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I was recently at an industry conference and tradeshow, and as a delegate had the opportunity to hear some feedback from the professionals in the room. They were extremely frustrated with the way they were inundated with emails in the two weeks leading up to the conference.
Here is an example: A provincial, west-coast association was receiving invitations to stop by the booth of hotel properties and CVBs across Canada. As much as this delegate understood the importance of supporting the tradeshow, as the contribution of the exhibitors and sponsors directly impacts conference fees, he did not understand why Sales Managers at these hotels/CVBs would ever consider sending him an email. He will NEVER have potential for them, unless he changes organizations. And, if he did, he would do his research at that time, not now.
As a result of this conversation, and a few others, I got to thinking about the supplier side of the business (such as myself). I believe sponsors and exhibitors really should only be marketing to those who have immediate and/or future opportunities and interests. But that will take some profiling of your members, which is not something we are provided with now. When your next tradeshow is done, reach out via a survey campaign and uncover the following information:
- Products and/or Services they are in need of NOW
- Products and/or Services they are interested in for the future
- Whether they are an influencer or decision-maker in the buying process
- Confirm the format they would like to be contacted by suppliers/sponsors for the following year (i.e. by phone, by email, through social media channels such as LinkedIn, etc).
Maintain this information in your system. Then, when it comes to sending out the conference/tradeshow attendee lists pre & post show, filter on those who selected the product/service type that matches the exhibitor/sponsor, and send them ONLY that list; or, house the information online and allow suppliers to filter it themselves. Does it not make more sense to send them a list of pre-qualified contacts to place in their sales funnel, instead of sifting through hundreds or thousands of people to find the diamonds in the rough?
And how can you ensure your sponsors and exhibitors follow the new protocol? In the final stages of your exhibit sales process, when they sign the contract, add in your terms and conditions a clause that requires them to only contact those delegates who visited them at their booth, or that have been spoken to at a session, or how have provided a profile that matches what they offer. Take the high road and point out that a complaint from a delegate who receives marketing information by someone outside of their profile, could result in non-admittance of the exhibitor in the future.
For many show exhibitors, this will sound extreme, but this could help improve delegate satisfaction, and exhibitors will see value in a smaller, qualified, more manageable list.
Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net
