Something to Show For

If you think e-commerce is the only way to go, it may surprise you to know that spending on trade show exhibits will increase 7.6 percent per year over the next three years, according to Veronis, Suhler & Associates. Cahners Research reports 18 percent of business marketing budgets was spent on trade shows last year – double the amount spent on Internet marketing.

In this wired world, every selling task must be done faster, cheaper and more effectively. And when face-to-face contacts with customers and prospects are necessary, trade shows save time and money. In fact, the integration of electronic tools with well-conducted personal contacts at a trade show blends speed, depth and face time at a very affordable cost.

However, successful shows require a clear strategy and tactical steps before the exhibits are even put up. “Why are you going?” asks trade show trainer Marc Goldberg of Marketech Inc. in Westboro, MA. “Is it to increase market penetration? To reposition yourself in the market? Or to reinforce your current position in the market?”

The old reason – trade shows generate leads – simply isn’t enough any more. You should begin to generate leads well before the show. Why? In some cases, you can close sales at a show. In other cases, leads can become well-qualified prospects hot to buy. In other words, work the show well before the show begins, and then follow up afterward. The results are well worth the effort.

Before the Show

First, call show organizers to find out whether they have a list of preregistered attendees available before the show starts. The list should include names, titles, companies and addresses in a comma-delimited computer file. Better yet, ask about preshow lists when you are negotiating your attendance and exhibition fees.

You can use the list for a straightforward preshow mailing. “The letter announces that you will be at the show, tells what your services are and invites them to come to your booth,” explains John DeMartino of Acxiom/Access Communication Systems in Melville, NY. “The letter is benefit oriented and says you’d like to discuss your product with them at the show. If you are offering a premium, such as a raffle, it is a good way to tell them about it.”

DeMartino recommends limiting the preshow letter to one page, with inserts of any case studies illustrating how you helped similar firms in the past. “Case studies show the benefits from a customer perspective,” he says. Using inserts also keeps the main letter short and simple.

If your letter and preshow list are ready well beforehand, you should try to get the mailing in the hands of show attendees two to three weeks before the show starts. “You don’t want to send it out too close to the show, because some people are traveling or have a very congested mailbox,” DeMartino warns. “On the other hand, you don’t want to send it so early that they forget about it.”

Preshow lists do not include every attendee, such as the last-minute bookers. But mailing to any reasonably thorough list maximizes the value of the tough work you put in at the show. “When people come by your booth with that letter in their hand, they are prequalified,” DeMartino emphasizes. “They are looking for your stuff.”

And mailing is just a start. “Remember, you have a new tool now – the Internet,” says Marketech’s Goldberg. If your preregistration list includes email addresses (it should), “you can email them and start a sales dialogue with your prospects even before the show begins.”

Email contacts can be patterned after the preshow letter: short and simple. But email allows fast two-way contact, so you may learn about prospects while you are introducing your company.

Goldberg argues you can go even further. “One of my clients sends out a mailer with his company disc before the show. That becomes the initial part of the dialogue. The prospects load the disc on their PC and go through three stages of qualifying questions before the show even starts. They are participating before they get there.”

It sounds obvious, doesn’t it? Still, according to Goldberg only 20 percent of exhibitors do even a preshow mailing of letters to attendees. Don’t you just love having lazy competitors?

Show Speed

Goldberg’s company, Marketech, trains reps to work at trade shows. He can do it in a couple of hours at the client’s headquarters, interactively over the Web or in a brief session at the show site.

However they are done, Goldberg calls these sessions “transitioning” rather than training. Experienced B-to-B reps know how to sell their products, but they normally have 30 to 45 minutes to make a sales call. On a show floor the same reps will have only three to five minutes to do most of what they do in a half-hour sales call.

How do you do it that fast? Sales scripts are not the answer. “A canned pitch is real boring,” Goldberg believes. Besides, veterans should not need a script. “Management should determine what message the reps will deliver, and the reps can put it in their own words,” he says.

Goldberg packs down the message – not into a can, but into four simple steps:

1. Reach out. Use techniques to get a dialogue going with booth visitors in three to five seconds.

2. Relate to them. Establish rapport and get a conversation going without just launching into a description of what you have in the exhibit.

3. React and respond. Make the transition to communicating your main sales message, getting the visitor’s reactions and responding to them.

4. Record. Capitalize on the dialogue by capturing information and using it as a bridge to future sales.

Goldberg’s four steps cover most of what an in-person call does, short of the close. The key difference is speed. “Most sales veterans work one or two shows a year, while they are selling the other 197 days per year,” he says. “They know how to sell. But you have to get pumped up and very focused to do it for six to 10 people an hour at a show. You are usually not trying to close, but you should be trying to get very near to closing.”

Suppose you need more than five minutes to do it all? For new or complex products or new customers, you may. Up to 40 percent of trade show visitors are entirely new to the industry, Goldberg estimates.

Before arriving at the show you should have already booked your own special site – an off-floor hospitality suite or demonstration room. Companies use these special venues to conduct more serious dialogues with major customers or hot prospects. “The best companies are using hospitality events more effectively than just as parties. They are tying them to their show themes and objectives,” Goldberg says. “Some companies host meetings for special groups of customers or users.”

Whatever lead information you collect, write it down. “You should use the electronic attendee discs the conference organizers provide,” Goldberg advises. “But it will contain mostly demographic data. You need to do your own lead cards, with customized information about who they really are plus subjective data and their needs for your product.”

Follow-up

About three days after a show ends, everyone who attended gets together with management and headquarters staff to plan the follow-up.

One purpose of show contacts is to get to know each prospect as well as possible. This kind of information should be saved and used in individual prospect follow-ups.

Some leads are so good they should be pounced on immediately and personally. For others, make sure you remind them about your contact, even if you cannot call right away.

Another purpose of the show is to get to know industry developments from the buyer’s point of view. This industry-wide information should be incorporated in your postshow mailer or other follow-up tools. “Try to understand the state of the industry from your conversations with all the attendees, including your competitors,” Acxiom’s DeMartino explains. “Then figure out how your product helps them solve their latest challenges. Maybe there are mergers and consolidations rumbling through the buyers’ industry. How does your product fit in with that? Emphasize how your product or service can be adapted, no matter who owns the company.”

The follow-up letter should be kept to one page, with important points compressed into short bullets. There should be room at the bottom for a tear-off form that prospects can easily return. In the case of a simple sale, the tear-off may be an order form completing the sale. For complex business, prospects check off boxes requesting such specific information as product brochures. In all cases, you should have a space where the addressees can give you an alternate contact in the company if they are not the right decision makers.

As before, remember alternate communication tools. Depending on industry and information available, the follow-up can be via email, fax or company disc. The same rules apply – keep it brief and give prospects an easy way of responding.

Does it work? DeMartino says preshow and postshow mailings often generate more and better leads than the show itself: “You can spend $10,000 to $15,000 to go to the show, and for $2,000 more you can improve results by at least 50 percent.”