The return on investment (ROI) from exhibiting at a trade show can surpass any of your other growth marketing strategies this year…
IF you know how to execute a trade show exhibit properly.
Many businesses take a hit each year because of low ROI for their event efforts. Why? It all boils down to strategy. With trade show ROI, you get what you give. In other words, if you want to have a successful exhibit, you need a strong plan of attack.
In this article, we’ll show you how to make your next exhibit a smashing success by learning the top five ways you can maximize ROI and engagement with your trade show booth.
Ready? Let’s go!
1. Make a Good First Impression with Your Display
Did you know that, as humans, when we first meet someone we form our first opinions of them within milliseconds?
It follows then that visitors to your booth will quickly form their first opinion about your brand based on the design of your booth because it’s the first thing they will encounter.
Therefore, be sure to create a visually appealing design that stands out and catches visitors’ attention. Learn in this post how to design an effective Trade Show booth.
2. Boost Engagement with an Interactive Display
This is important for two reasons.
First, you want your visitors to stick around for a while. If they just take a quick look and keep walking, you know you’ve missed the mark and that they will quickly forget you. The longer they stick around and interact with your display, the better your brand awareness.
Second, speaking of brand awareness, other visitors will be quite aware of the fact that a steady line of people is building up around your booth, waiting for their turn to interact with it. This will have them wondering what all the fuss is about and increase the demand generation around your exhibit.
3. Build Brand Awareness in Multiple Places at Once
It’s true that you only have one booth at a trade show, but your brand can be in multiple places at once. You can achieve this by giving away souvenirs or “swag” to visitors of your booth that are eye catching and will have people talking.
And before you go slapping your logo on a tumbler (not that that’s a terrible idea if you’re a coffee brand) make sure you choose an item that is both fun and representative of your brand - something people won’t just throw away as they exit the auditorium.
4. Start Demand Generation Online Beforehand
Use your email lists and social media outlets to let all your customers and leads know about your exhibit ahead of time. It might even be a good idea to offer an incentive to them to come out and say hello.
Perhaps you can advertise a giveaway beforehand for the first (insert your magic number here) visitors who stop by your display.
Another idea is to offer a prize for anyone that snaps a selfie of themselves at your booth, uses your branded hashtag, and tags you in their photo.
5. Use FastSensor to Measure ROI
Ever wonder why the same companies always seem to have the best results at trade shows. It’s not luck, it’s because they know precisely where to focus their efforts for maximum ROI.
And they know because our data shows them how to improve their booths and boost their experiential marketing efforts. There’s no guess-work involved with FastSensor.
We can help you boost your brand awareness by showing you where you’re getting the most impressions.
Our data analyzes foot traffic for conversion to visitation so that you can see what works best and focus your efforts there.
We can also tell you, based on engagement and dwell time, which parts of your display are most appealing so you can maximize your visibility.
If part of your design is falling flat, we can help you improve engagement with A/B display testing so you can iterate and refine until you achieve the desired outcome.
We can also help you optimize your layout by analyzing traffic flow in and out of the booth so you can prioritize your assets to capture as many visitors as possible.
While all of these suggestions are important to your success at a trade show, the only true way to be sure you’re maximizing engagement and ROI for your booth is by tracking data and measuring it for desired outcomes. Without that, you’re just spinning your wheels as to what works and what doesn’t.
So don’t gamble your company's precious resources on a trade show exhibit that may or may not be effective. Have FastSensor come alongside your organization and take the guesswork out of the equation.
Let us show you exactly what works and what doesn’t so you can fine-tune your strategy until it’s ideal. Contact us for a demo today.