Once the Trade Show is Over, Your Work is Just Getting Started

Trade shows are an important part of many companies business model. The reason you attend a trade show is to increase exposure and make sales during the event. However, a large portion of sales and opportunity lies after the event is over. What you do with your leads will greatly affect the bottom line and the overall success of the trade show.

Numbers Tell the Story

The following infographic and stats come from the Northwest Creative Imaging Blog. As you will see from these statistics, following up leads after a trade show or exhibition will greatly improve your return on investment. For expensive trade shows, it can make the difference between being in the red and turning a profit.

  • Trade show attendance reduces the amount of calls to close a sale.
  • 63% of sales and marketing managers agree or strongly agree that exhibitions assist in gaining market share.
  • The average cost to close a sale is reduced by approximately 1/3 for exhibition leads vs. non-exhibition leads.

Exhibition Lead Stats

Important Steps to Take After the Trade Show

After the Trade Show

Once a trade show ends, your work is not over. If you do not follow through with your leads, search engine optimisation efforts, maintaining buzz, collecting feedback, and archiving content then much of the potential benefit will be lost along with a large portion of conversions. Follow the following tips outlined in the graphic:

Steps After the Show

Persistence pays off! As noted above, it still takes an average of 3.5 calls to close a lead post trade show follow up. However, when you see that 80% of exhibitors do not follow up on sales leads they collect at trade shows, it highlights the ability to capitalise on the lack of effort of other exhibitors.

Evaluating Your Trade Show Success

Evaluating Trade Show Success

Besides the work that must be done post trade show event, part of the after trade show routine must be about evaluating the results. Calculating what went right and acknowledging what needs improvement are habits of the most successful businesses. Join them by going through questions 1 through 5 above and making that part of your post exhibition routine. Your “post mortem” should take place as soon after the close of the event as possible.


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