearly contrasts with the aisle's carpet.
Leave some empty space - you want your booth to look nice and appealing, but sometimes less is more. Don't over-estimate your stall's size: keep things neat and avoid unnecessary clutter that could limit the flow of visitors.
Put your products in the light - the venue's ambient light is never enough to showcase your product. Consider adding additional spotlights focused on your key products. Prefer LED to halogens to have a cleaner light and avoid overheating your booth. Plan for internet - very few venues offer decent Wi-Fi at trade shows, and almost none offers FREE decent Wi-Fi. Plan for it yourself, either by ordering a private network from the organizer or by arranging 3G/4G cards. Internet is important to remain connected, check your emails, show your website, relevant videos, capture leads, share on social media, etc.
Have a floorplan - you will have a much better vision of your booth with a floorplan. Add a small character in your booth to see whether you can easily circulate around the products.
Prepare your toolbox - as Charles said, Murphy's law is always right. Prepare pens, paper, stapler, glue, tape, scissors, screwdriver, batteries, cables, etc. Anything that MacGyver could consider vital should be in your toolbox.
Plan your logistics needs - if you send your products or samples by sea instead of air, it will take much longer to arrive, but you may save up to 90% of the cost. All you need to make it happen is to plan early. Don't forget to plan for the return trip: if you do not book your goods post-show logistics you will need to battle with other exhibitors, lining up in front of the local FedEx, UPS or DHL office and pay unexpectedly high expenses.
Figure out your follow-up strategy - following-up with your prospects is the very key to success but needs to be planned ahead of time. Have a set of follow-up emails ready for all possible buyer persona or situation. When it is time for you to actually send follow-up emails, you should only have to select a template and customize it a little. If you must build it from scratch, prepare PowerPoints, and figure out which file to send, you have failed to plan your follow-up properly.
Do you need promoters? - not every booth needs promoters or hostesses. If you have sufficient staff in your team, better use them than hire outsiders. If you do hire promoters, think about what they should wear (the concept of "booth-babes" may be considered normal for an automotive show be inappropriate for other exhibitions), what training they need, what are your actual expectations, etc.
Think about training - even Olympic athletes require training, so there is no reason you and your team should be exempted. Figure out what kind of training you need and how to make sure everyone benefits from it.
Teach booth etiquette - there are some basics you need your team to understand and respect. Things you cannot do in a booth, such as chewing gums, eating, drinking, sitting, staring at your shoes, playing with your phone, guarding the entrance, looking angry or bored, etc. Educate your team about the right way to behave in a booth: stand up, smile, look people in the eye, greet people who make eye contact, etc.
Make yourself comfortable - you need to look good, yes, but trade shows are not the right place to try on new shoes or uncomfortable pants. Make yourself comfortable because you will need to stand and talk for hours, and your personal comfort directly affects your mood.
Keep your booth clean - with all the construction going on around the venue, there will be dust. Clean up your booth at the beginning and at the end of each day to keep it tidy and attractive.
Have a qualification process ready - it may be true that "all men are created equal", but it certainly doesn't apply to leads and visitors. It is essential that you differentiate a good lead from a bad one within minutes if you don't want to waste your precious time with people that present low to no potential of becoming customers. To achieve that, you need to spend more time listening than speaking - ask the right questions to identify the quality of each visitor. Before the show, prepare a series of questions that your entire team should be using to figure out whether the prospect is serious, has buying and decision power, has a real need for your product, has sufficient knowledge about the market / industry, etc. You need to clearly define what is a hot lead, a warm lead and a cold lead across your team, otherwise you and your teammates will use the same words to talk about different things.
Capture leads the right way - when you capture leads in your booth, remember why you do it. If your goal is to convert prospects, you will need detailed notes. Standardize your capture so that all leads report uses the same format and vocabulary to be easily identified, filtered and organized. Collecting business cards cannot be considered capturing leads: you need to take thorough notes about your prospect and his needs. Avoid pen & paper as it requires double work (you will need to transfer everything to digital sooner or later), causes human errors and seriously delays your follow up. Capture the lead immediately after the visitor has left your booth, even if it means asking the next visitor to wait for a couple of minutes: your memory isn't as sharp as you think.
Follow-up quickly - if you are not able to follow-up immediately because you must prepare an offer or assemble a presentation, at the very least send a thank you email to your prospect within 48h to let him know that you care, that you are reliable, and make sure he does not forget about you. Remember: buyers talk to tens of people, visit hundreds of booths and see thousands of products. Chances that they will remember you are getting thinner each day.
Use rich emails - a good follow-up email has a clearly defined structure. It is short and contains all your prospect needs: a short intro (who you are), a reminder (use details from the conversation to remind him of you), a brief recap of the discussion and a clear CTA (Call to Action) to bring him one step further down your sales funnel. To make the email even more efficient, you can add links and documents (keep only what is necessary, sending 10 files is the best way to get your email in the trash box) as well as photos (pictures of your booth can help him remember your company, a personal profile photo helps with memories of the conversation, pictures of the products help remind him of your offer, and a nice selfie with him re-builds the connection you had earlier).
Setup reminders - if you are not a salesperson using a CRM, setup your own follow-up reminders. After sending an email to someone, set a reminder to make sure you send another email or make phone call after a certain period of time. Only that way can you make sure your leads don't fall through the cracks.
Track email opening - before sending another email or calling a prospect, find out whether he has read your previous email. Use email trackers to know whether people read your emails, it makes your follow-up more efficient.
Don't give up - converting a prospect doesn't happen in one shot. In average, it takes three follow-ups to convert a hot lead captured at a trade show. It would take even longer if the lead wasn't mature yet. Don't give up and keep pushing until you get the sales or a clear signal that the buyer isn't interested.
Track your achievements - what is success if you can't quantify it? Trade shows are great ego and motivation boosts. Everyone is positive, open, talkative, makes big promises; but don't get fooled. Don't trust everything you hear - words don't mean anything, only actions matter. Track your company's achievements (leads captured, converted, revenue generated, media talking about you, etc.) as well as individual results (for each team member) and compare them to your original targets to identify your level of success. Tracking achievement can be done 6 months post-show, once you have a better vision of customer conversion.
Motivate your team - pep talks are important. It is not just about motivating people but also about showing them that you are with them and reminding everyone of their objectives. You have spent a lot of time and money preparing for the show, make sure your people know it and respect it.
Give immediate feedback - don't wait to be back to the office to point out good and bad things. If you catch your colleagues playing with their phone, draw a red line right away. On the opposite, it someone is doing great, don't be short of good words and recognition. The only rule is to be always positive: you don't want to ruin your people's energy or motivation, every comment, even the negative ones, must be brought in a positive manner.
Explore the other booths - there is always idle time at trade shows. Walk the aisles to see what others do better than you, in terms of products but also strategy, booth design, product demo, greeting, etc. There is always something to learn or to improve at an exhibition. Make sure you take notes for later.
Make a post-event report - the event is over, you are tired, you have done your part and all you want is close this chapter and move on. But there is one last thing you need to do, and it is essential. You need to put together a post-event report. This isn't some kind of boring report no-one will ever read - this report contains a list of all the things you did wrong, why it went wrong and how to avoid doing it again next time. It also contains everything you did right and how to do it again for the next show. It contains a list of the suppliers you have used as well as your level of satisfaction. It contains a copy of your budget and expenses, your floorplan and product placement, your electrical and lighting blueprint, etc. It contains ideas taken from other booth. It basically contains everything you need to start planning your next event. Spending a couple of hours more today could save you days of headaches later.
I could have made this list much longer and it could go on and on for pages. I restricted myself to what I consider being the most important or most easily forgotten aspects of a good trade show strategy.
Do you feel ready for your next show?
Tell the people within your team that will attend the show with you about this blog - the more prepared they are, the better your results!
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