Exhibiting - Part IV: Stand Promotion

With your show preparations well underway, you must consider what you are going to do to maximise the number of visitors to your stand. This activity falls into two main areas: "Pre-show promotion" and "At show promotion".

Section I - Pre-show promotion

Pre-show promotion is the area most often overlooked but it is so vitally important to successful exhibiting.

Those companies who have taken the time to promote their presence at a particular exhibition in advance will receive the following benefits:

• They will have a constant flow of traffic on their stand.
• Their busy stand will generate interest and curiosity from other visitors.
• Their prior knowledge of which clients and prospects are coming to their stand -and when they will arrive- will enable them to stagger presentations and plan staff logistics.
• Having a mixture of existing clients and prospects on their stand give them the opportunity to arrange testimonials and recommendations which will increase prospect confidence.
• They will be able to meet with their clients, improving relationships and selling them more products and services.
• They will have a productive exhibition even if the volume and quality of other visitors to the show is not what was hoped for.

To assist with pre-show promotion, many organisers provide a marketing and publicity guide from which you can order complimentary visitor tickets and make VIP guest nominations. It will also have event logos to include on your literature and outline advertising opportunities in the exhibition guide and other show related media. There is often an opportunity to rent the pre-show visitor registration list, a very valuable tool for pre-show promotion so that you can invite these people straight to your stand.

The guide may also contain a form to give the press office details of any newsworthy product launches or promotional events happening on your stand and sometimes advice on preparing press releases and maximising publicity.

These exhibitor's guides, when available, are an invaluable tool that should be studied carefully and used to maximum effect.

When formulating your pre-show strategy decide first who you are going to aim the promotion at. This may include:

• Existing Clients and Prospects.
• Competitor's clients (if known).
• Pre-show registered visitors.
• The previous year's exhibition visitors (if available).
• Companies in the local area surrounding the exhibition hall.
• Lists of companies in your target market who would be interested in the exhibition and specifically interested in your product range.

Then decide the best way to approach these markets.

Whatever methods you use be it direct mail, PR or media advertising you may
like to consider some of the following suggestions.

Send out free tickets or better still encourage them to register with you for their free tickets. This way you can get the visitors names, the date and time they will be attending and their area of interest before the show. Then you can prepare for their visit or find other ways to meet with them should unforeseen circumstances prevent them from attending.

You also need to give them an incentive to come to the exhibition and visit your stand

Among the incentive ideas that work extremely well are:

Discounts or special offers that are only available at the show.

An exclusive product such as signed copies, limited editions, special editions or
commemorative items which can only be obtained from your stand.

A free gift which could be the same for all attendees or determined by a scratch
card, raffle ticket, the spin of a wheel etc. The slight gambling perspective
enables you to attract masses of people with mention of the main prize while only
having to give away much smaller prizes to the majority of attendees!

Here are just a few examples...

If you want to use the press to add to your pre-show promotion find out from the organisers which local papers, national papers and industry journals are carrying features on the exhibition and produce an interesting press release to send to each of them.

It is extremely effective if you can send them a copy of your press releases in text format on a CD-ROM with accompanying high-resolution photographs. If the CD-ROM is both Apple Mac and PC compatible so much the better. This makes the journalists' life very easy and therefore dramatically increases the chance of your story being widely printed.

Section 2 - Promotional activities at the show

Despite effective pre-show promotion there will still be people arriving at the show with no idea that you are exhibiting there. Your challenge is to quickly make your presence known and allure or entice them on to your stand.

Some of the best ways to do this are:

• Sponsoring or advertising in the exhibition catalogue as close to the exhibition layout map as possible.
• Putting scratch cards or prize vouchers in the show guide.
• Sponsoring the exhibition bags given out at the entrance.
• Getting the organiser's permission to give out flyers, prize vouchers or scratch cards at the exhibition entrances.
• Having banners put up around the exhibition.
• Sponsoring floor tiles with arrows leading to your stand.
• Putting AV Equipment showing your promotional video in rest and refreshment areas.
• Putting touchscreen kiosks in key positions.
• Arranging for celebrities to be on your stand and publishing times in the catalogue, show guide and press room.
• Using promotional staff to trawl the aisles giving out leaflets, free gift vouchers or swapping sweets for business cards.
• Putting a hot air balloon above your stand.
• Regularly putting on a live show (stand room permitting!)

Finally, there are the on-stand prize draws and competitions which can contribute enormously to crowd generation, but you must make sure that is does not distract people away from the products and services that you are trying to promote on the stand. If it simply turns your exhibition stand into a casino you have achieved very little except unqualified business cards.

It is important to ensure that those drawn to the stand by the promotion are also introduced to the benefits of the products and services on display.

Two ways to ensure this is to have the prize vouchers validated by the stand staff after the visitor has received a very brief presentation or by having the prospect fill in a detailed questionnaire on the back of the voucher before they can submit it for a prize.

Do not be tempted to pay for prize draw vouchers, scratch cards and other "come to our stand promotions" to be put loose in the visitors carrier bags because experience shows they will not even be seen until they have returned home from the exhibition. The only item normally taken from the bags at the show itself are the show guides or catalogues and that is the place to be.

Next Issue: Stand Management