We participate in the exhibition. Part 1: preparation
The network has a huge number of publications reporting from exhibitions - CES , NAB , CeBIT and others. But information on how to become a participant, not a visitor to the exhibition, is not enough. When about a year ago we had the idea of ​​participating at the CSTB exhibition, we had to collect information bit by bit. Obvious things like “your booth should be informative” was full, really useful information is not enough. Now, completing preparations for the third exhibition, I want to share the experience of participation from the practical side with those who are thinking about participating for the first time.
I foresee the question: why should IT companies, which in most cases do not create a product that “can be touched”, make a stand at exhibitions? Traditional answers are well known: among the visitors to the exhibition are many potential customers, the format of the exhibitions is conducive to the creation of business connections, the formation of the image. However, I would not want to go into this question. We will assume that the decision to “exhibit” has been made, the exhibition itself has also been chosen.
Very briefly talk about how the exhibition looks. The large pavilion (thousands of square meters) is divided into many small areas, each of them has a stand. The stand can occupy 5 sq.m. and have two walls-partitions and a chair, and may be something like a small two-story cottage :) People who tell and / or show something to visitors work at the stand. Visitors freely (randomly or on a planned route) move from the stand to the stand, collect promotional materials (often), exchange business cards (less often) and communicate with people on the stand (even less often).
NAB Show, photo by dcinemak.com
')
So, what should be done so that your preparation for participation in the exhibition is successful.
Participation, especially for the first time, is rather complicated, there are a lot of questions (from the number of 220V sockets on the stand before ordering transfer from the airport to the hotel), and the schedule is very tight (the organizers will not wait for you). There must be a person who is responsible for your preparation for the exhibition, controls the situation in general and has the authority to customize the rest of the team. I do not recommend placing these duties on the head of the project that will be presented - he will have so many worries to fine-tune the project to the necessary condition. Therefore, the technical side of the organization of participation is better to entrust to another employee.
The tasks of the person in charge will include: preparing documents for participation, communicating with the organizers, booking hotels and buying tickets (if the exhibition is not in your city), drawing up lists of necessary things for participation, constant coordination of the team’s work and much more.
The person responsible for the organization should as soon as possible find out the most important issues: free places at the exhibition, cost of participation and other services, deadlines for sending an application for participation, getting a contract of participation, finding out the possibilities of operational printing at the exhibition site, available hotels, etc.
Unfortunately, your preparation may end at this stage: due to the lack of empty seats in the exhibition pavilion (at large exhibitions a few months before the start everything has already been purchased) or because of the cost of participation (for example, at IBC the minimum stand will cost 10 thousand euros).
Study the contract with the organizers in the most attentive way, especially the requirements and rules of conduct for exhibitors. The contract will specify restrictions (for example, the prohibition to leave an empty stand during working hours, leave the exhibition before closing, distribute promotional materials without the consent of the organizers, etc.) and, most importantly, penalties for violations.
Be sure to subscribe to the newsletter of the exhibition. This should be done not only by the person responsible for the training, but also by all active participants in the process.
You will need to make a text description of what you will submit. The exhibition organizers will require:
Writing texts is not the task of the person responsible for the organization, but a task for marketers, product managers, etc. Most likely, your product already has a description, but do not rush to use it "as is". If the product is highly specialized, and the exhibition covers a wide area of ​​the industry (which usually happens), make an adaptation of the description for the masses.
We turn to the central element of our participation - the stand. If you are participating in an exhibition for the first time, I would recommend limiting yourself to a minimum-sized stand and the simplest construction (2 or 3 walls-partitions). If we only have software, then we do not need to organize showcases or a show room.
An example of a simple stand, image NAB show
If possible, choose a booth location closer to the main aisles, the entrance to the pavilion, the entrance to the conference rooms, or at least closer to the stands of large companies (the organizers send the layout where participants are usually signed). Strategically right, also located near the coffee corner, if there is one. Traffic is always traffic.
By choosing a booth, find out from the organizers exactly what is necessary for you at this booth:
If something from the list is missing, then I recommend paying and ordering it (the prices may shock you). In addition to the above, you can usually additionally order: chairs / tables, a surge protector, a bookcase holder, a cooler, a coffee machine, shelves, a clothes hanger, etc. - it's all up to you. Of course, you can bring your equipment to the stand, coordinating with the organizers of the importation (in other matters, it can turn out even more expensive).
Relying on free Internet via wifi or mobile Internet in the pavilion is not worth it - a large crowd of people can cause it to overload and failure at the most inopportune moment. If you need an online product to demonstrate the product, then order it separately.
It is possible and necessary to order (from the organizers) a large-format print on the walls of the stand, on the front desk front panel - this is inexpensive and practical. A short, well-readable text or several “keywords” will help you attract potential customers. None of the visitors will bypass all the stands and ask: “what do you do?” (Although it seems that some exhibitors hope so).
Ask the organizers for a three-dimensional image of how your stand will look, and experiment with the design. Check out how the stand design will look like, if there will be several people standing on it, will they close something important by themselves? Will the product name be visible from afar?
Since the stand is the simplest, the organizers will take care of the construction. Before the exhibition starts, your stand will be ready for work by your arrival.
Handouts are all that you distribute to visitors at your stand. Distribute for two reasons:
Usually, “razdatku” is divided into informational (usually paper, the era of CD / DVD has departed) and promo (all sorts of useful and useless branded souvenirs). I will speak only about the information, because Promos are obviously optional and their effectiveness is ambiguous.
You need to have at least two types of handouts: business cards and flyers / leaflets / booklets.
As a business card, they use either regular business cards (employee name, personal email and telephone), or corporate business cards, which indicate only the company name, general mail and telephone number.
In addition to business cards, there should be at least a small leaflet (A5, â…“ A4, etc.) in which you can write something about yourself. The usual situation is when a pile of materials dragged from an exhibition in a relaxed atmosphere is studied in your spare time. One business card will make it very difficult to remember who you are, what you do and why this business card was dragged from the exhibition. You should not be zealous with the creation of multi-page folios: it will be hard for visitors to wear and your work will be thrown out.
Unfortunately, I have no data on the ratio of the number of visitors who received a razdatku to the number of those who passed by the stand, or the ratio of those who visited the exhibition to those who visited our stand. But this number is not very large. For a small stand of a little-known (for the time being) company, it is necessary to focus on about 50 sets of hand-outs on 1 exhibition day for a large exhibition (unless some additional events were organized to attract visitors). Find out in advance whether there is a possibility of rapid printing at the exhibition. Well, to bring more and not to distribute - this is better than to bring less and feel a shortage.
A stendist (person working on a stand) is the “face of the company” at the exhibition. Therefore, it is important that he not only exchanges contacts with the visitor, but also makes a generally good impression. In general, it should be a person who:
Stand, photo efem.com.ua
Two stand-assistants are the very minimum, since there is an opportunity to substitute each other. For them, a text with a story about the company and the like must be prepared in advance, preferably in two versions - brief and more detailed. Knowing the technical details of your product is optional. Our practice has shown that most visitors are not very interested, it is more important to get a presentation or a demo, calculate the cost on the spot (if it is not fixed), possible cooperation options and similar “commercial” questions.
In addition to the text, you can prepare a presentation of the product and show it on the TV screen (in advance, try to rent it) or a tablet (in this case, take care of the chargers).
There is a rather extensive offer of professional stand assistants on the market, but we did not use them - we went to work for a stand ourselves and did not regret it.
The exhibition organizers offer many additional paid services: advertising, participation in the conference in the role of speaker, sponsoring various events during the exhibition, hotel reservations, etc. Most likely, in the mailing list from the organizers you will be overwhelmed with similar offers. Read carefully, tk. There are often offers to promote you for free: for example, a 15-minute presentation of a new product in front of a large audience or an interview for a magazine. But such proposals are always limited, and you need to have time to fit into them - there are many people who want it.
Also, participants are often given invitations to various events - from some sponsored seminars (boredom) to city tours and parties with free alcohol :) Try not to miss.
Do not forget to invite your potential customers and partners to visit your booth. A short letter indicating what you will be submitting (do not forget to indicate the stand number) is a well-established practice in such situations. The length of the mailing list itself depends only on your attitude towards spam.
So, the basic preparation for the exhibition ends here. Additions and comments are welcome, and the continuation of the participation in the exhibition itself is planned in the next part of the article.
I foresee the question: why should IT companies, which in most cases do not create a product that “can be touched”, make a stand at exhibitions? Traditional answers are well known: among the visitors to the exhibition are many potential customers, the format of the exhibitions is conducive to the creation of business connections, the formation of the image. However, I would not want to go into this question. We will assume that the decision to “exhibit” has been made, the exhibition itself has also been chosen.
Very briefly talk about how the exhibition looks. The large pavilion (thousands of square meters) is divided into many small areas, each of them has a stand. The stand can occupy 5 sq.m. and have two walls-partitions and a chair, and may be something like a small two-story cottage :) People who tell and / or show something to visitors work at the stand. Visitors freely (randomly or on a planned route) move from the stand to the stand, collect promotional materials (often), exchange business cards (less often) and communicate with people on the stand (even less often).
NAB Show, photo by dcinemak.com
')
So, what should be done so that your preparation for participation in the exhibition is successful.
Responsible for the preparation and participation
Participation, especially for the first time, is rather complicated, there are a lot of questions (from the number of 220V sockets on the stand before ordering transfer from the airport to the hotel), and the schedule is very tight (the organizers will not wait for you). There must be a person who is responsible for your preparation for the exhibition, controls the situation in general and has the authority to customize the rest of the team. I do not recommend placing these duties on the head of the project that will be presented - he will have so many worries to fine-tune the project to the necessary condition. Therefore, the technical side of the organization of participation is better to entrust to another employee.
The tasks of the person in charge will include: preparing documents for participation, communicating with the organizers, booking hotels and buying tickets (if the exhibition is not in your city), drawing up lists of necessary things for participation, constant coordination of the team’s work and much more.
Contact the organizers
The person responsible for the organization should as soon as possible find out the most important issues: free places at the exhibition, cost of participation and other services, deadlines for sending an application for participation, getting a contract of participation, finding out the possibilities of operational printing at the exhibition site, available hotels, etc.
Unfortunately, your preparation may end at this stage: due to the lack of empty seats in the exhibition pavilion (at large exhibitions a few months before the start everything has already been purchased) or because of the cost of participation (for example, at IBC the minimum stand will cost 10 thousand euros).
Study the contract with the organizers in the most attentive way, especially the requirements and rules of conduct for exhibitors. The contract will specify restrictions (for example, the prohibition to leave an empty stand during working hours, leave the exhibition before closing, distribute promotional materials without the consent of the organizers, etc.) and, most importantly, penalties for violations.
Be sure to subscribe to the newsletter of the exhibition. This should be done not only by the person responsible for the training, but also by all active participants in the process.
Description of the company or product
You will need to make a text description of what you will submit. The exhibition organizers will require:
- The name of the company or product (usually a marketing name is admissible, it does not have to be officially registered), which will be displayed above the stand, is written in the catalog of participants, the map-scheme of the pavilion and in other materials of the exhibition.
- A short text about you (or even several texts, from 30 to 300 words) that will be placed in directories, descriptions of participants, etc.
Writing texts is not the task of the person responsible for the organization, but a task for marketers, product managers, etc. Most likely, your product already has a description, but do not rush to use it "as is". If the product is highly specialized, and the exhibition covers a wide area of ​​the industry (which usually happens), make an adaptation of the description for the masses.
Stand
We turn to the central element of our participation - the stand. If you are participating in an exhibition for the first time, I would recommend limiting yourself to a minimum-sized stand and the simplest construction (2 or 3 walls-partitions). If we only have software, then we do not need to organize showcases or a show room.
An example of a simple stand, image NAB show
If possible, choose a booth location closer to the main aisles, the entrance to the pavilion, the entrance to the conference rooms, or at least closer to the stands of large companies (the organizers send the layout where participants are usually signed). Strategically right, also located near the coffee corner, if there is one. Traffic is always traffic.
By choosing a booth, find out from the organizers exactly what is necessary for you at this booth:
- furniture (chairs, table, front desk) and its quantity;
- lighting (spot lights);
- electrical outlets and their number;
- the Internet?
- trash can?
- daily cleaning?
If something from the list is missing, then I recommend paying and ordering it (the prices may shock you). In addition to the above, you can usually additionally order: chairs / tables, a surge protector, a bookcase holder, a cooler, a coffee machine, shelves, a clothes hanger, etc. - it's all up to you. Of course, you can bring your equipment to the stand, coordinating with the organizers of the importation (in other matters, it can turn out even more expensive).
Relying on free Internet via wifi or mobile Internet in the pavilion is not worth it - a large crowd of people can cause it to overload and failure at the most inopportune moment. If you need an online product to demonstrate the product, then order it separately.
Stand decoration
It is possible and necessary to order (from the organizers) a large-format print on the walls of the stand, on the front desk front panel - this is inexpensive and practical. A short, well-readable text or several “keywords” will help you attract potential customers. None of the visitors will bypass all the stands and ask: “what do you do?” (Although it seems that some exhibitors hope so).
Ask the organizers for a three-dimensional image of how your stand will look, and experiment with the design. Check out how the stand design will look like, if there will be several people standing on it, will they close something important by themselves? Will the product name be visible from afar?
Stand Construction
Since the stand is the simplest, the organizers will take care of the construction. Before the exhibition starts, your stand will be ready for work by your arrival.
Handouts
Handouts are all that you distribute to visitors at your stand. Distribute for two reasons:
- to be remembered after the exhibition;
- to remember not only your name, but what you are doing and how you can be useful.
Usually, “razdatku” is divided into informational (usually paper, the era of CD / DVD has departed) and promo (all sorts of useful and useless branded souvenirs). I will speak only about the information, because Promos are obviously optional and their effectiveness is ambiguous.
You need to have at least two types of handouts: business cards and flyers / leaflets / booklets.
As a business card, they use either regular business cards (employee name, personal email and telephone), or corporate business cards, which indicate only the company name, general mail and telephone number.
In addition to business cards, there should be at least a small leaflet (A5, â…“ A4, etc.) in which you can write something about yourself. The usual situation is when a pile of materials dragged from an exhibition in a relaxed atmosphere is studied in your spare time. One business card will make it very difficult to remember who you are, what you do and why this business card was dragged from the exhibition. You should not be zealous with the creation of multi-page folios: it will be hard for visitors to wear and your work will be thrown out.
How many print handouts
Unfortunately, I have no data on the ratio of the number of visitors who received a razdatku to the number of those who passed by the stand, or the ratio of those who visited the exhibition to those who visited our stand. But this number is not very large. For a small stand of a little-known (for the time being) company, it is necessary to focus on about 50 sets of hand-outs on 1 exhibition day for a large exhibition (unless some additional events were organized to attract visitors). Find out in advance whether there is a possibility of rapid printing at the exhibition. Well, to bring more and not to distribute - this is better than to bring less and feel a shortage.
Preparation of stand assistants
A stendist (person working on a stand) is the “face of the company” at the exhibition. Therefore, it is important that he not only exchanges contacts with the visitor, but also makes a generally good impression. In general, it should be a person who:
- able to communicate freely with strangers (introversion deleted);
- can confidently tell about a company or products (at least according to a previously learned text and without technical details - but with feeling, plainly, placement);
- strong enough health to withstand almost all day on his feet and in conversations.
Stand, photo efem.com.ua
Two stand-assistants are the very minimum, since there is an opportunity to substitute each other. For them, a text with a story about the company and the like must be prepared in advance, preferably in two versions - brief and more detailed. Knowing the technical details of your product is optional. Our practice has shown that most visitors are not very interested, it is more important to get a presentation or a demo, calculate the cost on the spot (if it is not fixed), possible cooperation options and similar “commercial” questions.
In addition to the text, you can prepare a presentation of the product and show it on the TV screen (in advance, try to rent it) or a tablet (in this case, take care of the chargers).
There is a rather extensive offer of professional stand assistants on the market, but we did not use them - we went to work for a stand ourselves and did not regret it.
Free buns
The exhibition organizers offer many additional paid services: advertising, participation in the conference in the role of speaker, sponsoring various events during the exhibition, hotel reservations, etc. Most likely, in the mailing list from the organizers you will be overwhelmed with similar offers. Read carefully, tk. There are often offers to promote you for free: for example, a 15-minute presentation of a new product in front of a large audience or an interview for a magazine. But such proposals are always limited, and you need to have time to fit into them - there are many people who want it.
Also, participants are often given invitations to various events - from some sponsored seminars (boredom) to city tours and parties with free alcohol :) Try not to miss.
Invite potential customers
Do not forget to invite your potential customers and partners to visit your booth. A short letter indicating what you will be submitting (do not forget to indicate the stand number) is a well-established practice in such situations. The length of the mailing list itself depends only on your attitude towards spam.
So, the basic preparation for the exhibition ends here. Additions and comments are welcome, and the continuation of the participation in the exhibition itself is planned in the next part of the article.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/235533/
All Articles