Trade Show Booth Staff Training Expert, Susan Friedmann, CSP, The Tradeshow Coach

Let me ask you, are your tradeshows getting enough of your love and attention?
As we celebrate Valentine’s Day, love and affection is in the air, and it makes me wonder how much heart exhibitors really put into their exhibiting efforts.

I doubt that many of you take your displays into your arms and whisper sweet nothings, or gush your loving sentiments.

Chances are quite the opposite. For many companies, tradeshows are viewed as a necessary evil.  You participate because your competition does, and are scared not to, for fear that the marketplace assumes the worst – “oh dear, the XYZ company must have fallen on hard times because they’re not exhibiting.”

Well, my thought is that if you feel compelled to exhibit for whatever reason, you might as well embrace it, and give it all the love and attention it deserves.

Here are 7 ways to help you fall in love with your tradeshows:

1.  Review your show schedule, and make a vow to only participate in the shows that are worthwhile – the ones that give you a certain ROI, whatever that means for you.
2.  Reverse engineer your success, and consider the end result you’re looking to achieve. Then plan your strategy to achieve it.
3.  Fall in love with each show and make a commitment to do whatever it takes to make this union a true success.
4.  Share the love. View each and every show as the best possible opportunity to hug – make a good solid connection – with your customers and prospects.
5. Choose team members (intimate companions) who share your exhibiting passion.
6. Share the essential booth staff training skills needed.
7. Embrace all lead follow up so that your prospect union turns into a marriage made in heaven.

Wishing you a long, healthy and loving life together!

The 21st Winter Olympics are about the start.  The buzz of activities and all the arrangements are reaching a crescendo in preparation for the Opening Ceremony.  However, all is not exactly as planned.  The weather is causing havoc – fog, lack of snow and rain are not what was expected to make the events run smoothly.

How similar is this to your trade show plans? Don’t you plan for the ideal situation where everything runs seamlessly? The display and your products all arrive on time, damage-free. Your literature and giveaways are there as planned, Your team makes the trip from all parts of the world with no travel hassles. If only it was that easy!

As we all know, life has its wonderful way of throwing curve balls at us to test our endurance, but most importantly to test how well we’ve planned the event.
What is your Plan B if something untoward happens unexpectedly? Do you have a Plan B and even a Plan C?

Here are seven steps for preparing for the unforeseen:

1. Brainstorm with your team what possible scenarios could occur.
2. Ask other employees for their thoughts on unpredictable situations.
3. List all possible circumstances.
4. Map out each one of the unpredictable situations outlining what and who is needed.
5. Generate a crisis planning checklist.
6. Hold a crisis meeting with everyone who needs to be involved.
7. Create a written plan of action and distribute it to all necessary team members

Follow these seven steps, and then pray very hard that you don’t need to use anything you’ve planned for.

Having a contingency plan in place will give you peace of mind so that you’ll sleep better knowing that everything is under control, whatever happens!

This the fourth and final part of our Trends for 2010 tips. Today, I’m focusing on five rules to help you leverage technology to add to your trade show success.

1. Online is not an add-on.

The virtual component must be integral to every step of your trade-show planning.  Select the best online communities to reach your customers. And maintain your brand voice and image in every message.

2. Accessibility is key.

Make sure your trade-show web page is optimized for all the browsers, including those on smart phones. The design that looked great on Internet Explorer may be unreadable on a Droid.

3. Make your message move and speak.

Use web video, still images, and podcasting as well as text. Multimedia approaches engage more of the user’s attention. Live feeds from your booth can extend your trade show message to customers around the world, and YouTube videos can make it accessible months or years after the event is over.

4. Update often.

Keep your customers coming back to check for more. Good content may be news and links, helpful tips, community-building, or just the sense of a warm, engaging person as the face of the company.

5. Listen as well as talk.

Twitter, Facebook, and blogs offer almost instantaneous feedback on what’s working and what’s not. If a member of your booth staff was rude to a customer, you can be sure the news will be all over Twitter in five minutes. Monitor the Internet and the Twitterverse with automatic searches, and respond instantly to any problems.

I was inspired to write this blog today after reading a chapter in Carmine Gallo’s book “Fire Them Up!.” In it he talks about three types of communicators, “the blah, the mediocre and the inspirational.”

The first thing that popped into my mind was how this was the exact way to describe exhibitors – blah, mediocre and inspirational. Of these three types of tradeshow exhibitors, only one of should represent your company on the tradeshow floor.

You’ve all seen the “blah” exhibitors who have zero drive and enthusiasm or energy to be in the booth.  They’re on their computer, or cell phone most of the day. They’re convinced that exhibiting is a total waste of their time, and they just want to go and do their “real job” – whatever that is.

The “mediocre” exhibitor is one step better than the “blah” exhibitor. They take care of being in the booth, but aren’t really clear about what to do, and they just wing it in robotic fashion.

Finally, there’s the “inspirational” exhibitor who is energizing, engaging and electric!

What makes the difference between the three types? In a nutshell, the inspirational exhibitor wants to be at the show, knows what he or she wants to accomplish, and enjoys interacting with visitors. This person is also proud to be a company ambassador at the show, and finds real meaning (and fun) in the role they play.

If your have blah or mediocre people representing you, consider finding substitutes – people should consider it a privilege to be a company representative at the show. Plus, make sure that you provide some tradeshow training, so they are well-prepared with the essential exhibiting skills before they step foot in your booth.

Remember, it’s your people who can make or break relationships on the show floor, so prepare them well!

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What’s ahead for trade shows and other marketing efforts in 2010?

Last week, I referred you to the StrongMail “2010 Marketing Trends” survey which polled more than 1,000 business leaders across a wide range of industries about their marketing plans for the upcoming year. This week I’ll continue reviewing the trends.

Trend: Everybody is jumping on the social media bandwagon. A whopping 59% of surveyed companies will be increasing their social-media budgets. How many will be spending less? A mere 3%.

Social media has become the new essential tool for marketing.

3 things this means to you:

1.  Choose the right social networks. Twitter covers almost every audience. Facebook and Myspace pages work best for products with consumer appeal. LinkedIn groups are most appropriate for BtoB marketing.

2. Stay on message. The speed and flexibility of social media can be a huge advantage, but it can also be a pitfall. Set clear guidelines for all communications, and review the messages and results regularly.

3. Use social media to support trade show exhibits. Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn can allow you to increase the effectiveness of your trade show appearances. You’ll reap great benefits when you integrate social media into your overall marketing strategy.