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Our Most Recent Wyoming Business Tip Article

By Cindy Unger, Business Counselor

Terri M. from Casper asks, “How effective a marketing tool do you think trade shows are, and what should I think about before I go?”

“Choosing a Trade Show”, the first of two articles addressing effective trade show marketing.

Trade show marketing can be a high-risk, high-reward endeavor. A business could spend a year’s marketing budget on a single show and end-up with no sales, or could efficiently and effectively gather enough solid leads to provide sales for many years to come. Sometimes trade shows will “solicit you”, other times a business may seek out appropriate shows. In order to make the decision of whether to exhibit at a trade show, a business must analyze the desired accomplishments, combined with projected target market attendance, to determine the value of attending any particular show. A good website to check for event listings is http://www.tsnn.com. Beware of “new events”. If a show has no history, potential for low turn-out may be higher than you want to chance. Although shows held close to home or in interesting vacation spots may look attractive, base your choice on the ability of the show to increase your sales.

Consider your goals in attending the show. Do you expect to sell physical inventory or is your objective primarily to achieve name recognition among a group of wholesale or retail buyers? Do you want to expand the demographics of your audience to add new clients? Are you looking to solidify a few major deals? Are you planning to launch a new product? Trade shows present an excellent opportunity to “test the waters”, elicit feedback directly from potential buyers. Trade shows also present an excellent opportunity to directly evaluate your competition. Clarifying what your goal or goals are in terms of participating in a trade show will assist you to plan all other aspects of your promotions and enable you to make the most of your time and dollar expenditures.

To proceed, try to contact the sponsors of any event you are considering and get a list of both the exhibitors and attendees involved in the previous year’s show. Analyze the list to determine whether your customers are likely to be attending the event.

If the show looks promising, the next step is to match expenses with your marketing budget. When analyzing expenses, don’t forget to consider event attendance; an inexpensive event with no traffic may be far more costly than attending an expensive event with huge attendance. Check on prices for different sized booths, different locations. Obtain a layout of the exhibit area to determine the best location for your booth. Look at display table sizes and prices. Be sure to purchase enough space to market your business effectively. Don’t forget to check on availability of electric, internet, tablecloths, etc. Your total expenses will include exhibiting and travel costs and expenses for your trade show booth, promotional literature, giveaways, etc. Plus, don’t forget the costs of being away from your business.

A Blog version of this article and an opportunity to post comments is available at http://www.wyospace.com.

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