Do you want to make sure that your trade show promotion is the best one yet? Maybe you just want to make sure that you promote your next event well enough so you can capitalise on the number of people who are in attendance. Either way, this guide will help you to get the best of both worlds, so you can feel confident in your venture.
Establish Goals and Objectives
One of the first things you have to do, before you even think about stepping foot in the booth, is to find out what your goals and objectives are. Do you have a vision for how you would like to participate in the event? What would you like to achieve by hosting your booth? How is your show going to help you to move your company forward? The objectives and the goals you have set for your next trade show are all critical to your success.
They are going to determine how much time your staff spends at your booth and what you have to do in order to get the most time out of the show. If you need more staff to run your event, such as hospitality staff, temporary event managers or brand ambassadors to help drive the event to success, then an event staffing agency should be your first port of call.
Promote Participation
While your trade show may well be a few months away, you do need to start promoting any participation while you can. This will help to build a bit of excitement around your brand and it will also help you to promote your idea and book the booth space. It is also entirely possible for you to promote your participation on social media, or through an email marketing campaign. You can focus on other digital marketing channels as well if you want.
This is great if you want to reach out to local media, or if you want to generate coverage so you can attract new visitors. This is so important if you are hosting your event in another city where there isn’t much brand awareness. You have to let your trade show attendees know about your event in advance so that they have more than enough time to plan for it. When people know about your event, they will begin to look for information about your company, as well as its services and products.
Travelling to a different location is a great opportunity as it gives you the chance to target certain clients or accounts that you would like to grow. You can also book separate meetings if you want. If you can leverage travel costs and create personal touch points out of it, then you will soon find that you can build on your ROI in a major way.
Use Social Media
The marketing landscape has changed quite a lot over the years. A lot of this has to do with the fact that a lot of events are now being hosted online. Even though live events do offer networking opportunities, you have to remember that promoting your event can be a very valuable source of engagement. On top of this, it can also help you to generate way more traffic to your trade show booth. Remember you can promote your own trade show booth in a way that is similar to a prize wheel, or a trade show game. You can encourage people to leave their business cards behind so you can give them a follow-up, as an example.
Get your Name Out There
Visitors to your booth are probably going to be people who work in the same industry as you. It is so important that you get your brand name out there and that you let people know who is going to be attending your show. What’s more, is that your prospects may get an impression of your brand through a swag bag. Of course, you can do this before they even step foot in the event hall, which is great to say the least. You can even hand out promotional swag if you want, just make sure that it is useful. People won’t have a problem promoting your company if it benefits them as well, so focus on things such as pens, notepads, memory sticks and other related stationery.
