The Exhibitionist

Steve Reeder, Nichola Reeder

Description

A practical and inspiring guide to executing
effective trade shows that attract and convert high quality leads into
profitable sales. Organisations regularly waste vast amounts of money, time and
effort attending the wrong shows, planning them poorly and failing to follow
up, leading to an almost zero return on investment. The Exhibitionist gives exhibitors an
end-to-end guide covering all aspects of best-practice trade show execution
including budgeting, researching the right show, selecting and training staff
and post show contact strategy amongst many other elements, to build the
confidence and skills required for delivering more effective events.

Through a series of three
modules - planning, implementation and evaluation - The Exhibitionist guides
readers through the linear process of delivering a commercially measurable
trade show. This is a practical journey which alongside the theory uses case
studies and examples to bring the key points to life.  Rather than just giving readers the answer,
The Exhibitionist provides the stimulus and inspiration to arrive at the right
decisions for each organisation’s specific trade show needs. The Exhibitionist directs
you through the minimum requirements to deliver an effective trade show but
also discuss more advanced elements such as media management, speaker platforms
and digital engagement that will enhance the basic delivery for more
experienced exhibitors

Sujets

• Marketing stratégique
• Meetings
• Business Communication
• Presentations
• Marketing et communication
• Economics
• Business
• Sales

Informations

• Publié par: Practical Inspiration Publishing
• Date de parution: 16 mai 2019
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781788600941
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

First published in Great Britain by Practical Inspiration Publishing, 2019
Nichola Reeder and Steve Reeder, 2019
The moral rights of the authors have been asserted
ISBN 978-1-7886-0092-7
All rights reserved. This book, or any portion thereof, may not be reproduced without the express written permission of the authors.
Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders and to obtain their permission for the use of copyright material. The publisher apologizes for any errors or omissions and would be grateful if notified of any corrections that should be incorporated in future reprints or editions of this book.
CONTENTS
About the authors
Introduction
PART I: Why engage?
Chapter 1: Why trade shows matter even more in the digital age
Chapter 2: Are trade shows the right tactic for your business?
PART II: P.I.E.
Chapter 3: Planning
3.1 SMART objective setting
3.2 Which show?
3.3 Budget planning
3.4 Buying your space
3.5 Stand design
3.6 The exhibitor manual
3.7 Lead capture
3.8 Pre-show marketing
Chapter 4: Implementation
4.1 On-site final build
4.2 Selecting your stand squad
4.3 Opening lines
4.4 Squad training
4.5 Filtering visitors – prioritising prospects and leads
Chapter 5: Evaluation
5.1 Breakdown
5.2 Follow-up
5.3 Evaluation
PART III Final considerations
Chapter 6: Maximising the media
Chapter 7: Going global
Closing remarks
Contact details
Bibliography
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
B efore you start on the journey to your trade show success, it might help to know a little more about us and why we’re hoping to inspire you to think differently about your own campaign. In different ways we’ve been involved in trade shows and exhibitions for more than 20 years collectively, as exhibitors, visitors and helping organisers to add value to their events.
We started out much the same way as many of you will, inheriting the planning and execution of a trade show as a ‘development’ project, with a reasonably sized budget but very limited information on what had and hadn’t worked in the past. The only way we learnt how to do it was to ask questions, lots of them, about everything from where to store huge boxes of chocolate or crates of beer, to which colours are most likely to catch a visitor’s eye on graphics and how many staff to have on your stand. We asked everyone from event organisers to stand design agencies, visitors, other exhibitors, venue managers and logistics experts and found that everyone had a different version of the truth. One of the most important things we learnt on our own trade show journey is that there isn’t one single truth when it comes to trade show execution. So much depends on the specific circumstances, objectives and resources of an organisation that not every piece of advice is going to work for every single exhibitor or event. However, there are some general principles that help provide a framework of best practice that help inform decision-making and generate powerful results.
Steve Reeder
Logistics guru and lover of a planning spreadsheet, I thrive on working out how to get all your kit, equipment and people there on time, in full and with all the right permissions. My areas of expertise are in the operational aspects of trade shows, understanding the Exhibitor Manual and scheduling what needs to happen when to make sure an exhibition stand looks as engaging and professional as possible. As a quick-thinking problem-solver, I have overcome several challenges on behalf of clients including regularly finding homes for stock and kit when no one has booked storage, writing risk assessments and health and safety statements when exhibitors arrive on-site without either, and getting very large boxes through very small holes.
Nichola Reeder
I thrive on discovering an exhibitor’s commercial selling story and bringing that to life through their stand, pre-show marketing, squad training and follow-up. Finding the reasons why an exhibitor’s product or service meets (and exceeds) a visitor’s need brings the whole campaign to life, and for me it’s the core to so many other decisions and actions that will ensure a trade show fills an organisation’s sales pipeline. Having delivered trade show campaigns on behalf of multinational organisations, I also understand the crucial role the stand squad play in the success of the show and have trained exhibitors on how to engage, develop and filter visitors to ensure that the most valuable visitors become future buyers.
We’ve worked on several different projects as exhibitors ourselves as well as with clients who need either a guiding hand with their decision-making or want us to do all the work for them. We also work with event organisers on several exhibition elements including exhibitor training courses, developing and managing live theatre areas, visitor recruitment campaigns and working with high value sponsors and exhibitors to maximise their returns. Over the years we’ve heard the frustrations of so many exhibitors who feel they have wasted their money, or blame event organisers for poor results, yet we’ve seen so many fantastic executions that have generated solid commercial returns for businesses. Through The Exhibitionist we want to bring together some of the answers to the questions we’ve asked over the years and to provide some inspiration and food for thought that helps exhibitors, event managers and anyone involved in the industry to add more value to their campaigns and generate more profitable results.
INTRODUCTION

I’m in a hole because at some point I found a shovel and started digging. Maybe I should trade my shovel for ladders and start climbing.
—Craig D. Lounsbrough, M.Div., LPC
H ave you ever invested a significant amount of budget in a trade show, spent three days on your feet and not spoken to anyone of interest before thinking there must be a better way? Maybe you keep doing what you’ve always done because your company accepts it’s ‘just the way it is with trade shows’? Or maybe you’re a business owner who really wants to get out and speak to your customers but is secretly terrified?
Congratulations! Just by picking up a copy of this book you’re already on the first rung of the proverbial ladder to generating more profitable leads and better returns from your trade show investment. You’re probably wondering how that’s possible when you haven’t even read a page yet? In our combined experience of 20 years’ working on trade shows and events we’d say success is about 70% attitude, enthusiasm and a desire to learn and 30% what you actually do. Despite the digital evolution, face-to-face events remain a crucial element of the marketing mix with 99% of marketers from overperforming organisations believing that events provide visitors with a valuable opportunity to form in-person connections in an increasingly digital world (Bizzabo, 2018). But trade shows are often hard work – emotionally, physically and mentally. Not everyone has the necessary desire or disposition to deliver them brilliantly and that’s not something any book can help with! Coupled with the perception that trade shows never deliver a measurable return, they are often easy targets for criticism and budget cuts from senior teams wowed by the latest social media platform. However just by picking up this book you’ve demonstrated the mindset for learning some new skills and taking some inspiration that will enable all your future trade show campaigns to act as the engine for your organisation’s sales pipeline.
Often when we meet with clients for the first time there’s a range of causes driving their trade show anxiety, from a lack of confidence and skill, to a lack of time and resource. They’re always surprised when we tell them that they’re not alone and that so many fellow exhibitors feel those same fears. There seems to be a culture in the industry that ‘everyone can do trade shows’, as though it’s as easy as jumping out of bed in the morning. To a certain degree, it is easy to book last minute, turn up with a couple of mis-shaped pop-up banners, spend the day chatting with fellow exhibitors or on your laptop and then moan about the lack of business generated. However, to plan, implement and evaluate a trade show brilliantly, that engages with visitors and adds real value to your business through building profitable relationships for the future – now that takes skill, experience and dedication. But by picking up this book, we know you’ll rise to the challenge!
There are so many sectors, variables, life stages, structures and budgets in business that it would be impossible to provide one blueprint for brilliant execution – one size most definitely does not fit all in this case. Equally, there aren’t very many straight yes and no answers either, it’s all about how a trade show fits in to your story and meets your customer’s needs. However, in the following chapters we hope you find an easy-to-follow framework that walks you through the key elements of delivering a brilliant trade show campaign, from the initial enquiry about which show to attend, to calculating a final number of what your investment returned (yes that’s possible, don’t believe the hype about trade shows being unmeasurable). We’ll be sharing some of the knowledge, tips, advice and examples we’ve collected over the years (good and bad) to help inspire your own trade show journey. If you’re a seasoned exhibitor you may perceive some of the advice as simplistic or patronising but often when we’re running workshops it’s the simple things that people already know they want reminding of – we’re trying to provide something for everyone so if there are bits you know, sk