Trade Shows That Don’t Suck

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You're listening to Underestimated, the podcast that helps overwhelmed small business owners turn their size into their unfair advantage so they can grow without burning out. Now, here's your host, Shawna Suckow. Long ago, in a galaxy far, far away, before I was a professional speaker, I was a conference and convention planner.

So I was a meeting planner and I orchestrated a number of trade shows as part of my job. And I learned a lot about what draws traffic, what doesn't, what things you should do, what things you shouldn't do. And now as a speaker, I have been to so many other conferences planned by other people, and been to so many trade shows.

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And I see every time I'm there, who's getting traffic and who's not, and I feel horrible for the small businesses who are there trying to get noticed and they invested a lot of money to be there, and what they're doing just isn't working. So today's conversation is about trade shows that don't suck, because you have limited time, you have limited resources, you have limited money. Let's not waste that on an ineffective trade show participation.

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So let's dig in. I'm going to split this into three categories. I'm going to first start by talking about before the event, like preparing for your trade show.

1:32 - 2:18

And then I'm going to talk about during the event, what I know works best, and some ideas for you to try. And then we'll talk about after the event, because the trade show doesn't begin when the show opens and your potential customers or clients are walking the show floor. It begins beforehand with the plan that you have.

And one of the things, the top mistakes that I see being made by exhibitors of all sizes at trade shows is that they have sucky swag. So they put out candy, which I am never going to object to somebody giving away candy, but candy pens, you know, anything with their logo on it. That is just, you know, a cheap little whatever.

2:19 - 3:08

It's a waste of money. People are probably not going to use your keychain. They're just not.

They're going to take your stress ball, maybe give it to their kid. It's long forgotten before it's done the work that you paid it to do. So think about swag that will make a difference, or better yet, avoid the swag altogether.

But if you want to give something away, then make sure it's unique, and you can talk to anybody in promotional products. You can go to ASI to their website, Advertising Specialty Institute, that is the Association for Promotional Products Companies, and find a human there. Don't just shop online because it's the cheapest.

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This is the important time to consult with a human who understands what your goal is and share your goal with them. Give them an honest budget, and they will find something that is unique that will serve you better than the same swag everybody else has given away. And start your planning with what you want people to remember after their interaction with you, and what you want them to feel, which is never given enough consideration, and what you want them to do after meeting you.

3:43 - 4:20

And I know you want them to remember your company, and you want them to feel like doing business with your company. And after meeting you, you want them to do business with your company. But let's go a little deeper.

So, what do you want them to remember? You definitely want to stand out, but you want to remember, you want to help them remember why you do what you do that is relevant to them. So, what problem do you solve? That's what you want them to remember. So if you have a banner made for this, or you have a whole booth made for this.

4:21 - 4:31

Don't just list your features and benefits. If you've heard my other podcasts, you have to tell microstories. And microstories can be told by a real photo, not a stock photo.

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A real photo of your team, real people, real photos of customers using your product, or if you are in the trades, let's say, real technicians doing the real work, the trades people. And so, help your customer know the why. Why should they hire you? What problem do you solve? That's what we want them to remember.

4:58 - 5:26

And then, as far as feel, we want them to feel any kind of emotion that is associated with what you do, because emotion is 22 times more memorable than features and benefits. If it is told through in the form of a story, 22 times more memorable. So, again, a photo can tell a micro story, or a line can tell a micro story.

5:26 - 5:39

Don't just put your slogan. It's probably too salesy or it's not as effective as it can be. Put a sentence on the banner, put a sentence on your backdrop, whatever that evokes some kind of emotion.

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What do they want at the end of the day? They don't want a hammer. They want what the hammer does. They want to hang their memories if you're selling hammers or they want to build their dream house or whatever.

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It's what they want, not what you sell. And tie it to what they want, and they will feel an emotion that will make you 22 times more memorable than the facts that everybody else is listing on their banners and on their materials that they're handing out at the show, etc. And afterward, what do you want them to do? Now, of course, we want them to do business with us, but what is the next easiest step? Because they're especially the more expensive the thing is that you sell, they're likely not going to go home on Friday and call you up on Monday and, you know, book a $50,000 thing with you, whatever it is you're selling.

6:38 - 7:00

So what is the next easiest step they can do related to your business? And you also, I'll talk about this in your follow up. But so think of those things ahead of time because they will help you design your flyers, design your banners, your booth, whatever. And what if you don't have a booth? Totally okay.

7:00 - 8:03

I loved when potential exhibitors would come to me when I was planning and want to do something totally unique. And some of the unique things that I did or have seen done over the years, I have created a drink sponsorship package where either at the welcome reception or at that person, maybe you just have a table where you're exhibiting and you don't have a whole booth. Having that signature cocktail available only in your booth and they promote it, fantastic.

You also promote it and say, hey, come get your ABC Colada, if your company's ABC. You know, try to work your name in the name of a signature cocktail. Or just ask if you can sponsor the bar, throw money toward the bar and just put a sign up saying this cocktail is sponsored by XYZ company.

8:04 - 8:40

And make sure you have a mocktail version as well because mocktails are becoming very, very important because they're very, very, they're trendy and they're important to a lot of people. So that's an easy one. Sponsor, maybe they have a specialty coffee set up in the morning that is not sponsored by anybody.

Can you sponsor that? But then hang out at the thing that you're sponsoring. Don't just sponsor a coffee station and then let them do the work for you. Be there because that's your FaceTime and they will then associate you with their warm hot latte.

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Okay. I've done a shoeshine station where I organized a shoeshine for a mostly male conference. And these, I think there were three shoeshine people and you can come and get your shoeshined for free.

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If you or your salesperson, whoever's representing you, if you are standing at the shoeshine booth or stand, you have a captive audience of one, two, three people at a time getting their shoes shined for, you know, it's a quick shine because you want to get as many people through as possible. But for at least five minutes where they're really appreciating you and you can talk to them as that happens. I've seen chair massages be sponsored.

I've even seen manicures be sponsored, but breaks aren't typically long enough for enough people to get a manicure. If you have a group of mostly women attending a trade show, have somebody there doing their color analysis. Have somebody there analyzing their outfits and giving them pointers for their body shape.

Huge, huge. I did that for a conference once. Oh my god, huge.

Let's talk about at the conference. Now some of these require planning before the conference, but these are amazing traffic builders for your booth or your table. And it's, you have to think about how you're going to give people a reason to stop at your booth.

10:14 - 10:38

One thing I've seen done very well was a client of mine. I suggested that instead of giving away your pens or whatnot. Why don't you take that dollar or $2 whatever you would have spent on swag and put up a giant sign with with a message that for everybody that drops their business card or lets you scan their badge if it's that kind of show.

10:38 - 10:56

You will make a donation to XYZ charity. Now, the XYZ charity is important to choose you want to align it with the show. If the show has like if that conference has belongs to a foundation of some sort or is aligned with the charity.

10:56 - 11:37

By all means, support the thing that their association endorses, or if you are in your local community for a trade show, support a local nonprofit, hugely more impactful than a giant nonprofit, nothing against like Susan G. Komen Foundation and things like that that do great work, but you're a small business. I would support somebody local that really means something to this community that you're serving. And if you're in somebody else's community, same thing, find out what's important to that community and make the donation to them.

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Perhaps the number one suggestion I can give you because it's hugely effective but it is also near and dear to my heart is when there is a puppy petting puppy cuddling station. You can do this in your booth, you have to get permission, unless it's service animals, that's the way around if they say we can't give you permission, then have service animals in your booth. And they cannot say no to service animals who are legit service animals don't just throw a jacket on your poodle.

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And so, but puppy meet and greets huge, and if you partner with let's say a local animal shelter, and those pets are adoptable, even more fabulous. But if you make that donation then to that animal shelter you've tied into something local you've tied into something that is directly related to what those people came to your booth to engage with, and you're doing all the right things. Full circle.

Couple other things you can do. Have an Ask Me Anything expert in your booth. It can be one of your co workers it can be somebody from the conference, who you know is going and they're an expert in x y or z. Ask them if they would spend an hour in your booth, and you can promote that come by and ask, say you're at a manufacturing conference and this person knows everything there is to know about, let's say, AI, working with that particular manufacturing type.

13:21 - 14:21

I'm just pulling stuff out of the air at this point, but get somebody to stand in your booth and be an Ask Me Anything expert. Let's say that you're at a trade show for a conference that is maybe tech adjacent have a tech expert in your booth, where people could come up and ask questions. So any type of Ask Me Anything.

And one that I love as a speaker is when somebody sponsors me to come and sign books in their booth, because then during my keynote. I can mention that and say, Hey, right after this, I'm going to be at XYZ booth signing books, or if you buy books from me. What I've done before is I can do a logo on the cover, any keynote speaker who has the ability to independently publish can do this with an order of like 100 books or more.

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So it's not just me, but custom logo on the cover, your logo, a custom foreword written by you inside the book. Woo hoo. And then the author of that book, who is a speaker at that conference or an author of a book that's relevant to their industry.

14:38 - 14:58

Huge, but if they're speaking at the conference, even better because they will announce you about where they can be found and likely the conference will put it in the program. That is awesome. And for the cost of books, most likely, because the speaker is already there and they love it if you buy the books.

14:58 - 15:57

Oh, and one note, if you are, if you're doing the thing where you're going to give a donation for everybody that stops by, it would be really cool to have a dry erase board with like a red thermometer drawn on it and you fill it in. And people walking by can see it grow and see that they're actually making a difference that evokes emotion, which is what I was talking about earlier. This next idea comes from an industry colleague of mine, and it is so awesome.

So she's going to a huge event in hospitality, and she doesn't have a booth, but she promoted to her audience that she's going to be walking the show floor in a where's Waldo shirt. And if you come and find her. She's going to give you a discount on something related to her business so cool and fun and picture worthy.

15:59 - 16:50

If that's you and you just say hey I'm walking the show floor in a red and white striped shirt, come and find me, and I'll make a donation or get your picture taken with me and posted online and I will give you x discount, because that is also awesome. They have to post it online and tag you or use a hashtag that's yours. And then you get all of these promotions.

And you might look foolish in a where's Waldo shirt but hey, you know, have fun with it and leverage that. Other things you can do sponsor the local high school choir to come and perform during trade show hours with the planners permission planners don't like surprises. But, you know, throw a couple hundred bucks toward there, and then I will share that with my network.

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And a lot of people will, and then you have those photos for next year and say hey last year we did this we're doing it again so stop by. So things that have legs. That's what I'm talking about at your trade show, so that they're not just taking something forgettable off of your table and walking away and never reaching out never following up never giving you value, whether or not they ultimately become customers, the social media posts are still extremely valuable, whether or not they become customers.

And if you do have a customer that comes up and goes hey I'm a customer, get a video testimonial of them, either with you in the picture hey I'm standing here with Sandy, and she's a customer Sandy, why are you a customer, what's your favorite thing about working with my company or, you know, whatever, but capture those moments and turn all of that into value for you. And now let's talk about the follow up. So we've got the before the during now let's talk about the after afterwards.

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If you have gathered all these business cards. If you're at a business to business trade show not a consumer show if you're at a B2B trade show. By all means, link in with as many people as you can on LinkedIn.

And what I like to do, if it's not an overwhelming number is drop a video of myself talking to them, and hey we met at the show. We talked about this, especially if you can remember what you talked about or noted on their business card before they walk away, or leave them a voice note. And at the very least, I would personalize with text, the invitation to connect, rather than just send a generic connection request because they may not remember you.

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And so I would do that if it's B2B. I would also email and or call them pick two. So you're going to link in with them and then email or call them that same it within like the set the three days after the conference.

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And then, if you still haven't heard from them maybe a week later, try the other thing if you called them try emailing them, etc. But in all of these things, whatever you do to reach out, don't just say thanks for stopping by. Here are our show specials, they're good for two weeks, and here are features and benefits.

19:15 - 20:31

No, remind them of something funny that happened at the event or something interesting. Tell them about a conversation you had, or share pictures if you did the well, where's Waldo or the puppy thing or the color analysis. Share pictures with them.

And I know that pictures and links and all these things can get blocked by people's email systems. And so, once again, if you've heard me talk about video email, I use Dubb, dubb.com. I will share an affiliate link, but you don't need to buy it if you're just starting out with it, try it. They have free plans forever.

And you just need to pay for it. Once you become really comfortable using it and frequently do use it. But video email gets into their inbox because Dubb, make sure the product that you use is white listed.

So, meaning, they're known as good guys they don't use spam and record a video. So, if you can customize it for every single person whose card you collected, or who's bad you scant. I know this takes time, but there is nothing better to email than a video email.

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It's personalized it reminds them of your face it evokes emotion, you can talk about hey those puppies weren't they great and remind them of things that further evoke emotion. That's what makes you memorable. That's what gets your, your email responded to, or your voice note on LinkedIn, or your phone call, rather than saying hey really appreciate you stopping by.

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So, those are my suggestions for you. So, I hope you find something that is valuable to you in all this. And as always, you can find the show notes you can find the transcription.

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If you want to run the transcription through your AI and say, give me the suggestions in bullet points. Do that. I also will add resources to every show page that are relevant to that episode.

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You can find those at thebuyerinsider.com. Look under resources and you'll see my podcast there. This has been another episode of underestimated Thank you so much for tuning in. We'll see you next time.

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Thanks for listening to underestimated hosted by Shawna Suckow to connect with Shawna, go to thebuyerinsider.com.