Bringing customers to you can be challenging, but participating in public events such as trade shows can be an excellent opportunity to draw potential customers to your brand. Through public events, you can increase brand exposure, increase sales, and help you reach your target audience. Generally, events like trade shows are created to promote products, services, and brands.
There is no doubt that when marketing at events is done correctly can have a significant impact on your business success. Event marketing can significantly contribute to valuable relationships with past and prospective clients, whether a virtual event, in-person conference or a simple breakfast event. Therefore, when planning to market at an upcoming public event, carefully consider your goals and follow the following tips.
Plan Far Ahead of Time
Planning gives you enough time to think through every detail going into an event’s marketing. It helps you make the right decisions regarding what you need to be included in your marketing strategy, identify the event’s goal, and map out the entire event based on many other criteria. If you don’t give yourself time to fine-tune your marketing plan, you might miss vital details that can determine the success of your marketing.
Planning ahead of time for the trade show is also a great way to create and manage memorable marketing messages. Your marketing strategy aims to make your brand stand out, so give yourself time to calibrate captivating and outstanding marketing messages to attract potential customers. If you are using social media, create hype to make people anticipate your offerings during the event. Get the language your audience understands, and don’t be afraid to evolve your marketing plan as the event nears.
Spread the Word
Spreading the word through promotion beforehand is another way to help you develop memorable marketing messages. The primary purpose of earlier promotions is to get you ahead of the competition. If there weren’t any competition, there would be no need for promotions. If there will be a company selling the same thing you sell at the show, then you need to convince customers to buy from you as early as possible.
It is essential to bundle your products together as you run your promotion. Include popular products with non-popular products to help you cross-sell items that customers may not have given attention to. Ensure that you use online platforms like blogs, video hosting websites, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, among others. To effectively spread the word, ensure that you maintain a consistent branding message with the promotion on your website or social media platforms.
Choose Your Booth Space
Before people can engage you at a trade fair, they first see the appearance of your trade show booth. Factors such as branding, merchandise, props, and the wow factor are work that determines an excellent trade booth. No matter your target audience, ensure your booth is as eye-catching as possible and make the most of your space to grab everyone else’s attention.
The setup of your booth also sends a message to the ground. So, the layout, materials, quality, and people who represent your brand at the show should accurately represent your business. While the focus is to stay professional, personality and how memorable your marketing message should be, try to avoid being too cheesy or annoying to your audience.
Decide on an Achievable Goal
Setting goals for your marketing plan can help you quickly support and eliminate distractions. Achievable goals feel like the achievement you get once the job is well done. A goal to entice more customers through giveaways is an example of a good goal to strive for and implement. Achievable goals can help you put things into perspective and ensure you have the proper focus as a team.
When making these goals, specify the exact value you hope to bring into the equation. Make the purpose clear and easy to understand. Measure your goals and ensure that they are attainable. Many plans seem impossible until you set your mind to achieving them. Goals matter. Therefore, to deliver a memorable marketing message at an upcoming trade fair, make sure that the plans are relevant and set a time frame for each goal.
What Makes a Show Great?
Overall, what makes a trade show successful, is the same thing that will make your sales and marketing a success; branding. Therefore, you must pull everything together and stay positive as you set your marketing goals. At all times, communicate your message everywhere. Be it in everything you write or all your marketing decisions, have the brand message at the back of your mind.
