Determining how your company will relay its message to a trade show audience establishes the basic criteria you will need in selecting a trade show presenter.  Will your criteria’s be scripting, podium presentation, using audio visual technology, gimmicks, over the top presentations, or the presenter’s ability to communicate?  Successful exhibitors understand that each trade show has its own budget constraints, booth size and marketing objectives and not all trade show presenters are appropriate for every environment.

The basic goal of every trade booth is to generate leads and to educate the consumer about your company’s service or product.  You can achieve this by simply utilizing the trade show presenter as a sideshow attraction or as a Hollywood stage presentation.

The sideshow attraction works best in small booths and allows education, entertaining, and  lead generation to occur when the trade show presenter interacts with the attendee and inquisitively seek out key information to assess their need level.   The higher the need level, the faster the trade show presenter turns the attendee over to qualified sales staff.

Hollywood presentations educate attendees on products and services requiring attention getting tactics and typically larger booth space.  High tech displays and performance are there to dazzle the crowd into staying and watching the presentation with trade show jargon, sales pitch and information all rolled up into a 10 minute production.  These normally happen 3-4 times an hour. Lead generation occurs when the trade show presenter requests the audience to enter into a raffle or qualifying them for an immediate discount for participating in the show presentation.

The return on investment is what a company looks for when hiring a trade show presenter.  Accomplishing this is by knowing the companies specific needs and knowing what the presenter can offer.  Once the issues are address, selection of a qualified trade show presenter is easy.

About the Author:
Dale Obrochta is a professional trade show presenter who uses promotional balloon entertainment to build trade show booth traffic. He is a leading entertainer in the balloon entertainment industry who consistently works trade shows and corporate events. Magical Balloon-dude Dale is balloon entertainment at its best!

I have a transformational one-hour workshop I deliver that helps people learn how to love networking. Considering trades shows are HUGE opportunity to meet people, they are also a very unstructured environment and many people would get more for their money if they could attend a quick session to grow those skills on the spot to use that day.

Would this type of benefit be of interest at trade shows or does it mostly fit for conferences?

Thanks for the invitation to your site and for your enthusiasm.

Gail Sussman Miller

http://www.howtolovenetworking.com

Signed – Mr. Gray

Don’t clown around with your Booth Staffers & Boothmanship when it comes to your trade show exhibit display, leave that to the trade show entertainment.  Even a well built and well managed exhibit can fail to create the impact desired if your booth staff doesn’t properly portray your message and your company.

Give your booth staff the knowledge that is needed to impress your booth visitors, no one wants to wait to have questions answered.  Have a brainstorming session several months prior to the trade show and come up with questions that your prospect may have and define your answers as a team.  Depending on your product or service, figure out some of the simplest questions that prospects may ask, even brain storm with your kids, they are honest and direct and may have a magic answer just waiting for you.

You only get one chance to make a first impression, make it a professional one, having your booth staff appearing streamlined, neat, clean and ready to go will help that impression be a lasting one.

Do not allow your booth staff to hand out literature willy nilly, that is a scape goat and a conversation crusher.  Getting your booth staff to communicate & educate without literature, can leave a door open for later conversation.  Show a sample copy, and tell them you would like to mail them a cleaner version, getting their business card for after the trade show follow up.

Small displays can be classy expressions of your organization. Pay attention to detail, avoid clutter, use graphics effectively (remember trade show exhibits are like billboards and need to be read and understood easily and quickly) and realize when people stop, they want to talk to you.

Keeping your exhibit staffers on a schedule also helps form relationships with trade show attendees, giving them a familiar face to come back to.  Once a booth staffer engages in conversation with a prospect, they can tell them precise times they will be there and urge them to come back with any of their questions.

There are many boothmanship don’ts that I have seen on the exhibit floor as well.  Staffers sitting comfortably talking amongst themselves, it gives the wrong message.  The body language when booth staffers do this, comes off as “unapproachable” and that is not something you want your exhibit display to do.

Instead of having your staff stand in front of the display with their hands in their pockets or arms crossed, make sure they have something in their hands, a give-away, a piece of literature, entice your prospects into your booth.

After that first impression, here are some quick minutes of what happens with prospects at trade shows:

Prepare and practice questions that wont get a yes or no answer.

Determine if the prospect is worth presenting to and what to present.

Demo on just the prospects needs, not everything you know. Prepare for common objections and questions.

Lead card complete? Agree on the next step and go on to the next lead!

For more staff survival tips, booth etiquette & boothmanship

Thanks for your time, Kim