The Who, What, When, Where and Why of Tradeshow Planning

The prospect of planning for a trade show can seem like a daunting task. After all, overlooking the smallest thing may result in a day-of calamity that affects the viability of your lead generation efforts and compromises the impact you intend to have on the audience – not exactly the impression you’re aiming to make.

When sitting down to write an event checklist, you’ll likely find you have a lot of ideas at first. Holding a brainstorming session is a great approach if you’re just looking to get everything down on paper, but you’ll need to come up with a more structured list down the road. Once you’re ready to take that step, consider breaking everything up by using several common questions as a base.

Who?

The question of “Who?” can be broken into two parts: Who is the audience you’re targeting, and who will be manning the booths on either side of yours? Knowing your audience is a basic and virtually self explanatory step – if you’re not familiar with the likes and interests of your target demographic, you probably won’t be able to effectively appeal to its members – but you might not even be thinking about what’s going on at neighboring booths.

What?

Sometimes, exhibitors get so wrapped up in prepping for a trade show that they forget about what comes after. Asking “What is my post-show plan?” will encourage companies to commit to deploying effective follow-up strategies.

When?

If you’re planning a trade show, setting up a calendar is crucial. Kick off preliminary planning six months to a year in advance, then set four-, three-, two- and one-month benchmarks, with weekly and day-of goals after those.

See more at: TSNN – The Who, What, When, Where and Why of Tradeshow Planning