Making the most of your exhibition stand
Part III: Designing your exhibition stand

When designing your stand there are
several things that you need to consider.

1.The overall stand size

2.The position within the exhibition hall

3.Your available budget

Let's begin with stand size
The stand size may be limited by budgetary restraints but you need to bear in mind the space needed to house your product samples, your staff, literature racks, AV equipment, storage area, presentation area, reception and discussion areas. Then leave enough room for people to wander on, off and around the stand without meeting obstacles or feeling intimidated.

Most of the exhibitors we surveyed said that their design priorities always included the provision of sufficient space to allow visitors to walk freely around their exhibition stands.

Making the most of available space is where professional stand designers come into their own.
Get them to present ideas based on various stand sizes or proportions. If you can achieve the
same objectives with less space and less expenditure, you could save a fortune!

Remember though, that for them to create the best possible stand you need to give them the best possible brief. This should also include requirements for ISDN links, telephone lines, high voltage supplies or any other special requirements.

Most design companies will support you with a project team to provide a full service from design through to implementation including costing and supervising the construction.

For a full list of reputable companies contact the British Exhibition Contractors Association at the following address:

BECA (British Exhibition Contractors Association)
Kingsmere House
Graham Road
Wimbledon
London SW19 3SR

Furniture is very often left to the very last minute, indeed it is not uncommon for the stand manager to drag in the garden furniture, office chairs or breakfast bar stools on the first day of an exhibition.

If you have a variety of product ranges it may be worth having several smaller highly focused stands placed strategically around the hall rather than one big stand. You may find that this will enable you to reach a larger audience and increase the overall number of leads generated. It will also help you to have specialist staff knowledgeable in the specific product range at each location.

Another important thing to consider, is that in almost every case you pay for the length and depth of the site but rarely the height! So make the most of this free third dimension by building a second floor or balcony, putting up a balloon, fixing a projector screen above the stand erecting a tower with a revolving logo - whatever takes your fancy!

When considering the cost of designing and building your stand you may like to ensure that it can be stored and reused rather than torn down and discarded. This will enable you to spread the cost of the stand design and production over several exhibitions and give you a consistency and uniqueness of style that people will come to recognise. However, if money is less of an issue the ideal solution may be to customise the stand to meet the objectives and visitor profile of each individual show.

If your budget is small there are two alternatives to a customised exhibition stand:

The first is making use of a simple shell scheme. Although it looks rather drab while empty, you can make it stand out at an exhibition by trying some of the following suggestions:

• Lay a different coloured carpet to the standard shell scheme colour.
• Raise the height of the floor.
• Invest in some attractive graphics to line the walls.
• Add illuminated display cabinets or spotlights to add atmosphere.
• Use a television screen or video wall to add impact
• Add plants to create further colour and warmth
• Use a speciality act to attract attention.

The second alternative, is purchasing one of the many modular systems that are currently available. They are designed for reuse and minimum storage and transport requirements, thereby removing many of the challenges of customised stands.

They look far more professional than a simple shell scheme and the latest offerings can compete extremely well with expensive customised stands. Both the designs and costs of these systems vary considerably so it is well worth speaking to a number of suppliers and getting some competitive quotes.

Most good modular system contractors and suppliers will include graphic panels within the costs and often show sample designs before you have to commit yourself.

Once you have chosen a design, ask for an all-inclusive price and if you later decide on modifications have them costed and agreed before they are carried out

Visit some other shows and see what other exhibitors are doing with their space. You can learn so much by looking at the ideas of others and incorporating them into your own designs

Finally, while we're talking about exhibition stands let me just give you another word of warning. Leave the electrics to the official stand contractor, otherwise you may find that you are responsible for fusing the entire exhibition or even burning it down. At the very least blowing your own fuses in the middle of a client presentation or demonstration may also be very embarrassing!

The planning process
Having decided on your objectives, chosen an exhibition and considered the stand design, careful preparation is essential to ensure the success of the exhibition. With a totally immovable deadline the old adage "If you fail to prepare, you prepare to fail" is never more apt.

Regular exhibitors will undoubtedly have experienced the stress of last minute preparation which normally results in having no printed literature or business cards on the first day of the show, or having to resort to a hastily printed one colour flyer because the glossy brochures are still on the press.

It is also not uncommon to have video walls in place but no video to play on them, or a state-of-the-art computer with the most impressive multimedia presentation rendered useless because of a missing monitor lead.

To avoid these problems you need to prepare two essential documents. The first is a checklist containing every item needed for the show. The second is an action list to ensure that all of the necessary preparation work is completed in adequate time.

Let's start with the item checklist. This should contain everything necessary for the stand display, administration, promotion and entertainment.

Obviously we don't know your specific requirements but the following lists will prompt you to include all of the essentials and items that are sometimes forgotten until the day of the show. If you are using a stand designer the items marked with an asterix would normally be their responsibility.

Your item checklist should include:

• All products that you wish to show on the stand Display cabinets or plinths*
• Plants*
• Furniture*
• Graphics*
• Telephones
• Lighting*
• Pens/Pencils
• Pads, questionnaires, scanners or light pens for recording leads.
• Brochures
• Give aways
• Flyers
• Business cards
• Leaflet stands, holders and dispensers
• Price lists
• A Fridge (if serving cold drinks)
• Drinks for visitors and staff
• Food for visitors and staff
• AV Equipment with all appropriate leads and connectors
• The video cassettes, CD-ROMS or floppy discs containing your AV presentations
• Male and female velcro strip for putting up graphics
• A pair of scissors
• Sellotape
• Blue Tack
• Sticky backed velcro hooks and loops
• Staff uniforms
• Mobile phones
• ISDN or telephone lines
• Shoe polish/brushes
• Safe/lockaway
• Special Exhibits
• Representatives diaries
• Insurance documents
• Security devices
• Badges
• Exhibition passes
• Car Park passes
• Camera (Get some useful stand shots without paying a fortune to the in-house
  cameraman)
• Press releases for the press room
• A Trolley to avoid lugging heavy boxes or props.
• Leads and extensions for all equipment
• Maps to the exhibitio
• Accommodation for all staff
  
• Cash - many exhibition halls do not take credit cards for drinks and light refreshments
  and you never know when you might have to buy someone a drink

Now that you know what you need, it's time to prepare an action list to ensure that everything is going to be ready on time
First take from the item list everything that needs to be prepared or produced in advance such as printed literature, giveaways, graphic panels etc. Then plan the dates by which each stage of that preparation needs to take place. For example, if you are producing brochures especially for the show you need to aim for them being completed at least two weeks in advance. Working back from this date, in consultation with your printers you will be able to establish deadlines for copy approval, photography, design approval, film production and printing. This should be carefully noted and monitored.

Next list the items that will need to be hired, purchased or booked in advance such as furniture, AV Equipment, contract and promotional staff and insurance. Hire everything in plenty of time and check off each of these actions as they take place.

Take into consideration the stand items that require special planning. For example if you are giving visitors on-line access to the internet you may need to get an ISDN line installed. If you are storing perishable items in the fridge overnight you need to make sure your stand has a 24hour power supply or If you have expensive items on your stand you will need to organise security.

The action list should also include: build up and breakdown times, the preparation of special exhibits, arranging transport and contractors, booking accommodation for stand staff and returning the forms within the exhibition manual in plenty of time..

The exhibitor's manual supplied by the organisers will invariably contain many forms each with their own special deadlines and it is essential that these forms are returned on time. These forms will cover such items as: the nameboard details on your stand, your exhibition catalogue entry, car parking permits and your stand's electrical and lighting requirements.

At this juncture we would like to cover the three aspects of your stand, which apart from the design and manufacture of the stand itself, probably need the most careful though and preparation.

Printed literature.
Before organising the printing of literature you should decide exactly how it is going to be used at the exhibition, if at all! There are three schools of thought on this subject.

The first is the shotgun approach, that literature should be made easily available to visitors to take themselves. So it should be placed in racks or dispensers on the outskirts of the stand so that as many people can grab it as possible without having to wonder onto the stand. It should also be handed out to passersby by the stand staff.

The second idea is to place literature of high quality in the centre of the stand so that it is only given to people who have sufficient interest to wonder onto the stand and make an enquiry. You therefore will need less literature and can therefore spend more money on the quality.

The third idea is based on the premise that the purpose of an exhibition is mainly to meet people, talk with them and generate as many quality leads as possible. Literature should therefore, not be handed out on the stand at all, but sent out subsequently to interested parties. Although this may sound strange, there is a lot of logic to it.

1. You don't have to take stacks of literature to the show and have it take up valuable room on the stand.
2. Literature is only sent to those who are genuinely interested so the costs are reduced.
3. The literature is not lost amongst all of the other bits of paper collected at the show but arrives later, when it can be noticed, landing directly onto the desks or doormats of the interested parties.
4. Specific literature can be sent out in relation to the enquirers actual interest rather that a general generic handout.
5. Those on your stand will spend less time handing out literature and more time talking to and qualifying visitors.

As you will shortly discover, there are also other items which could be a lot more effective as giveaways than printed literature.

At the end of the day though, your final decision can only be made in relation to your key objectives. Think this through carefully before ordering a few forests of printed literature which may not always help you to meet your exhibition goals.

Audio/Visual material.
A well produced video or multimedia presentation can add enormously to the look and effectiveness of an exhibition stand. However it needs to be produced with the exhibition in mind and, where possible, organised at least three to six months before the exhibition is due to commence.

Many exhibitors make the mistake of showing their standard corporate or product video at an exhibition, this, however, is often ineffective. It is a lot better to have a video or computer presentation created specifically for exhibition use. If should be short, (no longer than 2-3 minutes), visually stimulating and concentrating on the key point that you wish to communicate at the show. People will not take the time to stand and watch a long video and dialogue is rarely heard. It is important to get the message across quickly and visually.

Audio Visual giveaways prove to be far more effective than printed literature and stand out amidst all the other brochures collected at a show.

A video can be duplicated for less than £1 per copy so you can freely give them away at a show and the recipient feels that they really have something of value. Our advice is to give this video a consultative or training emphasis rather than purely promotional and it will be much better received.

For example, if I were a Recruitment agency I would not give out a video saying "We are the best recruitment agency in world" as it would probably never be watched.

I would instead give out a video entitled "The art of effective interviewing". Visitors to my stand would then feel they were being given a gift of real value as the cost of good business training videos can be hundred's of pounds. Of course, I would still have the opportunity to promote my company subtly throughout the video and probably much less subtly at the end!

If you feel you cannot afford to give everyone a video, why not give out an audio cassette? The cost has dropped to below 50p a tape and the recipient can listen to your sales message on his way home in their car. Here again, a little training or consultancy content will increase its value and the chance of it being listened to.

Then there is the interactive business card. A plastic, credit card-sized business card that incorporates a CD-ROM! Hand these out at the exhibition and they will generate an immediate "WOW" factor from the recipient. They will usually place the card somewhere safe and at the end of the show put it into their standard CD-ROM drive where they can watch your interactive sales presentation and find out all they need to know about you, your company, it's products and services.

If you would like any further information on Exhibition Videos, audio cassettes, multimedia presentations or the interactive business cards, contact ProActive Productions on www.proact.co.uk or www.cre8zone.com or call us on (01322) 221199.

Once you have decided what to have on your stand, completed the checklists and set realistic deadlines you are well on the way to having a very successful show!

NEXT ISSUE: Promoting your exhibition Stand