Participating in exhibition events will give you an opportunity to showcase your products/services to the right target-audience; and build fruitful connections with your peers and prospective customers’.

To ensure a successful exhibition event, you need to professionally plan and prepare for the event and ensure that your participation in the event goes off smoothly.

HOW TO PREPARE?

Your preparation for the exhibition event should ideally begin a year or six months in advance when you’re choosing and registering for the event.

PREPARE A BUDGET

Your first preparation move should start with developing a budget for the event. Having a well-planned budget will help you to understand what kind of exhibition events you can afford to take part in and how much you can afford to spend for the event. Then based on the exhibition events selected, you can set your plans accordingly.

Your budget should take into consideration factors ranging from booking of event space to expenses for travel, logistics, and accommodation, and more. Additionally, you also need to make sure to set aside a portion of your budget for marketing, that is, marketing materials and strategies to be used to garner the attention of the attendees.

SET YOUR GOALS 

Once you know what your budget is, your next move must be to set your goals for the exhibition. 

Setting exhibition goals during the preparation process will help your team to adopt a more focused approach and do what is required to be done.

Your goals should realistically be achievable. Identify what is that you want to achieve from the exhibition. It can be anything from creating brand awareness to generating a specific number of leads or sales during the exhibition, and so on. For instance, if you have identified your goal is to generate leads of say 250 or 500 during the event, then your team can work towards achieving the same with committed focus.

CRAFT A MARKETING STRATEGY

When deciding your exhibition goals, simultaneously you also need to set your marketing strategy to ensure proper alignment with the set goals.

Your marketing strategy should ideally allow you to attract and connect with the target-audience so as to achieve your exhibition goals.  Towards this end, 

• Study and analyze the marketing tactics of businesses that have proven to be successful at earlier exhibition events. What kind of tactics they adopted, how they were a success, and how they benefitted them.
• Identify the products/services you would like to highlight during the exhibition event. 
• Promote your brand with the value it can offer to the people and how it differs from that of the competitors.
• Work with your marketing team to craft effective strategies and then identify the marketing materials like brochures, flyers, handouts, etc, needed to be created. 

Finally, when crafting a marketing strategy, you also need to ensure that it is done keeping in mind your available budget.

DECIDE YOUR EXHIBITION STALL TEAM

Having the appropriate exhibition stall team is also important as they will serve as the face of your business at the event.

Hence, make sure that they align properly with your company goals and objectives, know all about the company and offerings, and have the required experience to present themselves in proper light at the event. 

They can be identified through the goals you set for the exhibition event. Like for instance, if your goal is to generate leads or sales, then you can hire sales professionals as they know how to build a rapport with the event visitors, and are motivated enough to drive leads or sales. Similarly, if your goal revolves around technology, then you need to hire staff members with technical knowledge and skills. 

There are some businesses that hire PR firms to assist them with promotional activities or take the help of staffing agencies to supply experienced professionals for the event. However these can come at a steep price and unless you have the budget to afford their services, it is advisable to not opt for their expertise. 

SELECT THE RIIGHT STALL LOCATION

Selecting the right stall location is vital for preparing for the exhibition event. 

Begin with selecting the ideal location for your stall design. Some good examples of ideal locations include areas with high foot traffic near exhibition venue entrances or near snacks and drinks stall or toilets. 

Once done, study the location thoroughly and what kind of attendees is likely to be near such locations. Then, craft plans on how to differentiate your brand from others and how to grab the attendees’ attention and attract them to your stall.

FOCUS ON THE RIGHT STALL DESIGN

An ideal stall design should 

• Incorporate visual brand elements like colors, interactive elements, graphics, logos, etc, to increase brand awareness and recognition.
• Communicates your offerings to the attendees with clear messaging. This will help them to understand your business properly and also convince them to stop by your stall and talk to your stall staff.
• Offer interactive experiences to the attendees. This can include product demos or visual presentations like videos.

To acquire the ideal stall design, hire a professional exhibition design company like Experience SOL Brand Solutions to develop an eye-catching and professional looking stall design.

FOCUS ON CUSTOM DISPLAYS FOR YOUR SPECIAL PRODUCTS

If you have the budget, get a custom display made to purposefully display your special products.

The custom displays can be supplemented by special features like integrated LED lighting for extra effect (you can get it to shape the display to match the shape of your special product). ELSE you can add mechanical components to highlight your special product effectively like usage of interactive features which will get the attendees involved.

Make sure to have each custom display tailored to suit your product as they tend to attract a higher percentage of quality attendees to your stall.

HARNESS THE POWER OF SOCIAL MEDIA

The power of social media is limitless. By harnessing its power, you can create buzz around your stall design and build hype in a way that will convince the social media users to visit your stall at the exhibition event.

• Before the exhibition, display posts on yours as well as the exhibition event social media channels to announce your attendance at the exhibition.
• Provide information about your stall location on the exhibition floor like the stall number, or a map. This will help the likely attendees to find your stall easily.
• Announce incentives to all those who stop by at your stall on the exhibition floor like a giveaway or a product sample. 
• Use event hashtags to expand your audience base and reach out to other interested parties.

CROSS-CHECK ALL ASPECTS

Make sure to cross-check every aspect of the preparation process.

• Develop a checklist that covers all aspects of planning and preparation for the event, from registration process to travel schedules and accommodations, day-to-day preparations’, and more. 
• Develop a checklist of the items like marketing and promotional materials, giveaways, etc, ordered for the event. Then, track the items and ensure they get delivered at the right time; and then check off items upon their completion. This will help you to stay organized and know what you are doing and what needs to be done more.

Cross-checking every aspect of the planning and preparation process will help ensure your whole exhibition event process goes off smoothly. In case, you run into challenges later, you will get to know them in advance and also take adequate steps including identifying solutions, to set right the likely obstacles.