Alexis Exhibits

How to Make Your Trade Show Booth Stand Out

Exhibiting at a trade show is a marvelous way for your company to capture the attention of its target market in order to introduce a new product or service, generate valuable sales leads, get media attention, or sell products. Garnering that attention, however, can be tricky when your booth is amid hundreds of competing booths, each staffed with eager employees trying to grab the often-fleeting interest of passing attendees.

standoutSo how do you make your exhibit stand out? Research shows that exhibitors have mere seconds to grab the attention of attendees, often weary and overwhelmed by the vast number of booths. You can’t meet your tradeshow objectives unless you get those folks in your booth to hear your pitch, so exhibitors must always be on the lookout for new and creative ways to make their exhibit stand out.

One way is to walk the show floor and take note of what other exhibitors are doing with their trade show exhibits and displays. Notice what types of marketing strategies they are using to attract booth traffic. Also, pay attention to what booths seem to be drawing in the largest number of attendees. Is there an enticing giveaway drawing in hordes of people? Ask attendees that have stopped in your booth which exhibitors’ booths they were most drawn to and why.

Leverage your relationship with your display provider as well. They often can offer specific expertise on what has proven successful for other customers as far as boosting traffic. It is their job to stay on top of the latest in exhibit design, event strategies and promotional trends.

Another potential source of innovative ideas are trade show associations and industry consultants. The Center for Exhibition Industry Research (www.ceir.org) is another great resource for ideas on how to increase your tradeshow exhibit’s visibility. Once you have developed some new strategy ideas to boost booth traffic, lead generation and possibly sales, just make sure they all align with your company’s brand positioning.

Here are a handful of promotional ideas to draw in visitors to your booth:

Entertain them. Magicians, caricaturists, and celebrity look-alikes are sometimes cheesy but often effective in grabbing the interest of attendees, giving your booth staffers an opportunity to strike up a conversation.

Photograph them. Take a digital photo of visitors and superimpose them on unique backgrounds, such as magazine covers to create a memorable takeaway. Or use the image to perform a virtual makeover, so visitors can see what they would look like in various hairstyles or clothes.

Let them play. Provide a chance to play virtual sports, such as golf or baseball using simulation software systems. Winners take away balls with your logo printed on them.

Feed them. Weary and often hungry trade show attendees tend to flock to booths offering free food, coffee or beverages. While they are munching or sipping, make sure your booth staffers introduce themselves and give them the two-minute pitch.

Reward them. Offer an incentive to stop by your booth. A creative giveaway— with your logo and marketing slogan on it—could include tote bags, laser pointers, memory sticks, apparel, golf tees, pens, coffee mugs, etc.

Give us the opportunity to help you find the best way to stand out on the show floor, among other things – we are confident that you’ll respond in much the same way as these happy clients attest.

Let’s talk.

What should you know about your Trade Show prospects?

dataOne of the most important decisions you need to make about exhibiting at a trade show is what information you should collect from your key prospects.

Many trade shows place barcodes on attendee badges and have scanners available for rent at a reasonable fee. This streamlines the process of building lead lists and provides a fast, unobtrusive way to gather critical information for follow-up.

When a prospect enters your booth and inquires about a product, just ask permission to scan the bar code on their badge. Then also record the products or services the person is interested in knowing more about. Most trade shows will email a spreadsheet to participating exhibitors with complete contact information and other information about the prospects.

It is a simple, effective and useful way to systematize prospect information and prioritize sales leads. And you will have almost all of the information you need to effectively follow-up on your trade show leads.

Some Exhibitors have taken data collection to a whole new level

One Fortune 500 company tracks everything imaginable about a trade show prospect using a special RFID barcode that they place on prospects when they enter their booth. They track the prospect’s path in the booth, the specific displays and demos in the booth the prospect visited, the total time spent in the booth, who accompanied the prospect to the booth and so on. Then they combine this information with registration data to create a prospect profile. In all, this company collects over 200 pieces of information about every prospect. The catch is that they didn’t have any idea what to do with most of the information they gather.

What information should you collect about prospects?

The most important part of a trade show is that it provides an opportunity to establish and build a personal relationship with each prospect. It is vital to make sure that you do not interfere with the 1-on-1 dialog with a series of questions designed to gather information. Work to make the conversation very natural and focus on the vital info.

If you can get contact information from the trade show registration, then you do not have to do anything more than scan a badge and you can focus on the critical questions and answers:

  1. What products or services are of interest?
  2. When do the buyers plan to make their purchase?
  3. How much does the buyer plan to spend?
  4. What are the most important benefits and features the buyer is looking for?
  5. Who is your competition and what advantages does the buyer believe the competition offers?

Does it matter if the prospect spent 8.4 minutes or 6.2 minutes in your booth? No. What matters is that you can identify the high-value prospects to sell to during the show and to contact after the show and that these prospects have a positive experience at your booth and remember your company and your staff favorably.

Trade Show Tips – How to Do More with Less

A reality of the past years of recession is that companies across all industries have had to tighten their belts when it comes to marketing initiatives. One of the biggest and most costly pieces of the marketing pie is trade show exhibition. Marketers and exhibit managers are then faced with a challenge. cutdollarsHow do they increase sales and bottom-line revenue without the resources to amp up their marketing efforts?

Borne out of necessity and a lack of monetary influx into their existing budgets, many marketers and exhibit managers have found creative ways to do just that. And, it’s no magic trick. Simple cost cutting measures that help shift resources and reallocate money into areas of your company’s marketing efforts that can deliver the most benefits and payoff during economic downturns, such as trade shows.

Here are a few ways you can cut money out of your exhibit budget:

Buy, don’t rent. Renting accessories, equipment and individual components (display racks, folding chairs and tables, etc.) from an exhibit hall or show- appointed vendors adds significant expense to your overall exhibition budget. Save big bucks by shipping these items from your home office or storage warehouse. Even with shipping and drayage costs, you’ll still come out ahead for most items. This logic applies to your actual booth itself; if you exhibit at multiple shows per year, but don’t rent.

Cut travel expenses. Hotel costs for traveling staff members can very quickly add up and bloat your trade show budget. Learn to negotiate with hotels to get the best deals; also, bigger shows typically negotiate with local hotels to offer special “show” rates for exhibitors and attendees. Join hotel chains’ customer loyalty programs to get other free bonuses, such as free stays after a certain number of stays. Double up employees of the same sex in one room and look for hotels that offer free breakfast.

Lighten your load. Reduce your shipping and drayage costs by taking a close look at what you’ll really need on-site and in your booth. Focus on one product to highlight; don’t bring every product in your line. An overcrowded booth is a turnoff for attendees and makes it more difficult for visitors to focus on the one product you’re announcing or launching at the show. You might also be able to trim some off your drayage costs by shipping some things, such as brochures and other collateral material, directly to your hotel.

Order show services carefully. This is kind of like the hotel mini-bar. Seems so convenient, but when you check out and see that you shelled out $7.50 for that can of pretzels, you might think otherwise. Order the necessities (electricity, lighting, booth cleaning, etc.) by the earliest deadline and you might be eligible for a discount. Determine the actual wattage needs of your equipment and make sure that you don’t order more than you need and bring your own electrical power strips.

Want to see how we can help you take advantage of these cost-saving tips and more? We’ll do it right for you – Let’s Talk.

Handling the Logistics of Trade Shows

The trick to effectively coordinating trade show freight services and logistics to transport your trade show booth display for on-time delivery to a show venue is meticulous planning and coordination. Larger companies that exhibit frequently often use transport companies that specialize in trade show shipping to handle the logistical details.

tradeshowlogisticsOnce an exhibit arrives at a venue’s loading dock, contracted logistics experts may be used to ensure that crates are delivered to the booth area and supervise exhibit assembly, dismantling, and return shipping.

For smaller companies, however, this might not be a luxury they can afford. In this case, an employee is often tasked with handling trade show logistics. Options for getting your display to the show include transporting it yourself or contracting with a freight carrier to ship your exhibit crates from your storage location to the venue.

If you decide to hire a shipping company, choose one that specializes in tradeshow logistics so they will fully understand the requirements of transporting exhibit components. Ask the shipping company representative how long the company has been in business, check references, and request a price quote for the shipping in advance.

Before making a decision on a shipping company, check with the trade show’s management to see if there is a freight company that serves as the official carrier for the event. Often, these companies might offer perks such as special benefits, extra exhibit moving services, and discounted prices.

Drayage

Once you’ve submitted your exhibitor registration for a show, the event sponsor will provide you with an exhibitor’s kit that will include all the information you need regarding show participation. This kit will include exhibit moving and shipping instructions, a list of providers of trade show freight services, and forms required by the show’s drayage contractor.

This contractor is responsible for:

  • Instructing shipping company drivers when to get in line at a designated dock to unload exhibit crates.
  • Moving your exhibit crates to your booth location in the exhibit hall.
  • Removing your crates and boxes once you’ve assembled your display and returning them to you at the end of the show.
  • Directing shipping company drivers to specific loading dock lines when exhibit crates are ready to be picked up.
  • Loading your crates and boxes on the truck for delivery.

Once the show is over, you must complete a “bill-of-lading” and submit it to the event’s drayage contractor, which is what activates the process by which your crates are returned to your booth so you can pack up your booth display and prepare it for shipping.

When your booth is dismantled and packed, the drayage contractor will take your crates to the loading dock and alert your driver that your exhibit is ready for pick-up. Proper labeling of boxes and crates is essential to ensuring that your shipment will get to its proper destination. If items are not labeled properly and inadvertently get left behind, they will be shipped to the event contractor’s warehouse for storage until the exhibitor makes arrangements to have it returned.