Trade shows are an excellent way to introduce your company and promote your brand to an industry-specific audience, but with hundreds of trade show booths in the same space vying for the attention of attendees, it’s easy to be overlooked. Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to draw visitors to your booth and make the experience a memorable one. Here are some suggestions for increasing engagement with an interactive trade show booth:
Utilize fun and exciting tech
You don’t necessarily need bright signs and flashing lights to grab someone’s attention, but almost everyone is intrigued by fun and exciting tech and gadgets. Even if your company is not tech-based, you can use things like virtual reality goggles, robots, drones and gaming systems to promote your product or service. Allowing trade show attendees to demo gadgets while learning about your company will make the kind of impression that gets results, from brand awareness to lead generation.
Host an industry trivia contest
Offering a trivia contest with prizes is a great way to engage attendees. Many trade show attendees are experts on the industry at large and are more than willing to show off their knowledge. Whether attendees play against others or alone for a prize, trivia contests are an opportunity for your company to demonstrate its own deep understanding and place within the industry. For prizes, go beyond the typical trade booth swag and offer gift cards or special deals for your product or service.
Promote a social media contest
People love prizes, and if a trivia contest doesn’t appeal to your company, a social media contest might. Invite attendees to caption a humorous photo or create a branded hashtag and have attendees share photos or posts using the hashtag. You can offer a prize to the person whose posts garnered the most “likes,” shares, or other social media popularity measurement. Having a large screen set up with a live feed of contest entries also serves as a striking visual beacon to attract visitors to your booth.
Rent a photobooth
The photobooth has become increasingly popular at weddings, galas, and other large events, and it’s been recently popping up at various trade shows as well. Even if your company has little to do with photography, you can rent a photobooth and provide various branded props for attendees to pose with, which is a great way to promote camaraderie and break the ice. The photos can be printed on traditional strips for the attendees to take home, and you can also have them uploaded to your company’s social media accounts and invite people to tag themselves. This strategy is more than just a good time; it also serves to expose your company to industry people who aren’t at the trade show and wouldn’t see your booth otherwise.
Use strategic staff interaction
The most important element of a trade show booth—beyond the branding, the demonstrations, and even the swag—is the staff on hand to greet attendees and introduce them to your company. The staff you select for booth duty should be knowledgeable, approachable, and friendly, and while sales staff are a natural fit for the trade show environment, technical experts and customer service reps are also good choices.
Think outside the box for swag options
Nearly every trade booth in any type of industry convention offers some sort of pen or key chain as their branded swag. While extra pens are nice, most people don’t take notice of a logo when using them. To ensure your swag doesn’t get tossed in the hotel room trash bin or quickly forgotten as soon as the trade show is over, offer items that are uniquely useful or actually interesting. Examples can include phone chargers or power banks, reusable water bottles, eyeglass cleaning cloths, durable tote bags, and mini Bluetooth speakers.
Showcase vibrant signs and stylish brochures
All trade show booths start out identical, and it’s up to each company to decorate the booth with company signs and other branding that will catch the attention of people passing by. Large, vibrant signs with attractive colors and simple messaging are a must-have for any booth, along with expertly designed and printed flyers and brochures for attendees to take with them. If you want to make an impression on trade show attendees, both in the booth and long after they’ve returned home, it is essential to provide professional-looking printed materials.
At L+L Printers in San Diego, we offer printing services unique to conventions and trade shows, and we can help from the design process onward. For more information about our printing services, fill out our contact form or call us at (858) 859-9044 for our San Diego office or (760) 477-0321 for our Carlsbad office.
