people

It's about 8 weeks before the largest trade show in your industry and you and your team are sitting around the conference table brainstorming about ways to get people to your booth. If you did it the traditional way, you would be sending out postcards, direct mail and/or emails saying:

"Stop by Booth #125 to learn all about our awesome product or service!" 

This is annoying to the attendee who ends up throwing out or deleting all of such correspondence. Why? Because you are sounding like an also-ran. Homogeneous and…quite frankly…boring. 

So, what would excite potential visitors to your booth? Here are 7 ways to get them there and hopefully convert them to customers:

  1. Hire a Celebrity. This doesn't need to be a TV star, but it does need to be a name your attendees will know right away. Someone even YOU would want to meet and talk to.  
     
  2. Hold Seminars. If you have enough space in your booth, hold a seminar for 10 to 12 people about a topic of interest to them that may or may not be related to your product or service. Rent large Plasma TVs that are connected to the PowerPoint presentation equipment, so attendees walking by can stop, see what is going on, and sign up for the next session. 
     
  3. Encourage Appointment Setting. Rent iPads for your booth staff and when more visitors are at the booth than sales persons to talk with them, make an appointment with the attendee to stop back at a designated time. Get their email to send a reminder 5 minutes before the appointment. 
     
  4. Host a Cooking Demonstration. Hiring a celebrity chef or bringing along the chef from your property (if you are a hotel, restaurant, or caterer) is a great way to get people to your booth. Everyone is always interested in learning tips from a chef. 
     
  5. Be Highly Visual. Positioning computer kiosks running videos about your product, customer testimonials and executive interviews is very powerful and can keep attendees interested while they are waiting to speak with someone. Consider using video wall rental to really make a visual statement!
     
  6. Hold a Contest. You really need to know what your attendees are interested in winning in order for them to sign up at your booth. Here are a few things that might intrigue them: 
  • 4 tickets to a local event (such as a baseball game, concert, or play). This will be especially valuable if the tickets are hard to come by;
  • Hard-cover book from a thought leader in the industry or New York Times Best Seller (perhaps offer several of these);
  • One-year membership to the association the attendees are affiliated with or
  • Picking up the registration cost for the winner at next year's show.
  1. Provide Valuable Giveaways. Planning Guides are very useful because attendees can use them in their everyday life. Providing jump drives with tips, techniques and/or checklists can also be a great incentive to get visitors to your booth. 

AV Event Solutions, a California event equipment supplier, will work with you on your next trade show set up! They provide Plasma TVs, iPads, kiosks and much, much more! Give them a call at 888.249.4903 for more information.