September 5, 2016

Music-Inspired Tradeshow Blog Posts

It must be because I was a rock-and-roller from about the age of eight. Or maybe it was the first time I sat down at a drumset when I was 11 and knew I had to have one of my own. Or maybe it was when I finally figured out at the age of 16 what a bar chord on a guitar was, and how I could move it up and down the neck of the guitar for different chords.

Tim playing guitar — How many decades ago was this? What’s up with the goofy hat?

Or maybe it’s just because I gotta have music in my life as much as possible. I listen all day long, and grab my guitar to work on chord progressions, play an old favorite or sit down at the drums often to bash out something.

So you can imagine as my iTunes library’s some 47,412 selections (and counting) is set on shuffle day after day, I hear a lot of music. And that music inspires me in interesting directions.

Like the song I’m listening to now called “The Endless Night” by Return to Forever. I put “tradeshow endless night blog post” the Google box and on the first page was a link to “Ten Very Cool Examples of Experiential Marketing” by David Moth at Ecocunsultancy. Now that’s some inspiration!

Next comes “Red Rain” by Peter Gabriel. Let’s see what happens when I search for “tradeshow blog red rain.” Up came “Running a Live Lab at a Tradeshow” by Redgate on their blog. What an inspired idea for a tradeshow!

Next: “Hidden Treasure” by Traffic. A search for “hidden treasure tradeshow blog” gave me “The 4 Most Annoying Hidden Tradeshow Costs” on the Expo Marketing blog. Hey, saving money on shipping, drayage, deadlines and labor is definitely inspiring!

How about one more? One of my favorite Sixties bands, The Troggs, came along on my computer and played “Girl in Black.” So when I searched for “tradeshow blog girl in black,” on page one was an article from Classic Exhibits’ blog titled “What Not to Wear at a Tradeshow,” which is definitely a good read.

Now that you’re found out the wide diversity of music that inspires me, I want to know – what inspires you?

Let’s roll the Troggs here, just for fun:

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August 16, 2016

Oregon Cannabis Growers Fair: A Visit

The recreational cannabis business is exploding. At least in Oregon, Washington, Colorado, Alaska and Washington, DC. Which means that the marijuana growing and selling is also booming. I attended the Oregon Cannabis Growers Fair recently to find out exactly how big it really is.

It’s big. And getting bigger. The two-day event was held at the Oregon State Fairgrounds in Salem (just a hop, skip and jump from our office!). There were roughly six dozen exhibitors, hawking things from cannabis growing containers, to business support software, makers of pot edibles, promotional items aimed at the ‘high’ market and much more. I should emphasize that no one was allowed to sell or consume any cannabis products on site. However, you could collect business cards and discount coupons for your next visit to the local marijuana dispensary.

One representative of an industry group, the National Cannabis Industry Association, told me that the industry has seen an explosion in tradeshows. “Some are great, others not so great,” she said. When I picked up a free copy of DOPE magazine, I saw at least a dozen other shows being promoted between now and early next year, so the growth is evident.

As far as exhibits go, there were not too many that one would call sophisticated. However, that leaves room for growth, no doubt. Certainly a handful of exhibitors came prepared to show off their business in a good light. Some booths were professional, some were home-made. Most appeared to be slapped together by companies that either don’t have much of a budget or weren’t aware of what it really took to put a good booth together. Some exhibitors I spoke with were very new to exhibiting, so that makes it understandable. But with more states voting to legalize recreational use of cannabis this fall, with California squarely in that target as being not only the most populated state in the nation but with polls showing that 60% of voters in the state currently favoring legalization, the industry is poised at a tipping point to continue to boom.

Author Ed Rosenthal poses for a photo with a cannabis fair visitor.

August 9, 2016

Using Webinars to Promote Your Tradeshow Appearance [Webinar Replay]

There are many ways to let people know about your upcoming tradeshow appearance. You can email them, call them, advertise, get some press, and so on. Have you ever considered using a webinar to promote your upcoming tradeshow appearance?

Using a webinar to promote your tradeshow appearance does a couple of things: it sets you apart from your competitors who are not doing such a thing, and it allows you as much time as you’d like to point out the specific features and benefits of your products and services. If you tell them enough – but not too much – you’ll have people who coming to your booth who are already interested in seeing more about what you talked about during the webinar. In fact, you can let people in on some inside information in your webinar that you may not want to tell everyone at the show.

Definitely lots of possibilities with this marketing tactic. Take a look:

July 27, 2016

The Power of Tradeshows [Infographic]

The tradeshow industry continues to show strong growth from year to year. Our friends over at Veloxity Inc. created a very informative infographic that shows loads of details about the tradeshow industry. Take a look:

July 7, 2016

8 Essential Tradeshow Metrics to Track

Tradeshow Success is built on a lot of moving parts, and it’s often hard to know exactly how successful the show is unless you track the details. So let’s dive in a little and see what 8 essential tradeshow metrics mean the most to your overall success.

Booth visitors: knowing the overall number of booth visitors, or at least a valid estimate, can give you valuable information, especially in a year-to-year comparison at the same show, and from show-to-show. Even though when you measure show-to-show it’s a bit of an apples to oranges comparison, it does give you intel to help judge the show’s effectiveness.
Leads generated: one of the more straight-forward metrics you can track, but it’s important to break them down into at least thre

e levels: hot, warm and cool. This will give the sales team the information to correctly follow up on the hot ones right away and the warm and cool ones later.
Sales as a result of the leads: track how many new customers came out of the show in the first three months, six months and year (depending on the type of product or service you offer). Track the overall sales amount. It’s harder to track B2B sales from a tradeshow simply because you might not get a new customer until a year or more has passed.
New leads: a slight differentiation from all leads, this breaks out the brand new potential clients from those that you’ve had some sort of contact before. Valuable information, indeed.
New customers: same with customers – how many news ones did you get as a result of a show vs. how many are repeat customers that happened to be at the show and buy something because of the show.
Budget: actual vs. estimated. Keeping track of the investment is important; knowing how much over or under budget is critical.
Cost per lead: divide the overall cost of the show by the number of leads gathered to get a cost per lead.
Return on Investment: divide the overall net profit you’ve gained over three, six, twelve months by the net profit from the show (gross profit minus the cost of attending the show).

There are other numbers you can track, but if you do nothing but track these metrics you’ll have a lot more insight into the kind of success your tradeshow marketing program is giving you.

July 1, 2016

Reinvent Your Exhibit Marketing Plan [Webinar Replay]

Marlys Arnold of ImageSpecialist is an exhibit marketing strategist who recently gave a webinar at Handshake.com titled “Reinvent Your Exhibit Marketing Plan.”

It’s a great look at all of the moving parts of tradeshow marketing, and is well worth your time. So stop wasting time, energy and money and get your marketing plan together! Check out the video here.

June 23, 2016

Tradeshow Follow Up

The tradeshow is over. You’ve made sure the booth is packed in the crates and will be picked up by the shipping company. You’ve gathered the leads and have them in a safe place for transport back to the sales team. You’re ready to relax on the airplane and order up a well-deserved adult beverage.

Whoa! Not so fast! You’re not really done, are you?

While it’s great tying up loose ends at the show and getting off the floor in one piece, it’s just the beginning to your follow up.

First off, thank the folks that helped out. This ranges from the booth staff to the lead person on the set-up crew to the pre-show marketing team that helped out prior to the show. Send out a thank you card or an email (cards make more of an impression!) or thank them in person – just be sure you do it.

Next, go over the leads with the crew that gathered them. This may take place within a few days of the booth staff returning to the office. This confirms the follow up method, the value of the lead (cool, warm, hot), and when the follow up needs to commence. Then deliver that information to the sales team.

Now, go over any feedback or survey results you may have as a result of the show. Even if you don’t have actual in-booth survey results, check any feedback you may have gotten through social media posts during the show. Take screenshots and file them in your show folder. Make notes on what people liked and what they didn’t.

Depending on who’s in charge, it’s also time to document all of the costs associated with the event: travel, salaries, booth rental/purchase/upgrade/I&D, booth space rental and associated costs. Add in the cost of samples and giveaways. Now that you have this figure, when another six months have passed you can get sales figures that came as the result of the show appearance and determine the return on investment. Then do it a year later to see what’s changed.

Record-keeping is one of the best ways to track trends in your tradeshow marketing, so keep detailed accounts of as much as you’re able.

Did you and your team take photos, create videos and upload them to social media sites? Document all of the photos uploaded, keep copies of booth photos (especially any misfit graphics or booth pieces so you can get it repaired before the next show) and videos, client testimonials and associated documents.

Finally, look ahead. Do whatever planning is necessary for the next show, whether it’s a small regional or local show or if it’s the next big national expo. Make note of graphic updates that might be important, booth fixes, and prepare for whatever promotions might be coming down the pike.

Click here to grab my Tradeshow Follow-up Checklist

June 14, 2016

14 Proven Steps to Tradeshow Success [Webinar Replay]

Last fall I put out the book “Tradeshow Success: 14 Proven Steps to Take Your Tradeshow Marketing to the Next Level.” I’ve done several promotions around it, given away a bunch of copies, and use it as my main calling card.

But I’ve never done a webinar on the book. Until now. Check it out:

You can pick up a digital copy of the book at TradeshowSuccessBook.com. Or get your own copy here.

June 13, 2016

Tradeshows: Extroverts Wanted

Tradeshows aren’t a good place for introverts.

Of course, it depends on what your task is. But if you’re part of an exhibiting team that’s working to promote products and services and generate sales leads, being somewhat of an extrovert is almost required.

Face it: you have to smile, greet people with a handshake or a question, and be friendly. All of those things are important. And if you’re not up to the task, maybe you shouldn’t be there. If you’re the company boss or owner and are an introvert, it probably makes more sense to hire someone to represent you. If you’re a little quirky, with an odd personality and somewhat of an introvert, perhaps your personality is an attraction and people will put up that the quirks to get at the real you.

Extroverts on the other hand are outgoing, lively, engaging, showy and like to draw attention to themselves. If that kind of personality can be channeled into promoting a company’s products and not themselves, they can be a good addition to the staff. In fact, they might be the best kinds of folks to have around. Extroverts love the spotlight and love talking.

The upside of introverts, though, is that may often be more detail oriented and better at listening and communication.

The downside of extroverts is that they’re often tend to not have the attention span to take care of paperwork or write lengthy notes about contacts when necessary.

No doubt you know introverts and extroverts. And maybe you’re one or the other, but likely you’ve got a little of both in you but tend to lean one way or the other.

I’m more of an introvert and am comfortable with my head down. But when showtime comes and I have to put it out there, I’m capable of at least pretending to be extroverted and outgoing. It’s not a big stretch, but it works. And it gets the job done.

So when you’re choosing a booth staff, a general rule of thumb would be to lean towards the outgoing and friendly and stay away from the shy introverts.

They’re just more approachable and that counts for plenty in the fast-paced chaos of the tradeshow floor.

May 16, 2016

Make Yourself Memorable! [Webinar replay]

Tradeshow Sales Trainer Andy Saks of Spark Presentations spent 30 minutes with me this week to discuss engagement at tradeshows. We called the webinar “Make Yourself Memorable: How to Attract and Qualify Tradeshow Attendees.” Andy is great at showing how important it is (and offers a handful of tips) to properly engage folks at tradeshows so you don’t miss out on opportunities.

Check it out:

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