Trade shows can be an exciting event to plan for. But organizing one is not a walk in the park. There may be a lot of challenges that you need to face, and issues that you need to overcome.
Planning for a trade show involves a lot of skills. It includes strategic planning, marketing execution and planning for the event itself. The number of tasks that you need to complete can be a bit overwhelming.
When planning for a trade show, there are 5 elements that you should never be without.
First, you need a plan. When planning for an expo, you need to focus on identifying your potential market, making a draft of the specifications of your project, creating your marketing plans, and establishing your budget for the event. You need to spend some time in creating action plans to increase the chances of your event to become successful. You need to think about how you can reduce financial risks and enhance your event’s chance of success. This allows you to understand your target market. You also need to consider that date and time of your expo, making sure it caters to your target market.
Second, when creating a trade show event, you need to have a team that can support you with your tasks. You can outsource people to help you with the event. This can decrease your costs and reduce financial risk. You can also hire people but this may be a bit expensive, although it may be easier for you to establish a momentum. When hiring people, you need to have at least one project manager, event planner, marketing, and sales manager. When it comes to operations, designs whether it’s graphics or web design, these can be outsourced. It is also vital that the people you will be hiring will cross-functional skills.
Third, your event needs to have a sponsor. Getting the word out there about your event can be a major struggle. Marketing and promoting your event can be a bit difficult. One technique that can help you is having a partner or sponsor for your event, one that is an expert in the chosen industry that you are eyeing on, and someone that your target audience sees as an expert. You can discuss with your partner or sponsor what your terms will be such as a trade. You promote and give them high exposure before, during, and after the event, and they share with you their customer database, allowing you to display in their store and also asking for help regarding the trade show that you will be planning.
The fourth element is your location. Once you’ve understood your target market and you’ve established your sponsorship, you can now start to estimate foot traffic for your event, the number of participants or exhibitors, and the number of speakers for the show. These things are important for you to know as an event planner so you will know which venue to pick that will best fit the needs of your event. You need to check out the location if it’s close to freeways, hotels, and food shops or restaurants. You should also keep in mind that the location is where your target market is. And then you need to consider that services offered by the venue for your trade show. There are a lot of factors that you need to consider when choosing the location of your event.
The fifth element of your trade show is your marketing plan. Once youíve set the date and place for your trade show, you need to start promoting it. There a lot of different marketing and sales tactics that you can do to sell tickets for your attendees and exhibitors. You can promote your event via social media and through email marketing. You can also set up displays or posters and flyers for the event. You can also come up with early bird promos for exhibitors.
There are a lot of things to do when it comes to event planning for a trade show or expo. Your main priority should focus on being organized, and be able to handle several tasks.
