Why startups participate in exhibitions: 5 reasons from the practice of three days
Recently published a post about competitions for startups . Today we want to touch on the topic of exhibitions, namely the benefit of participating in them. And how do you feel about the exhibition? Took part? Is there a positive / negative experience? How useful is young business to participate in them? Is it possible to find clients at such events?
There is a popular belief that exhibitions for startups do not bring much effect, especially if they are of an image character for a city or country. But, as practice shows, it is far from always true.
Let us try to refute this opinion and take as an example a very recent event. 12 residents of the Ingria Business Incubator exhibited their projects and developments at the stand of the St. Petersburg International Innovation Forum.
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The event is definitely an image for the city. High leaders come, the governor visits the forum, projects of various St. Petersburg clusters are presented at the exhibition, and the event itself is being held in partnership with Tatarstan. Are there any practical benefits from it? Judging by the communication with the residents exposed, there is. Some of their statements we give below.
1. "We realized that we are doing the right thing." Hundreds of visitors every day, a constant line-up for the development of the company, practically a funky business. Rush demand for your development - is this not a reason to realize that you are on the right track.
2. "Preparation for the exhibition mobilized us, and we improved our product in two weeks, as we would not have done in a couple of months." Another good reason is that when you realize that hundreds, even thousands of visitors, will see your development, you are ready to do everything so that it is presentable and workable.
3. "We found customers in neighboring stands." If you write dozens of letters every day, make as many calls, try to flip through the yellow pages, or search for your potential clients on specialized sites, then at the exhibition you sometimes just have to go to the stand opposite.
4. "With our product, so many Russian audiences have not yet met." Real audience education. The company has 90% of its customers located abroad; in Russia, very few people have experienced it. And here is an excellent reason to expand not only the geography of our potential consumers, but also simply to show our compatriots that there is such a service / product / development in our country.
5. "At this exhibition I paid for the costs of promoting my product over the past three years." It happens and this - daily efforts, the desire to get to the desired result, but in the end you come to a particular exhibition, you stand with the layout of your own products, and the one who you needed all this time approaches you.
The list of reasons, of course, is not complete. In different situations at different exhibitions, there may be dozens, and maybe hundreds, of new stories from participants about the benefits (or disadvantages) they received from standing for several days at the stand. And each of the opinions will be in its own way relevant for young startups. Share your experience!
There is a popular belief that exhibitions for startups do not bring much effect, especially if they are of an image character for a city or country. But, as practice shows, it is far from always true.
Let us try to refute this opinion and take as an example a very recent event. 12 residents of the Ingria Business Incubator exhibited their projects and developments at the stand of the St. Petersburg International Innovation Forum.
')
The event is definitely an image for the city. High leaders come, the governor visits the forum, projects of various St. Petersburg clusters are presented at the exhibition, and the event itself is being held in partnership with Tatarstan. Are there any practical benefits from it? Judging by the communication with the residents exposed, there is. Some of their statements we give below.
1. "We realized that we are doing the right thing." Hundreds of visitors every day, a constant line-up for the development of the company, practically a funky business. Rush demand for your development - is this not a reason to realize that you are on the right track.
2. "Preparation for the exhibition mobilized us, and we improved our product in two weeks, as we would not have done in a couple of months." Another good reason is that when you realize that hundreds, even thousands of visitors, will see your development, you are ready to do everything so that it is presentable and workable.
3. "We found customers in neighboring stands." If you write dozens of letters every day, make as many calls, try to flip through the yellow pages, or search for your potential clients on specialized sites, then at the exhibition you sometimes just have to go to the stand opposite.
4. "With our product, so many Russian audiences have not yet met." Real audience education. The company has 90% of its customers located abroad; in Russia, very few people have experienced it. And here is an excellent reason to expand not only the geography of our potential consumers, but also simply to show our compatriots that there is such a service / product / development in our country.
5. "At this exhibition I paid for the costs of promoting my product over the past three years." It happens and this - daily efforts, the desire to get to the desired result, but in the end you come to a particular exhibition, you stand with the layout of your own products, and the one who you needed all this time approaches you.
The list of reasons, of course, is not complete. In different situations at different exhibitions, there may be dozens, and maybe hundreds, of new stories from participants about the benefits (or disadvantages) they received from standing for several days at the stand. And each of the opinions will be in its own way relevant for young startups. Share your experience!
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/130897/
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