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Trade Show Floor GPS? What is next?

How useful would an app you can download for your smartphone be -- that allows you to find exhibitors, products, and download the show schedule on demand? With functionality before and after each show, users can even register for the next show using the Follow Me app from Core-Apps. Click smartphone for tradeshows for more info. At the annual MeetingTechOnline (MTO Summit) is the single source of technology and innovation for the Meetings Industry.

Is it time to FLIP your Face-to-Face Marketing Strategy?

Many marketers spend countless hours brainstorming to discover the next creative idea for a trade show, event, or environment to surprise and intrigue an attendee / potential customer -- so they stop, look and listen to the message the marketer has attempted to convey.

Click on this video to see how well a Gap store used creative "out of the box" marketing to attract the attention of passerbys while promoting their new loyalty program - effectively named "Sprize". Only time will tell how well flipping a store upside down worked in successfully marketing their new program, but if I would have been walking down the street and saw cars, people and plants upside down on the street, as well as mannequins hanging from the ceiling, I know that I would have wanted to know what was going on. Gap successfully demonstrated a "wow" factor in this marketing strategy!

The question is, would you stop at this Gap store to find out why everything is upside-down?

Would you have told friends and family about what you saw?

If you answered these questions affirmatively, then Gap was successful!

--Valerie http://www.linkedin.com/in/valeriehurst

Ready to Take your Trade Show Exhibit "On The Road"?

Mobile trade show exhibiting is an option that allows a company to converse with clients at their facilities. One of our own clients, Hendrickson USA LLC is featured in this recent article in Exhibitor Magazine. This is one very effective method of showcasing products or services without competing with neighboring trade show booths in a convention center, and focuses their attention on your offerings while a mobile exhibit is parked at a customer's facility.

Top 5 Ways to Motivate Trade Show Booth Staffers

1. Have a series of Pre Show Meetings -- before travel, the day before the trade show, and before the show opens. Oftentimes not all booth staffers will be in attendance for every meeting, so have 2-3 short meetings to ensure that all staffers know the goals. A debriefing meeting at the end of each day to discuss how the day went will help regroup staffers for the next day.

2. Ensure that the booth staffers chosen to work the show have the knowledge required to discuss your product or service with a prospect or a current client. Make sure they know what an important role they are playing when working the booth.

3. If possible include booth staffers in the decision of booth attire required at the show. Professionalism, comfort and confidence will ensure better productivity on the show floor.

4. Decide upon two engaging questions to ask show trade show attendees. Upon answering the question, the booth staffer will know if the attendee would be considered a qualified lead or not. Practicing these questions will give them confidence.

5. Hold a contest for booth staffers to scan in qualified leads. At the end of each day, announce the winner, and reward them with late report to booth duty the next day by an hour or so, or give gift cards. Recognizing their efforts will go a long way!

--Valerie http://www.linkedin.com/in/valeriehurst

3 Steps to Draw Attendees to Meetings & Trade Shows

One of the continuing challenges that exhibitors have are not necessarily getting attendees to the booth, but rather the associations drawing attendance at meetings and trade shows. Here is a link to 3 steps as to what conference planners should do to make meetings more interesting, resulting in better attendance, and ultimately more leads for exhibitors!

Top 5 Items that a Great Set of Trade Show Exhibit Set-Up Instructions should Include

1. Overview – Usually a front page “roadmap” showing multiple views of the booth space and it properties i.e. floorplan, elevation, and perspective. Also should include a drawing schedule and some type of indicator(s) of booth location and orientation.
   
2. Shiplist – Not many display companies include this integral part to the overall scope of the project. The shiplist is a master document that includes all properties shipping to the show listing sizes, weights and contents. This one page can save possibly hours on the show floor once your crates/skids start making their way to your booth. Keep in mind your I&D contractor may have never worked on this booth before, but with a helpful shiplist, itemizing properties will allow him to locate the crate containing what he needs to get the job started and continue in an organized manner – thus saving you time and money by not wasting time looking through crates.
   
3. Utility Layout – This page is a clear picture of utility requirements that may be needed to bring your booth to life (electrical, internet, etc...). They may also include telephone, compressed air, and water. Accurate dimensions and valid descriptions of what the requirements are at that location are detailed in this layout. It can also be very helpful to include a legend or key as an indication to what and how many utilities are needed to complete the installation.
   
4. Hanging Signs/Structures – A large majority of exhibits today utilize some type of hanging sign and or structure. Since the installation of these properties is now handled almost solely by the riggers employed by the hall, it is usually a good idea to give them a clear indication of what and how you plan to hang these items from the ceiling. A floor plan and elevation with clear notes indicating structure assembly and any special hardware that may be needed is included. Let them know whether a sign is rotating or not, as this could incur costly labor later if not done right the first time.
   
5. Assembly of Properties – Probably the most important page of all--without it, you have no booth–right? Always include numbered layouts of wall panels and other significant properties. It is a simple step, but often is overlooked. As the detailer, you typically already know how something goes together, but out there on the show floor it’s just a bunch of wood and laminates. In addition to numbering properties, it is also helpful to label them in exploded views including any specialty hardware or tools. Include graphics info in the assemblies indicating locations and orientations as this information is available. Having the assembly detailed will save time and confusion during the set-up, and ensure properties are returned to proper locations during dismantle.
   
   Though there are many more aspects to a fully successful exhibit installation, a complete and thorough set of assembly instructions are essential to helping your booth become a success. The items mentioned above are certainly not all you need to create an effective set of prints, as each and every booth is different from the next one. They are however, key elements that should always be included when preparing set-up drawings. Not only do these items help you complete the install, they also can help with the bottom line – the dollar sign. Your marketing department will thank you!

---Sam, Project Coordinator http://www.linkedin.com/pub/sam-dresner/10/b76/827

Do "Green Hotels" equal healthy Trade Show Travel?

In the exhibit industry, many of us spend countless nights at hotels. Is it true that we may be healthier if we stay at "green" hotels? It is interesting to see the hotels that participate in this initiative, and what exactly it means to be "green." In your opinion, is being environmentally friendly important to the average trade show exhibitor or attendee traveler?

Inspiring Art Museum Design

This design for the Art Museum in Milwaukee is certainly worth taking a look at, as the design is carried throughout the structure.

What structures have you seen that have inspired you?

An Avatar Booth Staffer at a Trade Show?

What better way to draw a crowd than by using interactive software, which includes a virtual person (avatar) in conjunction with real booth staffers. These virtual employees are personalized with emotion, speech patterns and intelligence to represent the exhibitors' needs. The virtual employee, in combination with a plasma screen, can creatively conduct surveys, help drive sales, or easily assist attendees to find the information they are looking for --when the technology is used with a kiosk.

In addition, avatars are guiding people through training modules, hospitals, and museum exhibitions – all at the comfortable personal pace of the user.

Whether it is a web application, kiosk, or plasma in a tradeshow booth, an avatar may be a tool to consider.



--Valerie http://www.linkedin.com/in/valeriehurst

Travel to a Trade Show? It's Flu Season!

Travel is a necessity in the exhibit and tradeshow industry, but how do we protect ourselves from exposure to a flu bug? Here is an article that may answer some typical questions that our families and co-workers may be asking us everytime we prepare for a trip. Safe and healthy travels!

GALLO Creative Cafe October Design News

Check out our new monthly design newsletter, which focuses on not only what is happening at GALLO, but new substrates and technologies that are new to the industry!

Will the Cities we Travel to for Tradeshows Change in 2010, 2011. . .?

It seems that convention and visitors bureaus see trends of boosting the economy of cities like Denver, Detroit, New Orleans and Dallas in the upcoming years, according the article in USA Today.
It will be interesting to see what shows relocate to one of these cities over the next couple years, and whether it will affect the number of attendees. Would you attend a show if it were held in one of these cities instead of Las Vegas for example? Or is the show itself enough of a draw that the location does not matter?

Musings of a guy who used to play football…without a helmet

I was reading a discussion on a museum blog on the topic of using a motion tracking system to determine the movement of visitors and measure the time/interest they were spending at each exhibit. I was a bit surprised that the discussion took a turn in the direction of “confidentially of movement”. I was intrigued that this would be a concern since museums historically employ guards to monitor traffic flow. It seemed to me a natural and logical progression from merely observing visitors to compiling information and using it to improve content, seemed like a good idea to me. What ensued was a pretty spirited discussion about individual vs. organizational rights, and freedom of movement vs. monitoring movement. Before long, incendiary phrases like” Big Brother" were being thrown around. So I guess the question is to what degree do we as curators, marketers and designers have the right to use all of the information at our disposal to improve the visitors, or in the case of commercial exhibitions, the prospect's experience? Maybe I have just gotten to the point where I accept being on camera most of the day, certainly in my car and probably when I am walking down the street. On the upside, I am pretty sure I have privacy at home except of course when I am watching TV via cable.
---Richard http://www.linkedin.com/pub/richard-boothroyd/2/3bb/635

2009 GALLO Open

Check out this link to Exhibit City News to read about our recent successful golf outing for charity! http://tiny.cc/GalloOpen

Eco-Friendly Exhibiting at the 2009 Exhibitor Show

2009 Exhibitor Show

Las Vegas, NV - 3/22-26/09

The GALLO team participated in the 2009 Exhibitor Show as exhibitors and attendees. The planning process we undergo is identical to our clients – we need to assess our goals, then determine the best way to achieve them in this media. As marketing budgets are challenged across all industries – each marketing professional must focus on retaining sales, increasing sales, and promoting their brand. Retaining sales is all about relationships – face-to-face business methods refresh and strengthen these relationships. This is also the time to brag about the newest offerings in the company. GALLO used the Exhibitor Show as a platform to launch our new look and showcase the re-branding of our company from “Gallo Displays” to “GALLO”. This was our chance to excite new prospects and existing clients with our experience in exhibits, events and environments. Many of these opportunities unfolded from existing relationships and were not marketed stridently.

Our exhibit properties displayed our creative side in material selection. Our use of environmentally conscious materials proved that you can be eco-friendly without sacrificing the creative approach to exhibitions. Of course, we also need to gauge our return on the event. We enlisted the help of our booth avatar, Emilie, to collect good data to review post show. Emilie would catch the attention of passerbys, then ask them a series of questions related to tradeshow exhibits and marketing objectives. We were able to collect some detailed information about the attendees in our booth to make follow-up more constructive.

---Cynthia http://www.linkedin.com/in/cynthiaromaine

Dates for Exhibitor Show 2010 are 3/14-18/2010 in Las Vegas, NV

Perspective of the HCEA Annual Meeting from a "First Time" Attendee / Exhibitor

2009 HCEA Annual Meeting - Tampa, FL - 6/13-16/09

If I could explain in one word how my first HCEA Annual Meeting experience was, it would be “overwhelming,” but in a good way. Being a “first timer” at this year’s meeting was a real eye-opener in that there are more people involved in the healthcare industry’s meetings, conventions, and continuing education workshops than I thought – and I definitely think that is a good thing!

With all of the healthcare reform discussions going on in our country right now, keeping up with the healthcare industry is not only important for the consumer, but for the suppliers as well. HCEA is definitely the “go to” source for inside information on how healthcare companies are marketing themselves and trying to provide the best possible quality to the consumer while abiding by tradeshow industry standards and professional expectations.

One of GALLO’s own Account Directors, Mike Bates http://www.linkedin.com/pub/mike-bates/9/885/6a6, has recently been appointed to a chair on one of HCEA’s committees that suggests changes to the rules and regulations of the show floor for HCEA. Mike is also in charge of presenting new ideas for improving attendance in the show hall for future HCEA meetings.

Although there has been a declining number of exhibitors at HCEA’s Annual Meeting, attendee numbers have only experienced a minimal decline. The overall meeting was a solid, useful source for exhibitors and attendees alike, and most of all a great place to not only develop new relationships with those in the industry, but to reconnect with friends and colleagues in the industry as well.

Although this was my first time at HCEA, GALLO is one of the original three supporting members for this meeting, dating back almost 20 years!

--Emilie http://www.linkedin.com/in/emartinko121079

Dates for HCEA Annual 2010 Meeting are 6/26-29/2010 in New Orleans, LA