4 Steps To Getting The Booth Traffic You Deserve This Trade Show Season

As some of us pack up and get ready to exhibit at the ACE show in Chicago next week, I’m seeing quite a bit of promotion popping up everywhere from print to web to social media.  My LinkedIn feed is full of notices about who will be exhibiting at ACE this year and urging all of us to visit their booths.  These notices may look as familiar to you as they are to me because we see them ALL THE TIME depending on what trade shows are on the upcoming calendar.  Sadly, for the vendor, most of these messages look exactly the same and are ineffective. 

“Come Visit us at The Super Show booth #123” or “Come Visit us at The Super Show booth #123 to see our new products.” 

Look Familiar?  Of course it does as this seems to be the default idea of “trade show promotion via social media.”  If you are guilty of this (most all of us are), let me ask you a simple question.  Why would a water professional take time out of their limited availability on the show floor and care enough to give your company a part of that free time?  The key part of that question is the word “care.”  You need to give them a reason to CARE and to WANT to schedule some time to visit your booth.  Simply telling people you are going to be there and that they should “visit you” isn’t even close to being enough to peak their interest. 

So what can you do differently to help drive traffic to your booth?  Here are some suggestions:

1. Contests

What better incentive to take time out of their busy day than a chance to win something.  Their time in exchange for a chance to receive something for free.  The key here is that the “something” MUST be valuable and applicable.  Simple knick knack giveaways (other than the KROHNE ducks) aren’t enough to “buy” time with any professional that has purchasing authority.  Prove that you have put thought into what your target audience needs or would expect in exchange for their time.  For example, Schneider Electric had TREMENDOUS success for years at both ACE and WEFTEC around their contest that gave away free energy audits.

2. Charity Giving

People in general, especially driven professionals, consistently feel a need to contribute to something greater than what is in front of them every day.  If you challenge your target audience to help you contribute to a larger societal cause, you will be pleasantly surprised how many answer the call of duty.  Perhaps your charity of choice is Water for People, or Water.org, or lifewater.org. Market the fact that you will be donating a $1, $2 or $100 for every attendee who visits your booth and learns about your new product.  It’s the most feel good option you can entertain.

3. Mini Live Knowledge Sharing

We see it every year when walking past a booth with a lonely product manager giving a presentation meant for twenty to three or four attendees.  Remember that you must pay for your audience’s time with information that is valuable to THEM, not you.  If you keep these presentations topical on issues THEY find interesting (Hint: It’s not the diameter of your flow meter) you’ll have better success.

4. Content Sharing

Content and information in exchange for time.  Again, give them what they want and they will come.  Offering a free copy of your latest white paper in exchange for a booth visit may be just enough to get, not just a large number of professionals to your booth, but a large amount of the RIGHT ones.

Now go get the traffic and do so by making an impact

Image credit: "TC_booth2013," Virginia State Parks © 2013, used under an Attribution 2.0 Generic license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/