Trade shows can be great marketing opportunities for gaining new leads. This is because trade shows tend to be centred around a business niche and only people interested in that niche attend – as a result, it’s a great way of assembling your key audience in one place.
The downside to trade shows is that you’re having to vie for attention against other businesses within the same niche, some of which may even be direct competitors. As a result, you need to take extra measures to get yourself noticed – simply turning up and sitting at your stall won’t attract anyone.
To help your stall stand out, here are just seven tricks that you can use.
Invest in high-quality printed displays
Printed displays can help to clearly show your brand and can help your stall to stand out. Such displays need to be professionally designed and manufactured in order to create an impact.
Sites like eventdisplay.com.au specialise in such displays and could be a good place to go. You’re best ordering these displays in advance so that they have enough time to be designed and built.
On top of banner and marquees, you may be able to get creative with balloons and digital banners. Such visual displays will make your stall all the more unique.
Advertise exclusive promotions
Advertising one-off promotions could also help attract people to your stall. This could include a discounts to anyone that signs up on the day or a discounted product. A lot of consumers attend trade shows specifically to hunt for such deals.
Make sure to advertise these promotions using bold signage. You can also shout about them on social media.
Host a competition
Competitions can also be a great way of attracting people to your stall. The prize could be a cash sum or your product/service for free. You may even be able to get people to pay to enter your competition.
Competitions can also be a way of generating leads. Entrants will have to give their contact details in order to find out if they have won and you can use this opportunity to ask whether they’d like to sign up to your mailing list.
Demo your product
Giving a demo of your product is also likely to draw attention. This could involve you talking whilst physically presenting how to use your product, which could be anything from software to a vacuum cleaner. You may even allow customers to try out your product for themselves – this opportunity for interaction is also likely to attract people to your stall.
Not all products are possible to demonstrate, however you may still be able to produce a demo video that you can display on a screen. You can find video production companies to shoot these kinds of demo videos at sites like AMIweb.co.uk.
Appeal to people’s tastebuds
People love free tasters – if you’re a food company, make sure to offer this on your stall. Even if you’re not a food company, you may still be able to find ways of using food and drink as a gimmick to lure people to your stall. You could offer a condition such as only giving out these tasters to people that sign up to your mailing list. For instance, a wedding company may decide to give out free sparkling wine to couples that sign up, whilst a fitness company could offer free healthy snack bars.
Give away branded goodies
You could also consider giving away free branded items to passers-by. Fun promotional products such as wristbands, yo-yos and fidget spinners are likely to be noticed – consumers at the trade fair may play with these promotional products as they walk around the event and other consumers will want to know from which stall they got them. Whilst they are definitely a gimmick, they will get you noticed.
Promote your stall on social media
Many people at the trade show are likely to be on their phones using social media. Appeal to these social media users by posting social media updates. Twitter and Instagram are some of the best platforms for this because of their hashtag feature – by hashtagging the event, you can let social media users at the event know that you’re there. Facebook can also have its advantages – it’s live video feature could be worth taking advantage of.
