Updated & Expanded 7/31/2019. Featured in Better Marketing & Recommended in Marketing & Business on Medium.
Last week ushered in another successful Esri User Conference — a yearly international conference in San Diego put on by Esri, the world leader in GIS (Geographic Information System) software. This year’s conference saw over 17,000 attendees, 226 conference exhibitors, and over 2,300 Esri employees!
The five-day-long event is packed full of activities, including educational sessions, talks, panels, demos, socials, industrial-niche events, and etc. Standing out either in-person in the sea of exhibitors or on social media with the constant Twitter chatter can be hard!
So how do you help your organization stand out in the chaos? Here are five things companies can focus on to maximize their time and investment — no matter the size of the conference.
1. Create an In-Person Booth Experience
Having an engaging in-person booth experience is one of the best ways to turn an attendee who’s just passing by into a solid, qualified lead. Your booth should clearly show your brand to attendees.
Imagine it from an outsider’s perspective. You’re someone who is meandering through the conference exhibitor hall, and you slowly walk past your company’s booth. Are the graphics clear, attention-grabbing, and to the point? Or, are they busy, cryptic, and confusing as to what your company even does?
Is the space laid out inviting you in? Are the supplemental materials, examples, equipment, television screens, and interactive elements arranged in a way that leads you through the space? Are the staff free from distractions (computers and phones) and ready to strike up a conversation, or at least greet you on the way by? If you’re a repeat vendor, what makes this year’s booth different to get your established customers to stop by and check-in? Is there a memorable campaign message that will help attendees remember who you are?
All of these elements work together to build a complete in-person experience that will engage attendees and leave them with a lasting impression. Remember to be fun and personable.
2. Advertise Pre, During, and Post Conference
“Advertising” in this context doesn’t necessarily mean a paid campaign. Instead, it means creating and circulating content focused around the conference several weeks before the conference starts. You’ll also want to continue advertising during the conference, and you’ll want to keep the momentum going after the conference by touching on relevant lessons, themes, technologies, and etc. that were prevalent throughout the event.
Post-conference content is also a great time to engage people who weren’t able to attend and people who missed seeing you. It’s also a good time to re-engage new prospects who were introduced to your company during the conference by providing resources to more information.
Maybe your company sends out a handful of social media posts that consist of “Hey! We’re here,” or, “Come to our session!” or, “Come see us at booth _______ for (a demo/products/a free pen/a giveaway/whatever).” From the perspective of social media analytics and impressions, just a handful of messages like that are going to get completely lost in the constant thread of conference/industry posts. They’ll only be seen by a tiny percentage of attendees.
Before we move on to the third item on the list, let’s touch on the value of the content you’re putting out. Those types of messages described in the above paragraph are OK to post…as long as you’re providing substance and value along with them. Those messages being a part of a string of content educating attendees on your company is OK. But if those messages are the only content about the conference you put out, then it just looks like a sad effort to check off the box showing that you were there and told someone about it.
Pre-plan and make a campaign out of your content. Keep it frequent throughout the event, chime in with real-time things that are happening, don’t be salesy, enter conversations about events and unveils, and most importantly, show people that you’re actually having fun being there and being a part of their scene. This is the perfect segue to number three.
3. Follow Through on Social Media
When you use social media effectively, you consistently participate in two types of actions. The first is posting quality content, and the second, and arguably most important, is interacting and engaging with people. A lot of companies do the first action, but they fail to follow through with the second. Then, they wonder why they aren’t seeing engagement or growth on their profiles. The point of social media is obviously to be personal and social.
Think about if you were talking to a person. Imagine you’re telling them about your job, a question you have, or something cool you found and they’re just staring at you with a soulless gaze. Then, they completely ignore you and blow you off, and the only thing they say is, “Have you checked out my latest blog post on the effects of not getting enough sleep?”
You’d be irritated, right? Slightly confused maybe? Or perhaps a little creeped out? Don’t let your company be the robotic person only shouting random posts. Interact, engage, and have conversations with people — especially those at the conference posting using the #conferencehashtag.
How many times have you posted something, someone you didn’t know likes or comments on it, and then curiosity gets the best of you and compels you to go investigate who they are? This happens with companies, too.
4. If You’re a Repeat Vendor, Change It Up a Little Bit
If you attend a conference annually to learn about the newest trends, technology, and principles in your industry, you wouldn’t keep going if it was exactly same every year, right? That’s why they change themes/focuses every year and have a campaign wrapper around that theme with a different tagline, new advertisements, speaking topics, awards, showcases, and etc.
If you routinely attend the same conference year after year as an exhibitor and have the same booth displays, relatively the same literature, the same products with maybe an updated one or new one sprinkled in, and the same stuff to talk about, would someone who’s visited your booth before or your current customers have a reason to stop by to engage? They might stop by if they like you and want to say hi, but will they really engage in a new conversation?
Switch things up with a new theme every year for your whole conference circuit, or do something special for your biggest conference of the year. Pose a new question that gets people thinking and inspires them. Then, reflect that theme throughout your booth, social media posts, digital content, literature, and speaking sessions. Really tell a story with these supporting elements.
Side note: Sometimes getting new booth graphics on a yearly basis can become a financial burden. My suggestion is to make the larger, expensive graphics beautiful, eye-catching, simple, and something that supports your entire organization and won’t get outdated quickly. Then, go in with cheaper elements and change those out regularly. Highlight the things you really want to focus on. These could be tabletop graphics, counter/table signs, smaller signs around booth, literature, or images/videos on a display.
5. Be Fun
This is the closing topic since it is important enough to get its own number, but it’s also a big theme running through numbers one through four.
Conferences are a place for professionals to get together, network, let loose, learn, and have some fun. Always be professional, but also don’t be afraid to take some risks and move your company toward the personal and quirky spectrum. When there’s a whirlwind of people, events, exhibitors, sessions, and socials, people will remember something that made them laugh or was incredibly quirky in a fun way. Tie this in with some custom-made swag that ties into the industry but is also super fun, instead of USB drives or pens. Or, maybe host an in-person event or contest where attendees can win a prize. Get creative and let the quirky ideas blossom. Remember: there’s nothing memorable about being boring.
Going through numbers one to four:
- Be a fun person in your booth and make it a setting where people want to be.
- In your digital and social media advertisements, reflect your campaign themes and remember to mix some fun content in there. It doesn’t all have to be boring, and it definitely shouldn’t just be a sales pitch. This is for you to get noticed by people — be noticeable. Be fun.
- When engaging with people, also be fun. Reply back to the jokes and post funny things about what’s going on at the conference. Be professional, but have a personality.
- Have some fun thinking of some new ways to engage, inspire, and interact with people who are used to you, your presence, and your solutions.
Takeaways:
You’re spending a lot of money to be an exhibitor or sponsor at a conference. Make the most of it by making your company as memorable as possible. Be fun, have a plan, strategically make a lot of noise, and most importantly be personable and outgoing.
If you need help planning what you’re going to do for a large conference coming up, there’s nothing we love more than helping companies utilize multiple communication channels for an epic, attention grabbing campaign. Contact us for more info!
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