Which activities do you absolutely need to do in order to get the most out of a trade show or event?
Period of fairs and events, key events especially for companies operating in the B2B sector. Many organizations are busy at this time preparing booths, setting up materials, but above all the products to be presented. Samples, free packages, gadgets, catalogs, and brochures. But how much will their efforts be repaid?
Exhibiting at a fair requires an investment of resources and time. It is an excellent opportunity not only to increase brand awareness but also to network and investigate how competitors are moving on the market. However, you will not be able to get a great return on investment if you do not prepare yourself properly. In this article, we bring you 3 essential steps to be able to optimize the preparation and get successful results from an event.
1 – Identify your goals and define your strategy
It seems trivial to say, but often we meet customers who think it is enough to attend a fair, set up the stand and put our products well “on display” to get good results already. Unfortunately not! Definitely a good set-up, capable of capturing the attention of visitors is necessary, but not sufficient. We need to prepare ourselves in advance by identifying the objectives we want to achieve and what activities we can implement to be able to achieve them: in short, we need to define a strategy. One tactic that must be shared with all involved both in preparation for the active participation in the event. In defining your strategy a place of honor must be reserved for pre-event communication: start talking to your customers and prospects about the event well in advance, creating excitement and suspense … In addition to email marketing, which is always a great tool to engage customers for an event (with an ad-hoc invitation or content previews), social media is also very powerful. See how your audience interacts with the content you propose allows you to study their interests and then direct your strategy for the event towards topics of greater interest to them.
2 – Make the experience of your product come alive
The fair or event must be a moment of an encounter but above all of experience. From product samples to immersive experiences, you have to prepare everything so that visitors can personally test your product or service. Nothing is more engaging than a direct experience! A key point to collect feedback from prospects and customers (not only with direct questions and surveys, but also with the observation of public reactions): record this information during your event and then bring it back to the company, it will be an excellent cue to design and develop new improvements to your product and service!
If you want to get more credibility then seeks to bring together potential customers interested in your product/service with your very satisfied customers: in partnership with your customers, you can arrange short lectures to demonstrate how your product/service has facilitated their business, organizes round tables or networking moments. Who better than a satisfied customer can help you convey your value!
Involve your audience also from the point of view of social communication: organize a contest and create a hashtag dedicated to the event. Invite your visitors to post and share content on their social media channels using the hashtag and don’t miss responding to everyone (even just with one like!).
3 – Always activate a follow-up
One of the objectives of these events/moments is the collection of contacts. Business cards to load in your CRM! But remember to contact all the people you met in the days following the event. Send a personalized e-mail to thank them for the visit and provide them with more information about your business or your products, or invite them to organize a follow-up meeting. It is very important to do this while everyone still remembers the event.
In parallel with the follow-up with the visitors and the contacts gathered at the fair, remember to organize an internal follow-up with the whole team that participated to make a group assessment of the progress of the event and to collect all the information collected: communication performance analysis on different channels such as social media, insight collection from the fair (trends, market trends, competitors’ performance), …
Analyze together if the goals set at the beginning have been achieved and the reasons that led to the performance given.
If you find it difficult to organize and orchestrate all these activities, rely on professionals and companies that can help you. We at ZeraTech follow our customers from the event design to the realization of unique experiences. For more information contact our Marketing Strategy team.
