I recently attended two trade shows, and I really was surprised at the lack of effort put forth by the staff at most booths to work the crowd. No one tried to generate a conversation, no one tried to qualify, no one tried to uncover a need. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t mind not being bothered, but I was nonetheless surprised at the lack of effort made to talk to a prospect…namely me.
If there was ever a time to look with extreme focus at every aspect of your marketing program, now is it. Companies have pulled back on travel budgets, and to many, attending a trade show with any type of meaningful presence is a costly endeavor. That said, how is it possible for a live body to come into a booth, look at the products on display, take all sorts of literature and be ignored by two booth personnel who were more interested in their own sidebar?
It’s wasted opportunity, especially if you put the time and money into a pre-show traffic building program. In fact, I can create programs all day long that will increase booth traffic, but if there’s no effort to begin a meaningful dialogue once people get there, then all we did was go through the motions and waste a lot of money.
So, what’s the answer? I would suggest setting a lead goal for the show. Analyze the number of qualified leads in the database from last years show, and increase it by some percentage. I believe that people are motivated by a target, and we, as managers are responsible for giving our employees something to shoot for. Here’s another thought….have a contest among booth personnel for adding the most qualified prospects to the database. You’ll be shocked by what a little healthy competition can do.
One good way to establish rapport with a prospect in your booth is to act like you’re interested…I can’t tell you how many times I saw personnel talking among themselves, ignoring all the prospective customers in the booth. Talk to your prospect. Uncover some point of pain, establish yourself as a source of knowledge and expertise. Don’t rely on them to tell you their problem. Throw out an example or two that you have experience fixing. They will be interested in hearing about it, and they’ll more than likely offer up another issue they are facing as they get more involved in the conversation. As you’re talking, ask for a business card and ask if they’d mind getting an email periodically from you when you have relevant information to share. More often than not, they’ll give you the OK. Of course it’s up to you to effectively nurture your prospect and send them things that they are interested in, to keep them progressing further through sales funnel.
Another observation I made is that many booths don’t actually communicate clearly. If someone can walk by your booth and not instantly identify what you do in clear terms, you are wasting an opportunity. Sometimes we get so wrapped up in our own technical jargon that we forget to clearly convey the user benefit of what we offer. On the flip side, some marketers go too far in the other direction. They don’t use jargon, but they use lifestyle images to show what customers experience when using their product. That’s a delicate balance. If you use lifestyle images with no clear connection to what you actually do, it’s ineffective.
Picture a company that sells air conditioning systems. They are tired of talking specs all the time, and they decide to make an about face. They use a photo of a family nice and cool in their living room in all of their marketing materials. It’s a great photo, but do people know what you do? Don’t rely on your prospect to make the mental leap necessary to get your message, because most will move on without getting it.
The best marketers communicate in terms of user benefit, not features. In other words, while you’re telling me what you want to sell me, always tell me what benefit I will derive. We have to tell people why they should care...features are great, but you won’t connect with your audience until you talk to them in terms of user benefit. Taking the above into consideration, it’s a good idea to really scrutinize your booth graphics for clarity. We don’t want to make your prospects work too hard J.
So take a look at your trade show schedule, see how many leads you’ve had in past years from that show, and set an overall goal for this year. Develop a traffic building campaign for your booth, and create a contest for your people to see who can have the most meaningful conversations with prospects at the show. Doing this, and making sure your booth graphics clearly communicate your user benefits will help you to get the very most from your investment.
This speaks to a broader topic...namely, making absolute sure that most things you invest time into, provide some sort of return. It’s so easy to fall into the trap of feeling good just going through the motions, but it’s a dangerous place to be. That’s a topic for another day, thanks for reading.