For any company, a trade show program can be a major investment. That goes double for companies trying to break into new geographic or economic markets.
For these companies, a rental display can be a good choice to start. It allows them to keep their upfront costs low while maintaining professional-looking exhibits that represent their brands and their products well.
For some companies, rental displays are a good long-term strategy. But for companies wanting to “graduate” to custom displays, making that move can be a challenge, budget-wise. One of our clients went through that recently, and we worked with them to find a solution that met their needs for a custom booth at a cost they could afford.
To Keith Erickson, seeing his name in the long, rolling credits at the end of the movie would be more than enough. That, and the satisfaction of knowing he built the sets that framed all of the action and drama.
Keith did get a taste of working in show business when he worked on set construction for some commercials and for one season of the television program, “The Game.” Today he works in the slightly less glamorous world of trade show exhibits as our CNC router operator.
Creating a trade show exhibit is an exciting, creative process, both for us and our clients. Sure it can be stressful and hectic, but seeing the end result somehow makes it all worthwhile.
As fun as that process is, our clients often tell us that the process of selecting an exhibit vendor can be long and arduous, especially if they have to go through an RFP process.
One of our clients was able to avoid the RFP pain and go right to the fun part, working with us to create an ambitious custom exhibit.
When it comes to trade shows, there are two things you can count on. The first is that nothing will go as planned. With so many moving parts, there are countless ways things can go wrong.
As an exhibitor, you have enough to worry about, especially your staff and customers, and generating leads and sales during the show. One of the best things you can do is work with a dedicated crew to manage the on-site construction, tear-down, and at-show management of the exhibit.
Trade shows are a lot of work. All those hours, ideas, strategies, and effort to make a big impact at the show. Then in a few short days it’s over, and you’re back in the office.
Now what? Is your trade show campaign over?
In previous blog posts, we’ve looked at the planning and design of our ExhibitorLive 2017 booth, and the engineering and fabrication. We’ve also discussed how our salespeople will be engaging attendees in conversation.
With less than a week to go, we’re approaching the end of the process. This is when it all comes together. Literally.
A key part of our process is pre-assembly. This is something we like to do when the situation allows, so we can make sure the booth comes together the way we planned, and make any last-minute corrections. It’s also a big reason we moved to a larger facility.
With only a few weeks left until ExhibitorLive, we are finally getting started on fabricating our booth.
Maybe now we won’t grumble so much when clients delay in sending us strategy and direction. We are, it seems, our own worst client.
Regardless, the booth must get built. The show will start at 9:00am Monday, March 13, whether we’re ready or not.
So we now move into engineering and production. These are areas our clients typically don’t see, so we thought we’d give you a glimpse into how we create exhibits.
So, you work hard to plan and design and build your booth. It perfectly represents your brand, and is inviting and engaging for show attendees.
Now what?
The most important part of planning for a trade show is preparing to have good, productive conversations with show attendees.
Your trade show booth, while important, can only do so much. It displays your products, engages attendees, and physically represents your brand. For it to really work you have to build relationships with show attendees. We’d like to share how we plan to do that at ExhibitorLive 2017.
Trade shows are, of course, a huge undertaking for any company. Some people estimate that trade shows affect as much as 75 percent of a company’s annual marketing budget.
Those numbers vary, of course, but when you add up the cost of the booth, fees, events, promotions, literature, travel, and everything else that’s involved with a trade show, it’s not hard to believe.
That makes planning crucial. You have to understand your goals, your customers, and what specifically you want to accomplish at a show. You can then move on to the design process to determine how the physical space of your booth will help you reach your goals.
Even the trade show industry has a trade show, and it’s called Exhibitor Live. This year, it will be March 13-15, 2017, at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas, and we’ll be there.
We love Exhibitor Live because it gives us the opportunity to meet and build relationships with marketing and trade show managers from around the country. We can talk to you about how we work and what we do best. But more importantly, we want to hear about what your needs and challenges are.
