Whether or not you’re a fan of Lady Gaga, chances are you’ve heard about some of her wild and crazy antics. (Remember the meat dress?) But regardless of your feelings for her or her music, if you pay attention you can learn some great marketing lessons.
Lesson #1: No matter how big you are, act small.
In about three years, Lady Gaga went from a total unknown to having over 42 million Facebook fans and 13 million Twitter followers. But she still maintains a two-way dialogue and even engages fans in real-time by tweeting at her shows.
Image by vgajic on iStockphoto
Unless you’ve been on a desert island for the past year, you likely heard about the meltdown of Hollywood bad boy, Charlie Sheen. In a seemingly endless series of rambling interviews, he both looked and sounded like a crazy man.
While hopefully you’ve never had a booth staff member on the scale of Charlie-mania, you’ve likely had some that didn’t reflect well on your company. Perhaps they show up late for booth duty (in less than professional form), or they are complete renegades during their time off-duty from the booth.
I’ve often said that exhibiting is a lot like retail, but here’s a new twist: Make your exhibit more like Apple’s Genius Bar.
Whether or not you’re a Mac person, you can learn a lot from how their stores work. This article from the Harvard Business Review outlines why the Genius Bars are successful and how other companies can follow their model. (And be sure to take note of what average sales per square foot at Apple Stores are, compared to other retailers.) Some key ideas that apply to exhibitors:
- Make your exhibit reflect your corporate personality
This is a preview of
Want More Results Per Square Foot of Exhibit Space? Follow the Genius Bar Model
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Read the full post (143 words, estimated 34 secs reading time)
Following a recent exhibitor workshop, several attendees came up to me with a similar story: their sales team comes to the show, hangs out in the booth, and becomes more of a handicap than an asset. They wanted to know how they can turn that situation around.
Unfortunately, this is a common problem because the very things that make a sales person great at what they do often create a challenge in the trade show environment:
- They’re used to spending time building a relationship with a hot prospect (taking them to lunch, etc.), but on the show floor that time must be condensed.
This is a preview of
The Challenge of Using Salespeople as Booth Staff
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Read the full post (549 words, estimated 2:12 mins reading time)
Photo: iStockphoto
Confucious may not have had trade show experience, but what if he did? Perhaps he would have drafted tips for the New Year like these:
- “He who fails to set goals will have no success to measure.”
- “The exhibitor who stands and smiles attracts more traffic than one who sits and waits for someone to stop.”
- “Exhibiting without pre-show promotions is like throwing a party without sending invitations.”
- “He who leaves the booth early misses golden opportunities.”
- “Self-serve giveaways produce no qualified leads.”
- “A booth without a clear message draws no visitors.”
