For many organizations, trade shows constitute a large portion (if not the majority) of their annual marketing spend. With such a large budgetary commitment invested in trade shows, getting the best possible return on that spend is crucial. And given that it is prime planning time for the Fall trade show season, below are some ways to ignite lead production from your trade show participation.
To be clear, before opening the floodgates of badge scans at your next show, you must understand your lead collection strategy. There seem to be two main camps regarding lead collection at trade shows. First is the group that wants only to collect leads that align perfectly with their ideal customer profile (ICP) and the specific buyer persona. They argue that collecting leads that are not your identified customer type is a mistake as it will lead to misplaced energy from the sales team, lower marketing conversion rates, and more. Second is the group that is open to collecting nearly any type of lead you can even if they do not fit the mold of your ideal buyer. This group believes that casting a wider net will help you build the company brand and plant interest in potential future customers as people move around to other companies within their industry. While there are arguments on both sides, you should understand what best suits your organization and set your trade show strategies accordingly. Regardless of your specific strategy alignment, at a minimum you should implement a lead scoring process on all trade show leads so that you can treat differing quality leads appropriately. With that in mind, let’s get started.
While working at a B2B SaaS organization in the contact center space I managed our sponsorship at our largest trade show event of the year, Salesforce’s Dreamforce. Over four years of managing this show, the team and I were able to 6x the lead production from that show. Here are the three steps we used to realize this significant increase in lead production.
- Highlight Your Solution with Prominent In-Booth Demonstrations
Providing regularly scheduled, prominently featured, in-booth demonstrations is a terrific way to increase traffic to and leads from your booth. Performing a demo on a large screen viewable by multiple people at once will draw a crowd at your booth because individuals feel less of a commitment than when you are conducting a demo for them individually. Individual demos come with more of a barrier as individuals often feel hesitant to request booth staff time if they are not actively in a searching or buying mode. If an individual is not familiar with the solution provided by the exhibiting company, they are even less likely to seek an individualized product demo. Where a person may not be willing to commit to a demo created for them alone, they are more than likely willing to stand in for a group demo. Group demos feel safer to prospects on a discovery journey and not yet in the buying motion. Individualized demos should be reserved for those who have requested a demo and for highly rated contacts within your ICP. When you have a group of people gathered to watch your demo, the booth staff must engage them to hopefully further the conversation or to scan their badge at the very least.
At Dreamforce we were effective by conducting demos at the top and bottom of every hour. We actively recruited conference attendees to watch the scheduled demos and counted on many more joining the demos already in progress. Members of our booth staff, who were hand-picked because of their engaging personalities, performed the highly scripted demos on a large monitor in the center of the booth. We utilized limited chairs in the booth for seating and had standing room available.
- Create a Fun Atmosphere with Gamification
Booth draws such as games are an excellent way to create attention for your booth and help it stand out from the crowd. More than typical giveaways, like pens or the over-used hand sanitizer, games will create a sense of excitement and fun in your booth that will help you remain memorable to conference attendees. While activities like caricature drawings or professional LinkedIn headshots are unique, they take too much time and can lead the attendees away from rather than into your booth. With a well-crafted in-booth game you can increase or decrease the value of the prize and/or odds of winning to meet your specific needs. Furthermore, demonstrating the action using a quick video or photo also makes for great social media posts on your company and employee accounts.
One of my favorite games to use as a booth draw is The Price is Right’s classic Plinko. The game is easy to explain to the attendees, easy to play, very quick, and fun. You can easily change the odds of winning by adding additional winning slots at the bottom of the board or change the value of the prize to adapt to booth traffic and your prize budget. For Dreamforce we purchased a custom-built Plinko board that featured our company logo and branding and came with a custom shipping container. For the prizes, we purchased Starbucks gift cards.
- Set Clear Staff Roles Including Dedicated Lead Scanners.
It’s always a great idea to have dedicated staff in charge of scanning badges. While Account Executives and Sales Development Representatives (SDR’s) are a vital part of the trade show team, they should not be in charge of engaging people in the aisles to draw them into the booth. Sales associates are better utilized with in-depth discovery and product discussions in the booth and not the surface-level type of discussions of a badge scanner. It works better when you place people who have the dedicated responsibility to engage traffic around the booth, invite them into the booth, and scan their badge. Badge scanners should also actively engage attendees who have come to the booth to listen to your demos or play your games as outlined above. Additionally, it’s a good idea to instruct your scanners to try to avoid scanning badges of other vendors, known partners, existing customers, etc.
At Dreamforce we hired a team of professional badge scanners who have specific experience in trade shows and personalities suited for engaging conference attendees. Contracting additional team members can be less costly than bringing your staff when factoring in travel costs and lost opportunity costs of having the employee out of the office. Also, keep in mind that you are NOT going for the stereotypical ‘booth babe’ but rather charismatic individuals who have a knack for striking up conversations with anyone.
If trade show sponsorships are part of your demand generation strategy Fractional Boost can help. We provide fractional marketing support (Fractional CMOs, directors, and managers) for your organization at a fraction of the cost of hiring a full-time equivalent employee.
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