The B2B Lead » Trade Shows and Events

Increase Open Rates for Follow-up Emails

Leigh Anne Reynolds — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 14:56:10 +0000

Coming back from a trade show, everyone is on a high. Your team tells you, “it was the best show EVER” and the sales team is ready to get all of those hot leads. As much as they may want you to, the last thing you should do is just hand over the scans list to sales and tell them to have at it. Setting up follow-up is key.

We do one big trade show a year, Dreamforce (salesforce.com’s user group conference). We limit collateral at the show (partly because most of it ends up being thrown away and partly to do our best to be a bit greener) and promise to follow-up with more info in an email.

Most everyone that scanned me sent a follow-up email within days of the show. Unfortunately almost all of them used the exact same subject line. Yes, I said exact same subject line – Dreamforce follow-up. At a show like Dreamforce with hundreds of exhibitors, that just really is not going to cut it to stand out in the crowd. When I looked back at our follow-up email from last year I was a little disappointed that we had used that same worn out subject line. I decided I wanted to try something new.

The subject line I ended up using this year is a little on the long side but much more descriptive. The subject line was: Dreamforce follow-up on data cleansing and contact discovery. Notice I chose to exclude our company name. I did this for two reasons, it was already in the from line and it is doubtful anyone remembers who we are or what we do.

But much more interesting were the results I saw. I grew our open rate from 16% to 36% as compared to the same follow-up email from the year before. See if you can increase your open rates by adding more relevancy in the subject line for trade show follow up emails.

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Pre-show Marketing to Drive More Trade Show Leads

Leigh Anne Reynolds — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 17:37:17 +0000

Aren’t we all looking for ways to draw more people to our trade show booth? Start by generating traffic before the show. Do whatever you can to get on the attendee’s short list of must see sponsors. Here are a few ideas for pre-show marketing:

Send pre-show emails and/or direct mail to drive visitors to your booth. Don’t have a list of show attendees? Email contacts in your database that are likely to attend. Start by inviting prospects in the area. Do anything and everything to let people know you will be there.
Send out a press release – timing is everything on this because you don’t want to get lumped in with everyone else sending out a press release about the show. Make sure your press release is full of the right keywords and links to relevant content.
Announce it on your website
Twitter about it – be sure to tweet before and during the show. Make a tweeting schedule to promote registrations for the event and then the days leading up to the show to promote your booth. Find out from show management if they have a pre-set hashtag for the show you should include.
Utilize your sales team – make sure your sales team has all the details so they can promote as they speak with prospects.

In all communication, be sure to include your booth number and announce any giveaways and/or parties.

Photo: www.vinylbannersprinting.com/

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Leverage Your Current Customers at Your Next Trade Show

Leigh Anne Reynolds — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 17:08:33 +0000

At a trade show, you are all about talking to as many people (hopefully qualified leads) as you can. But don’t forget about your current customers that may be at the show. More than likely you will have a few current customers already attending the events you sponsor. Oftentimes with sponsorships you get free or discounted passes. Offer these to your best customers (note: those that live closest to the event are most likely to accept).

Engage with those you give passes to and any other current customers that will be at the show ahead of time and ask them to act as brand ambassadors for you. Give them something to wear like a t-shirt or button so attendees know they are your customers. At one show we sponsored, one of our customers literally stood at our booth (without us asking him to) and told anyone who stopped to listen about the great results he had seen using our data. If your customers love what you do, they are often more than willing to shout it from the rooftops.

Some customers may be too busy attending sessions and speaking to other sponsors to be a brand ambassador during the event. You may consider a cocktail party after show hours where you invite customers and prospects.

Most importantly, don’t forget to thank your customers, especially if they have been bringing you new leads. Cocktail parties, dinner or a gift at the show are a few ideas. If you don’t have your own user group events, industry events which a lot of your customers attend can be an open opportunity to connect and show your appreciation.

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7:30am Really? – Marketing WTF

Amy Hawthorne — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 15:00:10 +0000

We’ve just recently sponsored a few events. Some smaller very targeted B2B Marketing events, some with about 500 attendees like partner events and then a mega show with over 15,000 attendees. Here’s what I don’t get – why are we standing at our booths with smiles on ready to go each day at 7:30am? None of the attendees come out that early looking to be pitched.

Here’s a couple of interesting numbers we’ve collected over the last couple of months.

Targeted show of about 250 attendees, morning networking started at 8am, there were about 10 people on the show floor. Where was everyone else? Unfortunately they were all looking for their morning coffee and stale bagel.

Partner event with over 500 attendees, partner showcase opened at 7:30 (1.5 hours before keynote), we had 4 people stop by, 2 of them looking for breakfast.

This week we’ve been at the big mamma jamma show, over 15,000 attendees. Show floor opened from 7:30 – 9:00am with keynotes at 9am. 2 people stopped by, that’s right just 2.

So I’m wondering why? Why do those hosting events use this morning “networking” time as a part of the sales pitch? Really, as the host of these events does this make you feel like you’re giving us more for our money? I don’t know about you but I’d rather sleep in, get my cup of coffee, enjoy the stale pastries and be “open” for conversations when everyone else is ready to talk….let’s say AFTER 9am.

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One Month Until the MarketingProfs B2B Forum in Boston!

Amy Hawthorne — Fri, 08 May 2009 15:23:42 +0000

The Marketing Profs B2B Forum kicks off June 8th in Boston. If you haven’t already registered, today’s your lucky day! Use code ESPN7 and get $200 off your registration price. Join some of the smartest B2B Marketers getting definitive solutions to the 3 biggest challenges today:

Integrating your marketing programs
Engaging your customers and prospects
Measuring and analyzing to prove ROI

If you already have your tickets, we’ll see you there!

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Can I pay for my virtual event with virtual dollars? – Marketing WTF?

Amy Hawthorne — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 20:17:41 +0000

I am always looking for new ways to find qualified leads for sales and will typically try anything once. Each quarter we try to add something new to the mix. For next quarter we looked at couple of virtual tradeshows. We sponsored one last year and found it pretty interesting even though we didn’t get many real leads from it (lots of international visitors). It was a good place to cut our teeth on something new.

In the last week or so, we were contacted to sponsor another virtual tradeshow being put on by a major industry publication that seems to be in transition with both their events and their publication, moving everything online. I was intrigued and wanted more details. I inquired further about this new event to find out what the cost would be and how many/what kind of attendees they expected. I got back a very interesting reply. Sponsorships ranged from $10K to $25K. Little surprised here since this is typically the cost of live events. I was still interested…then I found out how many people they were expecting. I figured thousands, right? Nope, they’re only expecting about 2500 people. But how targeted are these people visiting?

With this economy travel budgets are definitely being cut but aren’t tradeshow budgets too? Not sure about you, but it seems like a hefty pricetag for a very broad tradeshow. I can think of a lot of things to spend $10K – $25K that will result in more targeted, qualified leads. What about you?

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The 6 Principles of Deliberate Marketing: Qualified Buyers vs. Leads – B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #183

Suaad Sait — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 16:02:51 +0000

This is the second post in a series on Deliberate Marketing. Be sure to check out the first post on Intention vs. Attention.

Sales teams are always clamoring for more leads but smart marketers know that what they really need to deliver are qualified buyers. A lead status is often applied to anyone who fills out a form on your website or stops by your trade show booth. Rather than tossing that list of names over to sales, marketers must nurture those leads and weed out the good from the bad, those with budget and need from those still in the education phase.

Deliberate Marketing ensures marketers can extract the most value from their marketing programs based on using the most cost-effective method to move prospects and buyers through the funnel. It is not focused on simply filling the marketing and sales funnel with contacts and expecting sales to follow-up on any lead that downloads a whitepaper.

Deliberate Marketing is about profiling the best possible buyers, recruiting more buyers that are just like them, and then executing the most effective techniques possible to move the prospect through each stage of the funnel.

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Rock Your Tchotkes – B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #167

Pam O'Neal Mickelson — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 15:02:47 +0000

Getting ready for your next trade show? Don’t skimp on the tchotkes with boring and ineffective promotional items like hats, stress relievers or mints. Take a lesson from the queen of self-promotion Madonna and go for something unexpected and memorable.

Successful Promotions magazine just ran a cover article on the killer goodies rock stars like Madonna distribute to promote their albums and/or tours. For her recent Sticky and Sweet tour, Madonna had giant lollipops made with her album cover emblazoned on them. Other musicians mentioned included Ice-T who distributed body bags and the Black Crowes who produced rolling papers.

If those options seem a bit inappropriate for your business, keep these tips in mind for selecting giveaways that help support your message and make your brand more memorable:

Think visual branding. To help your message or brand promise “stick” in the minds of your target market, go with a promo item that underscores your brand promise or the message of your latest campaign. For example, if your product promises to install within minutes instead of days, give out a stopwatch and invite users to put you to the test.
Create a must-have collectible or invest in a hot product that works as an incentive to draw people to your booth. NetQoS created a series of collectible t-shirts that were popular enough to draw 3500 booth visitors year after year. Other companies have accomplished this with less expensive product like buttons.
Come up with a giveaway that will garner press coverage or blog commentary. At Pervasive we created a campaign that involved jog wallets stuffed with different denominations of money. This clever program netted press coverage in Information Week magazine.

What are your favorite tchotkes — either for giving or receiving?

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Trade Show Marketing for Startups – B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #156

Pam O'Neal Mickelson — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 15:29:58 +0000

Just returned from Brussels where I represented BreakingPoint at the Broadband World Forum (BBWF). Our 6 meter by 3 meter booth was quite a difference from my typical experience in a 30′ X 40′ Platinum booth at the show entrance.

As a startup and a new entrant in the market, we didn’t have the large Marketing budget to invest in a huge exhibit and it wouldn’t have made a good investment anyway. We also didn’t have the history to score a great booth location. Finally, to make things even more challenging, we didn’t have the $80,000 exhibit that our competitors had to stand out at the event. So, we had to rely on a superior product and a little ingenuity to get the most from our investment in the event. Here are a few tips for your next trade show:

Locate your exhibit right next to your hottest competitor. It’s a risky move, but if your product stands out and provides superior capabilities this strategy should help you attract a steady stream of qualified traffic. It also makes a bold statement about the confidence you have in your product.
Locate your exhibit next to your largest partner. This will also help you attract qualified traffic without the risk. Even better, your partner may actually recommend attendees visit your booth.
Make use of lots of plasma displays to tell your story without the need to invest in a costly booth or expensive graphics.
Promote and deliver presentations in your booth. Live presentations from subject matter experts attract significant crowds and helps position your company as a thought leader.
Produce a creative marketing campaign that stimulates word-of-mouth.
Use Twitter to spread the word about your exhibit.
Take your show on the road. At BBWF, I actually saw an exhibitor rolling a mobile demo stand around the show floor. Genius!

Just a few ideas to help your startup stand out at the next trade show. Wish we would have had the time and resources to leverage all of these ideas at BBWF. As it turned out, simply using idea #1, 5, and 6 were quite enough to drive very qualified traffic. Another interesting data point: our Twitter updates drove about as much traffic as our email blast. Neither of these techniques worked as well as parking right next door to our competitor, however. Big risk, big reward.

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Drive Revenue from Customer Events – B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #128

Suaad Sait — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 15:56:28 +0000

In a previous life when I was VP of Marketing at a high tech software company we had thousands of customers with huge upsell and cross selling opportunities. Since many of these customers were long time customers we decided a live event would not only give us the opportunity to update them on our additional products and services but would also allow us some face time for further relationship building. Our overall goal for the event was to drive more revenue from our current customer base. As we were brainstorming on the event details we wanted to be sure we had a 3-D view on everything we did. We wanted to be sure we were educating our customers, building customer loyalty and get a better understanding how we were going to continue to monetize these relationships. I’ve included a few tips below for each of these components.

Education –

Make sure your agenda for the event is not biased towards your company and what your company has going on, but instead show interest to solving THEIR business problems and what really impacts them.
Think about what you want them to take back from this event?
Consider bringing in industry leaders or analysts to speak on their experiences in the marketplace
give away an educational book or take home information they could share with others
Add a panel of happy customers to discuss their experiences and results from working with you

Loyalty –

Make each customer feel like they are your #1 customer
Treat them to a nice venue, easy transportation and great food to start.
Most importantly, make your customers feel they are part of the inner circle and by being at the event they are privy to information others aren’t. For example, show an exclusive demo of new or upcoming product releases.

Monetize –

Hold your sales team responsible to have the right customers at the event. Ones who bring the most money, ones who have problems, ones that would benefit the most from being there.
While at the event, set up customer face-to-face meetings with key executives. I had a spreadsheet with everyone I was meeting and knew their problems going into the conversation so I could bring the solutions. This was key.

Even though the event ended on a high note, we would have to wait another year for this type of customer interaction. Today, we wouldn’t have to wait another year to catch up with our customers. Companies like BD Metrics have already started to tackle this obstacle. BD Metrics’ You-Based™ personalization technology for leading tradeshows and associations to help make sure once people leave an event, all is not forgotten. I’m sure there are others out there also helping extend the momentum of live events. What have you seen or used? How are you staying in touch with your customers 365 days a year?

Here’s another continuing customer event idea for you to ponder… ideas

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