This post is at the request to talk about leads.
Exhibitions and conferences are ineffective. The time and money that a company spends on participating in exhibitions and conferences are wasted and do not serve the purpose of attracting clients.
Let’s imagine an exhibition for “puzlo-muzlo” is being organized. We have plenty of booths from manufacturers, dealers, and suppliers of “puzlo-muzlo.” Each of them believes that right here, right now at the exhibition, they will land a super contract for the supply of their “puzlo-muzlo.” There’s a magnificent booth, girls in mini skirts are smiling enticingly, and you even brought a model of the production line for your “puzlo-muzlo.” Visitors are walking around the exhibition, likely potential buyers of “puzlo-muzlo.” Some of them stop by your booth, nodding in agreement as you talk about the enhanced “puzlistost” of your “muzlo” and exchange business cards with you. You happily leave the exhibition with a stack of business cards and enter them into your CRM system, then start using the contacts on the cards as leads. A beautiful picture, isn’t it?
However, it somehow doesn’t align with your company’s sales volume chart, which should have clear peaks corresponding to the dates of the exhibitions with some hysteresis.
The organizers of the exhibition seem to be right. Outside of the exhibition, it’s so hard to find a relevant client and arrange a meeting with them. A person who truly has the authority to make purchasing decisions for your product is always short on time. Moreover, they have probably already solved their problems with your product or are managing their business without it. They have more important things to worry about. Now, let Alexander Druzd’ answer the viewers’ question: Why on earth would a decision-maker waste their business day attending a puzzle exhibition? They might not even know that they need this puzzle. Why would they go to this exhibition? Because they received an invitation? Ha! The best they might do is send some less busy (read: less responsible) employee to visit the exhibition: “You go ahead and…по.go there, pricesпо.collect, thereпо.“we’re looking”. As a result, you have a pack full of business cards.по.“Contacts you could have obtained without the exhibition, simply by calling the company’s office from the yellow pages. The effectiveness of leads generated from the exhibition, in relation to every dollar spent, approaches zero. And, by the way, you also distracted your employees. Not to mention your own time.”
What else is bad at exhibitions? It’s a unique opportunity for puzzle enthusiasts to meet all their suppliers in one place. That is,is consideredThe need among people has been established, and they are clearly eager. Can you imagine such a scenario? I can envision that even if this motivator created by the exhibition organizers actually worked, your “interaction slice” with potential clients would be incredibly small, as you would simply be “one of a hundred” rather than the only one who showed up.
Another issue is the audience problem, which is very clearly visible at conferences and is typical for exhibitions.
The problem with the audience is that you are spreading information about yourself and your products among competitors rather than clients. Looking for clients at a specialized conference is as fruitful as trying to find a mouse in a cat shelter. If you give a speech, you are merely indulging your ego. A useful speech will be well-received by competitors, while a useless one will go in one ear and out the other. By the way, most presentations are generally lacking in substance and tend to pursue one goal—public relations. The idea that having the head of a company listed on the conference agenda somehow impacts sales is questionable, to say the least. Really?
Unlike exhibitions, potential clients don’t even make it to the conference. They don’t even send out invitations. However, this is fertile ground for those who want to sell you something. For them, the conference is a breeding ground.walrus.CEOs of companies you can meet with, discuss their interests, and negotiate the sale of their puzzle pieces. In other words, listen closely: they are offering you to pay money to be in the spotlight of dozens of savvy sellers. What a great deal!
Who do you think you’ll meet at exhibitions, besides “representatives of potential clients”? The same people, eager to sell. Representatives from business publications looking for subscribers, recruitment and staffing agencies, suppliers of software and IT solutions for businesses, suppliers of spare parts for your puzzle, and so on. In general, everyone who wants to make money off you, rather than those you want to profit from. “Okay, very interesting, let’s exchange business cards.”
There’s another category — the curious onlookers. This includes the proper curious onlookers, like educational institutions and schools, as well as just regular people who are “simply interested.” They are the ones who gather in crowds at exhibitions. It’s for them that you hired girls in bikinis and took up an entire “block” of exhibition space.
When are exhibitions useful? Of course, there is value in exhibitions, especially when the format is not “seller-client,” but rather “supplier-reseller.” These are known as Trade Fairs. This is particularly true for international fairs, which save time and money for businesspeople traveling to find suppliers for their retail networks or businesses. For instance, if Ukraine were a world leader in the production of lard, an exhibition for lard producers would be very beneficial for foreign suppliers looking to sell lard in retail chains around the globe. However, 90% of exhibitions in Ukraine are focused on showcasing Ukrainian lard to local clients—essentially the opposite.
Participation in exhibitions is also a kind of response to the “blackmail” in the “war” between competitors. It’s important to understand that if you have a very strong competitor and your participation in the exhibition will receive significant media coverage, then you shouldn’t hesitate to invest in such PR. This applies to international auto shows, CeBIT, and similar events. However, it’s also essential to weigh the costs against potential revenues. For instance, if regular participation in an exhibition accounts for 0.01% of your sales volume and the cost of participation is 10,000 Euros, then it only makes sense to participate if your sales exceed 100,000,000 Euros over that period.
Instead of spending money on participating in exhibitions and conferences to attract new clients, consider investing that money in improving the experience of your existing clients. This could lead to a more effective stream of referrals, rather than risking getting lost among others who are just like you.