The Exhibit Source Blog

Whether you have a trade show booth that needs an upgrade, or if you need a new trade show booth, you can contact the Exhibit Source. As you know, trade shows are hectic and fast paced. Your booth display has about 3 seconds to attract new and potential clients. In order to do that, you need to stand out from the others, but most of all, you need to stand out from your competition.

No doubt, trade shows are worth the time and money when done right. But with the money, time and employees that you are investing in the trade show, you need to make sure you make the best impression. Your trade show exhibit needs to grab qualified prospects, make them curious, and quickly show them what sets you apart.

The Exhibit Source understands the importance and the investment of your trade show display, which is why we offer numerous options of display styles.

Click “trade show exhibits” for more information.

Trade shows are your company’s chance to debut a new product, find better vendors and suppliers, reach out to potential clients and find new talent to bring in to your company. But if you want to grab people’s attention at a trade show, then you will need to make and follow a plan and use some good trade show techniques. The company that is prepared to maximize the opportunities at a trade show is the company that will walk away feeling like the investment in the event was worth it.

Marketing Materials

One of the biggest mistakes companies make when they prepare for a trade show is a mediocre trade show display and deciding to use the existing marketing materials they have on hand. In order to make a big impact at a trade show, you need to give people something that will make your products stand out. You need to have new marketing materials and pop up trade show displays made up for the products and services you will be featuring at the show.

Make and Follow a Plan

Your company is investing a lot of money into being on a trade show floor. Do not go into the show without having a plan. Your trade show booth may look impressive, but if you do not have a message for attendees that they can understand, then you will not draw traffic.

If you want to release new products at this trade show, then develop your approach around those products. If you are going to use this trade show to try and attract new distributors for your products, then you will need a presentation more geared towards the benefits of doing business with your company as opposed to just product benefits.

Have the Right Team

If you are focusing on product sales at the show, then you will need sales people and you will need product engineers to answer detailed questions. If your presence at the show is designed to attract vendors or distributors, then you will want members of the logistics team, marketing department and executive team on hand to make a good impression.

The Giveaway

Too many companies underestimate the power of the free giveaway at trade shows. Giving away toys or notepads with your company logo on them is nice, but if you give people something they can use word will travel fast among the crowds.

When you have a good plan for a trade show, then you can maximize your investment in show resources. Take the time to plan your presence in advance so that you can attract more visitors and collect more useful information.

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Finding the right trade show to take your business to is very important. Trade shows can be expensive, when you consider staffing, your trade show booth, promotional items and literature, and you want to make sure you’re going to be getting the best value for money. Going to the right trade shows means you will find the right target audience.

Determining your objectives

The first thing that you need to think about is what you actually want to accomplish at the trade show. Do you want to generate leads? Meet existing customers? Get exposure for your brand? Meet industry experts? Branch out into a new sector? Get contacts in the media?

Once this is decided, you can better research which types of events would most likely to help you achieve your objectives?

Finding an exhibition

Of course you have some knowledge about what events take place throughout the year, but it always pays to be thorough. There are several ways you can find out about exhibitions that are taking place.

• Trade show search engines and directories – yes there are such things! These are databases of events that are taking place that are searchable by various criteria such as dates, location and industry. Try http://www.tsnn.com/, http://www.biztradeshows.com/ .
• Industry publications – these are really good for finding events in your sector. They’ll probably list all the big industry-wide events. Individual publications may also list events they have organized themselves.
• Your contacts – Ask around people in the industry that you know. You can find out quite a lot by word of mouth. This can also help when narrowing down your list – if someone mentions that an event was badly organized, you might think twice before signing up.
• Your competitors – take a sneaky peek at your competitors’ websites. They may have lists of or news items about the exhibitions they’re attending over the next few months. And if you go to the shows your competitors are going to, it not only gives you the chance to compete for the same audience, but also to find out what your competitors are doing in terms of marketing, products and services.
• Industry associations – check their websites for event listings or give them a call to find out if there are any upcoming events.
• Local event and convention centers or chambers of commerce – these will often have events listings on their websites, or you can call them up and ask. If you’re not looking to go too far afield, this could be a good option for reaching new local customers.

After you have done your research, you need to collate the results and weigh them against your objectives. Which shows are most likely to help you achieve these? And how good is the ROI likely to be? Those trades shows that require you to travel, consider whether the expense is worth it.

Your customers

Think about where your customers are most likely to be. If you can, talk to them and see if they’re going to any upcoming exhibitions or trade shows. If your existing customers are going, then the chances are that other attendees will be interested in you too.

Once you have narrowed down your list a bit, you could also try contacting the organizers of the exhibitions and asking them for lists of last year’s attendees. This will help you narrow down your list even further. Review your list whilst keeping your objectives in mind, and you should arrive at a shortlist of the events that are most likely to help you achieve them.

Then all you need to do is sign up for each event and contact The Exhibit Source so we can get to work on an incredible trade show booth display that will wow your target audience and make them want to know more about you.

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