The planning for a tradeshow should start months in advance. Participation in a tradeshow is a strategic initiative. It is, therefore, essential to plan the online and offline messaging, promotion plan, gifting, etc.
1. Goal-setting: The purpose of participating in a trade show could be one or more of the following:
Generating Leads
Increasing traffic to offline channels after the tradeshow.
Increase in social media likes/follows/comments
Increase in the website visits
Increase in the subscriptions for our blogs/newsletters/page
It is critical to define specific metrics for each of the above goals.
2. Setting up a Process to Achieve the Goals: Defining metrics for each goal needs to be followed up with a brainstorming session to decide how we will achieve them. Here are some suggested ways:
Send an email immediately to everyone who visits your booth and exchange their visiting card. The email should have a clear call to action to get the person to click/like/subscribe.
Print QR Code on our Booth and the Visiting Card so that anyone can scan it and reach your website/landing page/social media page.
Creating a landing page/social media page specifically for the event. There should be an embedded form to capture information about the people visiting them.
It is essential to have one single message that we wish to communicate to the people visiting our booth. This message should be amplified in all marketing communication, across all channels. The message and the following call to action should be so strong that it prods people to act.
Create a landing page that offers something valuable to visitors, free of cost. For example, it could be a report/white paper/ebook. Ideally, people should be offered something extra - free gift, access to a webinar, free training, and discount coupons.
If you are going to have a presentation running on a loop in your booth make sure that it is visible from a distance, is interesting, concise, and memorable.
As a starting point, request all your employees to share the link to your landing pages, social media pages, posts, etc with their network.
Write blogs before, during, and after the event. It is a great idea to tag customers and visitors in your posts. It improves the visibility of the blog as well as makes it current.
3. Designing of the booth: Booths are expensive. We need to make the most of the investment. Do not stick to the standard format of a table, counter, and chairs. Design a booth that conveys the personality of your brand. Most people wear formal clothes to a tradeshow. Break that rule by having your people wear something that uniquely conveys your value proposition. It also attracts the attention of the onlookers and pulls them to your booth. Be bold and interesting in the signages. Make people smile and become curious about them.
4. Handouts: Everyone collects a ton of handouts in a tradeshow. Most often, they are only scanned on that day and then forgotten forever. Spend time designing a handout that communicates with its audience instead of just providing facts and figures. Add a QR Code and create a hashtag for the event. Promote the hashtag in your digital communication before and after the event. Run a small quiz on the landing page to engage the audience and give them a reward for completing it. One word of caution. Thoroughly test all your QR Codes, Landing Pages, and Social Media Pages to ensure that they are working properly. It is an embarrassment to have broken links.
5. Create a communication calendar: It is a great idea to create a calendar that lists actions/channels/messages that would be communicated across a timeline spanning pre, during, and post the event. Here is an example.
Involve people in all the steps mentioned here. They need to know what is the expected outcome from the tradeshow and how you are planning to achieve it. Tradeshows are a great channel to link with your prospective and existing customers. It may be worthwhile to take your elite prospects and customers out for a lunch/dinner on the days of the tradeshow.
What are you doing to make your trade show a success?
Subodh Gadgil
May 13, 2022
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