Get Ready for Spring Trade Show Season

Although conferences and trade shows now span nearly every month of the year, Spring and Fall still tend to be not just peak event seasons but also peak travel times. With so many events crowding the calendar, it can be hard to juggle deadlines, expenses, and travel arrangements in order to maximize your brand and lead generation impact. Here are a few tips to help prioritize and prep for a busy spring event season.

Stay Ahead of Travel Costs

Spring is peak travel season and delayed staffing decisions could impact your event budget in a big way. Take advantage of conference hotel rates, make air travel arrangements at least three weeks in advance, and set reasonable per diem guidelines that include a timeline for expense report reimbursement.

Refresh your Corporate Message

Review booth designs, demos, videos, and collateral to make sure they reflect your company's current taglines and messaging. Not only are your sales targets evolving, so are your customer's pain points. Make sure your event team is equipped to have relevant conversations with conference attendees.

Be Clear about Goals and Results

Events may be the most expensive line item on your budget, so charting the path to a return on your investment is critical. To be impactful, you need 4 things: (1) connectivity to corporate branding and sales initiatives; (2) clearly identified sales targets; (3) quantifiable metrics for lead capture and sales opportunity creation; and (4) robust pre-event and post event outreach.

Plan Beyond the Booth

Your booth will be the central point for gathering new contacts en masse. Mixing up your event presence to include private dinners, happy hours, meetings, and speaking sessions helps create a more personal, memorable experience for your team and your customers.

Empower Your Event Team

Provide your team with consistent training on the latest messaging and demos. Share event goals and give them achievable targets and quotas for leads, meetings, and other metrics. Ramp up corporate support through pre-event emails to attendees, incentives that drive traffic to your booth, and reasons for attendees to be excited about meeting your team at the event.