“For selling to work, you need face-to-face, personalized and intense contact.” – Guy Kawasaki
The best connections you’ll make in business are those that begin with a face-to-face encounter. It’s the most memorable, impactful and effective way to engage with prospects: meeting in person builds trust and familiarity in a way picking up the phone or emailing will never achieve.
During a trade show, you have the potential to engage with a captive audience in-person. They have travelled specifically to the exhibit with interest in your industry and with the intention to learn new things.
With such a great opportunity comes pressure to stand out from the crowd. You can accomplish this by successfully communicating your brand values during your trade show. Keep reading to find out how.
A Crystal-Clear Purpose
If your booth team don’t know the business’s purpose of exhibiting they’ll have a difficult time representing you and your brand.
That’s because your trade show goal needs to align with your overall branding goal, so your team can broadcast that message effectively and help you meet your marketing objectives.
Imagine you run a property investment company. Your company-wide goal is to break into the Asian market. To accomplish this, you need to impress your targeted prospects by positioning your business as a powerhouse organisation on home turf.
Using the example, thought-leadership and top-class interpersonal skills must be embodied to exemplify your brand. Therefore your team need to be highly confident dealing with people and experts in your business to drive forward your brand’s purpose using face-to-face marketing.
What Sets You Apart?
As well as your purpose for exhibiting, your trade show team need to be clued-up on your best business values. So when they spark conversations with potential customers during an event they can demonstrate your brand appropriately. To define your brand promise and preposition ask yourself:
What does your brand promise?
Identify the major benefits that make your services or products attractive.
What’s your value proposition?
How do your services or products solve your customer’s problems and make their lives better?
Notice how these branding definers are focused on the customer and what your business can do for them. As senior vice president of Entertainment’s National Meetings and Events, Michael Massari points out:
“No matter what industry you work in, we are all in the people business.”
Putting your customers at the heart of your branding is integral to successful marketing. It shows them that you put their needs first, building trust and loyalty.
Maintain this image through your trade show staff. Encourage them to help solve people’s problems rather than blow your business’s trumpet or they may as well be back in the office doing cold calls. Outside The Box emphasises why the foundation of face-to-face interaction should be client-focused:
“If the customers themselves do not know that they are being put first, the value inherent in the strategy will be weakened.”
This is especially true if your main brand value is being approachable as a business, so optimise your booth experience for easy conversations too. One great way to do this is to set up a comfortable place where attendees can sit down and talk to you. Go the extra mile by having phone chargers or power points available for those who need them, so people can stop and chat with you freely.
A Team Captain for Branding Consistency
Your booth captain is the glue that holds your team together during a trade show. They make sure everyone fulfils their responsibilities, stays on schedule and, crucially, remains on-brand.
Monitoring their performance from a brand perspective is the key to ensuring the latter. It enables consistency by bolstering your face-to-face marketing objectives.
Instruct your captain to hold a pre-show meeting with the rest of the team. By going over your trade show objectives, strategies and brand positioning your staff will feel more confident enabling them to better represent your brand. Giving them the opportunity to ask questions will also reduce the risk of mistakes.
Ensure your team demonstrate your brand through their appearance and body language too – something your team captain can oversee. When attendees engage with your staff face-to-face they will be taking in the way your team is dressed and how attentive they are. If the dress code isn’t followed or if team members are on their phones this could negatively impact your brand perception.
Do You Have the Right Staff?
If you don’t think you have the right booth team, this needs to be addressed months in advance. Otherwise, you won’t have access to the talent needed to accurately demonstrate your brand during an expo.
The best investment you can make is hiring a team through a specialist agency. With a portfolio of over 2500 hand-picked exhibition staff, you can gain quick access to the best talent for trade show success using Expo Stars. Contact us today to find out more about our extensive staffing services.