Lean Exhibiting

Big, Fat, Ugly, Sacred Cows of Trade Show Marketing #1

What is it with trade show participants? Why does someone who has exhibited at ONE trade show, or has designed a couple of ten-foot exhibits feel that he/she now is an EXPERT at trade show marketing?

Here's my beef. Marketing, in and of itself, is a complicated combination of art and science. It is really hard to do good, let alone great, marketing. Heck, some of the best minds in the business have a hard enough time just defining marketing and its role in customer creation and maintenance. Seth Godin posted this in his blog this week:

Notable

I got a note from a friend about a co-worker that brilliantly summed up the chasm facing marketers today:

I believe she is good at the standard but limited in considering the notable.

Frankly, it's hard to be notable. Marketing's scope is so broad, most experts specialize in a subcategory - ex: direct marketing, on-line marketing, marketing with AdSense, trade advertising, telemarketing, postcard marketing, PR, and yes, blog marketing. Every one of these is a viable tool when used correctly.

Trade show marketing, on the other hand, is more complicated (not to say any marketing subcategory is easy!). The truth is, if you do trade show marketing correctly, you will most likely use several different subcategories in your plan. You might use personal letters. You might use postcards, voicemail, and faxes (a great tool BTW). You might use podcasting or newsletters.

But in addition to doing all that, you also design your booth, ship everything, set up travel & hotel, register for show badges, hire labor, move-in/move-out, produce a cocktail party,  compile a database of prospects... and on and on. When done correctly, trade shows are hard work! Believe you me, learning how to do trade shows effectively and profitably doesn't happen overnight.

The point of my rant has to do with all the same-old bad "how-to-do-its" getting posted and printed from these so-called "experts." Unfortunately, many of these tips have been bandied about for so long, they've become accepted as standard. I think it's time somebody started shooting down these big, fat, ugly sacred cows of the trade show world. And I guess that somebody would be me.

So let's talk about one sacred cow as it was posted in a recent article. I won't identify the author because I don't want this to turn into name-calling or anything personal. I could pick out any number of articles with the same message. I'm just shooting cows. The particular cow I'm aiming at today is:

Give freebies. Give people a reason to come by your booth. Most businesses give away pens, magnets, key chains, and other small items decorated with the company logo and phone number. Go a step further—bring food (even if your business isn’t food-related), give gift certificates and coupons, hold raffles for a valuable product or service you offer, give demonstrations, or bring a PowerPoint presentation.

Give freebies. Give away pens, magnets, etc.. Bring food. Give gift certificates.

These are what's known as "traffic builders." That's all they are - traffic builders. Now if you define success as "lots and lots of bodies in my booth," then by all means give away stuff that packs 'em in.

But is it Marketing and is it notable? My definition of marketing is delivering the exact right product to the exact right target market using the exact right media at the exact right time.

Using traffic builders, as espoused by so many industry "experts," is very different from attracting the exact right targets to my booth. Using freebies and food will most certainly bring in traffic, but equating "traffic in my booth" with "prospects" is simply wrong. The term for all that traffic is "suspects," not prospects. We suspect there might be prospects in that pile of traffic.

And there's the rub. It can be argued that prospects are somewhere in that pile. But so what? How do we cull them out? Do we have enough staffers in our booth to talk with every single person attracted by the freebies and food... have a long enough discussion to determine if they're qualified or not... reject those who aren't... and only spend quality time with quality prospects? Do we have the ability to scan hundreds of suspects and then follow-up after the show and THEN cull out the prospects? Most exhibitors (and I do mean MOST) have neither the time nor manpower.

I, for one, am only interested in attracting the exact right target market to my booth from the beginning. Giveaways and food attract everybody - other exhibitors, non-qualified attendees, spouses, students, union workers, bus drivers, temps on break... anybody who can fog a mirror. I am not interested in everybody. I am only interested in the exact right targets coming into my booth.

This means my booth design, layout, signage, graphics, pre-show communications, advertising, and promotions are designed to only talk to those who fit the profile of my exact right target market. By focusing on these people my booth isn't packed with traffic (synonym for "everybody"). This then gives my staffers the ability to have more quality conversations instead of spending valuable time giving away stuff.

Yes, my way is harder. Giving away stuff and attracting lots of traffic gives the appearance of success, and it's also a lot easier. That's why it's the standard. But if you want the biggest bang for your trade show marketing dollar, you don't take the easy way out. And don't you want to be notable?

(Oh, BTW, you might also notice that an awful lot of those articles encouraging freebies and food are written by people who SELL freebies and food.)

Notable

I got a note from a friend about a co-worker that brilliantly summed up the chasm facing marketers today:

I believe she is good at the standard but limited in considering the notable.

Who Is Your Competitor?

It's funny how we often need to be reminded of something we already know is true, but have forgotten.

Good buddy and client, Scott Graham, Meetings & Conventions Goomba for CBA (the association formerly known as the Christian Booksellers Assn) forwarded me a note he received this morning. Scott led a sales meeting at Advocace in Dallas last week and handed out copies of my book, The Most Wanted Marketing Strategy for Exhibitors, as gifts. (Thanks, Scott!)

One of the attendees at the meeting, Paul Martin, sent this note:

Thank you for giving each Advocace team member a copy of Steve Miller's book--it is outstanding!  There are so many nuggets from this book, but one that stands out for all of our work together: Exhibitors are competitors.

Each of our exhibitors compete for a very small window of space on the retailer's shelf.

To win, they compete for a very small window of time with the retailer at a CBA show.

A very big point.

Thanks, Paul for reminding ME of something I needed to remember - and I wrote it!

Don't Make It Hard To Do Business With You

I'm doing a first-time exhibitor marketing kit for the Global Pet Expo. Part of the package includes telephone interviews with show attendees, and this morning I spoke with GPE attendee Connie Packard Kamedulski. Connie owns the Animal Fair Pet Shop in Ridgefield, CT, and she shared a big frustration she has with exhibitors.

Connie described the numerous times she has stopped in an exhibitor's booth only to discover they were totally unprepared for a conversation with her. As an independent retailer, she has different needs from a big box store or a distributor. Yet too often the exhibitor didn't seem to get that. She gave the example of exhibitors who say, "We don't have a distributor for your area yet, so we can't talk with you right now."

Connie would explain, "Well, if you take my order and then get other retailers like me to order, I'll bet a distributor would be happy to fulfill those for you!" But too often the exhibitors shook their heads. Unbelievable, but true.

She talked about stopping at other exhibitors only to be told, "Minimum order is 500 pieces. You need to buy a container load." Then later she would find out that exhibitor DID have a distributor who could sell her smaller volume. The exhibitor just didn't want to get into that conversation.

Connie's not alone. Attendees at shows in all industries (not just consumer products) tell me similar stories about exhibitors suffering some type of marketing myopia. Even Gary Angel mentions this in his posting, View From A Booth: "For me, working a booth feels kind of like a "Groundhog Day" where you are helpless to change the outcome – because you have to say the same words over and over and over."

Look, I understand how hard it is to work a trade show or fair. It's hard work! But I wonder how many Connie Packard Kamedulski's are leaving events frustrated they couldn't get exhibitors to help?

It doesn't matter whether you're exhibiting at the Global Pet Expo, the Radiological Society of North America annual conference, or INFOCOMM,  there will be qualified professional attendees of all shapes and sizes; each with his or her unique needs. Our job, as exhibitors, is to be ready to talk with all of them.

Don't make it hard for them to do business with you.

I don't care how you start the conversation

In recent months I've read a number of trade show staffer "advice" pieces about how to open a conversation with a stranger. Every one of these stresses the importance of asking "open-ended" questions," not "closed-ended."

A close-ended question is one that can be answered with a "yes," or a "no." So, for example, the questions, "Is there something I can help you find?" and "Can I help you?" An example of an open-ended question might be, "So tell me about how you're Multivariate Regressing Frammajammit handles the the negative outflow of neural photons when temperatures exceed stated parameters?"

The argument is that an attendee will simply answer "No" to a close-ended question, look at you like you're an idiot, and that's the end of a potentially multi-million dollar sale.

C'mon, let's get real. First, the hardest thing to do at a trade show or fair is open your mouth and talk to a stranger. And we can blame Mom for that. Don't talk to strangers! But the fact is, that's exactly what we have to do at a trade show.

Look, don't sweat whether you ask an open-ended or closed-ended question. Just get the conversation started! I heard a troubling statistic this week from a study done at a top 40 trade show in the U.S. It seems that on average FOUR out FIVE attendees who walked into a booth were NOT engaged by staffers! This is astounding and, if true, a colossal waste of opportunity by exhibitors.

My advice? Just get the conversation started! I don't care if you ask an open-ended or closed-ended question. Just get the conversation started. Once we open our mouth and say something, we're okay.

I'm Still Waiting

Back in July, I attended the annual National Speakers Association annual convention in Orlando. Can you imagine? 2000 professional speakers and no listeners.

They do have a small trade show (less than 100 exhibitors) -- printers, presentation software and hardware, photographers, and others.

A couple of weeks before the convention I received a preshow mailer from one company promoting long-term care insurance. This was something I was interested in, so I made sure to stop by their booth.

I expressed strong interest in getting this insurance as an additional way to help protect my family from incurring a suffocating financial burden should I require long-term care. They were delighted to talk and after providing me with a computerized proposal, I asked them to follow-up immediately after the convention.

OK, so let's look at what we have here:

• I'm clearly a qualified prospect
• I asked for the information
• I have the ability to pay for this
• I expressed an urgency to my interest
• I asked they follow-up right away

The convention ended on July 25 (10 weeks ago today).

I'm still waiting for them to follow-up.

There are always exceptions

It just goes to show you there are always exceptions to the rule.

I'm firmly against having "booth babes " -- scantily clad women in your exhibit -- simpy there to attract male traffic. But at the recent IMTS 2006 in Chicago, Allied Machine showed me a new approach to having a booth babe that I can actually support.

Rather than just announce GEN3SYS as the latest, greatest innovation for the hole making industry, it was decided to launch this very unique tool on an equally unique platform, thus converting the traditionally conservative AMEC 40’ trade show exhibit into the Garden of Eden, complete with Eve, the apples and of course a few life-like serpents to round out the overall Eden setting. Marketing’s objective was to make certain that as many of the nearly 100,000 visitors to IMTS as possible, did not leave the show without first hearing, to some degree, about Allied’s presence and new offering of GEN3SYS (pronounced "Genesis," get it?), generated by the buzz of this stand-out booth exhibit. And stand out it did. Over the past several IMTS shows, AMEC averaged approximately 100 leads per day, despite every effort to draw attention and more people to the booth. After eight days of getting the constant flow of prospective customers to notice Allied’s booth and more importantly, Allied’s message of GEN3SYS (certainly along with Thread Mills, AccuPort and EcoCut) a record 2000+ visitors requested literature on AMEC products, almost tripling the number of leads received in earlier years at the more conservative booth presented at the show.

I asked Don Giammo, Marketing Coordinator for Allied Machine, about the decision to use Eve and the Garden of Eden theme:

"When the idea of a booth babe began to come into focus, I cringed at the thought of the shallowness plus the negative comments for 'pimping our ride...' but the gal, who's a Chicagoland model, turned out to come with personality, and interacted well with our booth visitors. Our objective was to be the buzz of the show, and from what we picked up on, it worked. Our follow-up, (the mailing of the literature & letters of acknowledgement) took place Sep 25-27, to over two-thousand leads... almost triple that of the '04 IMTS."

IMHO, what worked for Allied was this:

• The theme was congruent with the name of the product
• The "fun" theme didn't stop there. Allied staff worked hard to connect the dots between attracting attendees and meaningful interactions. You can watch an IMTS newscast and see for yourself.
• Eve may have visually attracted attendees, but she also was integral in helping start the business conversation and then handing off to an Allied staffer.

The bottom line is, it all worked because everything connected back to the overall objectives  and purpose for the show.