Written by on June 10, 2010 – 12:00 pm

Pre-trade show marketing should include providing information on what you will be doing on the day and where to find you; the idea is to raise attendee awareness before they visit the show.  Why bother – the attendees will all be there in any event, so why do you need to focus on pre-trade show promotion in any event?

The answer is simple – more than 60% of attendees will come to the trade show with a pre-set agenda.  Budgets are tight for everyone and attendees will be finding that their employers are cutting back on the number of shows they can attend and the length of time they can spend at each venue they do go to.  Using an agenda ensures they stay focused and there is a greater incidence of making appointments with exhibitors before the show itself.

Using a blog to promote your presence and dove-tail this in with general trade show news will help attendees to understand what you are offering and where to find your trade show display.  You are looking at making the attendees life and decision making as easy and simple as possible – use the blog, and social media pages such as Facebook and LinkedIn to demonstrate what you will be offering in the way of products and services.  Use the blog to promote your promotional giveaways and free gifts plus any competitions; you can make features out of these promotional activities but you can also extend this tactic to announce product launches and sales offers.

On the day, you can post updates to the blog as your trade show strategy unfolds – alternatively, look at using Twitter to provide updates and reminders to attendees who have expressed an interest in your company during your pre-show marketing.

The blog can also be used as a source for marketing collateral instead of relying on the traditional, printed brochures and product literature.  More than 90% of printed materials never make it to the attendee’s office, but instead it ends up in the trash.  Have your marketing and educational literature converted to PDF files which can be downloaded from the blog platform and reduce marketing costs without overloading attendees with more paper.  The blog also gives you a pretext to gain an attendees acceptance to opt-in to your email database by asking attendees whether they want the information emailed to them rather than carrying more printed brochures.Tags: blogs, facebook, linkedin, social media, Trade Show Displays, Trade Shows
Posted under Trade Show Displays, Trade Show Events, Trade Show Tips, Trade Shows |  2 Comments »