Five ways to delight exhibitors at your events

Corporate events like tradeshows offer immense opportunities for exhibitors to expand brand awareness and generate leads.

But without adequate ROI, participating in one can be a costly undertaking.

Focusing on exhibitor value is a must to create successful live shows that resonate with your audience.

Using event tech solutions is a huge help in addressing the different pain points and needs of your exhibitors.

ExpoPlatform research shows proving exhibitor ROI is among the biggest opportunities for event tech to develop in 2023.

This article highlights five ways organizers can delight exhibitors using technology.

Also read:  The event industry is witnessing the “rise of the tech-savvy” planner – Insights from Confex 2023 

Why you should prioritize exhibitor value at events

Getting your events to work means locking in long-term relationships with your exhibitors.

They should feel informed and energized – and be confident about their investment in your show.

Seeing clear value in their participation and a quantifiable increase in their returns will encourage exhibitors to invest additional resources into future events.

Here are a few reasons why prioritizing exhibitor value is a must:

• Repeat business: Exhibitor satisfaction is the bedrock of an event’s success. A positive experience will ensure they return for future editions of the show.
• Increased revenue: Happy exhibitors will be willing to raise their investments on sponsorships, booths and other activities, driving up event revenue.
• Word-of-mouth marketing: Satisfied exhibitors are more likely to spread the word about the event to their industry peers. This attracts new exhibitors and boosts attendance.
• Improved event credibility: Events that leave no stone unturned to make exhibitor participation worthwhile get a good industry rapport. More high-value attendees and exhibitors become interested, which boosts industry credibility.
• Higher attendee satisfaction: There’s a palpable energy at the venue when exhibitors are delighted with their experience. This translates into a more vibrant and engaging show for attendees, who further enhance the reputation of the event through positive reviews and social validation.

Download: The Event Tech Forecast 2023 – how the digital evolution of events will shape business this year

Five ways event tech can help you delight exhibitors

Improvements in exhibitor ROI indicate a well-planned event – but you need to consistently put your best effort at every event.

In fact, ExpoPlatform’s Event Tech Forecast highlighted it as one of the biggest challenges for organizers in 2023, with more than half of respondents polled reporting it.

Here are five ways event tech can help:

#1 Create a seamless onboarding experience

😥 Pain point: There are many challenges involved in onboarding different exhibitors to your event. Lack of information, inconsistent communication, confusion over requirements and time spent figuring out the logistics can be major hurdles to the success of your show. 

💡 Solution – An exhibitor manual is a detailed document that serves to streamline onboarding to events.

It contains all the information and guidelines exhibitors need to know before, during and after the event.

For organizers, it helps manage the complexities of set-up, operational requirements and regulations.

An exhibitor manual acts as a central hub to explain and remind exhibitors to fill the necessary details and follow the relevant steps.

This reduces friction onsite and establishes a sense of preparedness and trust while maintaining consistency across all participants.

Read more 👉 The Exhibitor Manual guide to making tradeshow onboarding easy

#2 Provide advanced networking options

😥Pain point: Limited time, crowded venues, lack of personalization and difficulty in identifying the right contacts – these are just some of the challenges faced while trying to network at events. 

💡Solution – Intelligent matchmaking solutions powered by AI can help connect buyers to relevant exhibitors and vice-versa.

These connections aren’t limited to just people, but also products and content using a ‘people-to-resource mapping’ algorithm.

Organizers can also match high-value buyers to exhibitors using the hosted buyer program.

Such a program pre-qualifies buyers and uses a personalized concierge experience to set up meetings and appointments.

This fosters deeper engagement between buyers and exhibitors through focused sales conversations that ultimately leads to better deals for both sides.

Download 👉 The Hosted Buyer Playbook – a complete guide to creating ROI-driven programs

#3 Intelligent lead capture solutions

😥 Pain point: Capturing and qualifying leads can be a cumbersome process if you don’t have an event tech system in place. There are problems aplenty, such as:

• Difficulty in identifying the right booth visitors – genuine prospects vs tire kickers. 
• Inaccurately recorded data – potential customers might slip through the cracks
• Time-consuming –  Manually collecting leads and entering the data into the system requires too much time and effort.
• Unorganized – Exhibitors aren’t properly equipped to streamline siloed data.

💡Solution – Lead intelligence solutions provide an easy and efficient way to capture quality leads and accelerate your sales pipeline.

A quick QR code scan of the visitor’s badge uploads their contact information to the exhibitor dashboard where it can be sorted and exported.

This helps eliminate the manual time needed to retrieve leads.

Exhibitors can qualify, score and follow up on leads more quickly as well as capture and transfer prospect notes into their exhibitor records.

Also read: Why Lead Intelligence is a must to see measurable results on investment

#4 Data analytics and insights to measure ROI

😥 Pain point: The absence of data analytics at events can deprive exhibitors of many critical insights. Some common issues are:

• Lack of visibility – Miss out engagement patterns that can be used to optimize and adjust marketing and sales strategies.
• Inefficient lead management – Miss valuable sales opportunities without a system to track leads.
• Limited targeting – Difficulty in targeting the right audience for their campaigns.
• Inability to measure ROI – Justifying future investments can become tough if there is not enough data to measure the event’s performance.

💡 Solution – Data analytics tools like an exhibitor dashboard provide invaluable insight into the customer experience at events.

It gives them a deeper understanding of their audience’s preferences, behaviors, sentiments and interests.

This in turn allows them to enhance their strategies and make more informed decisions to market their products and services.

They can also use this data to track consumer traffic at their booth so they can adjust exhibit elements to maximize foot traffic.

Additionally, analytics also helps exhibitors build customer profiles for follow-up marketing activities.

Further reading: Five top benefits of event data and analytics

#5 Enable year-round connections with buyers

😥 Pain point: Tradeshows are often crowded affairs and a typical three-day timeframe is not enough to make meaningful conversations and connections. This could make exhibitors lose out on business opportunities and drive down ROI.  

💡Solution – Online 365 marketplaces provide an easy way for buyers and exhibitors to track business opportunities and stay connected throughout the year. 

These platforms help continue the conversations from the live show and provide buyers with insights related to emerging markets, new products and services.

Exhibitor visibility increases dramatically when using a marketplace platform as they are not dependent solely on physical events.

They can 24/7 connect with potential customers who can review product catalogs, watch videos and interact in real-time with exhibitors online via live chats or instant messaging.

Moreover, data collected through visitors’ interactions can be analyzed by stakeholders to share useful insights about customer preferences and predict potential trends for the future.

Also read: How to make your events more profitable with 365 marketplaces

CASE STUDY 👇

➡@GITEX_GLOBAL Case Study: 1 million leads with 500,000 scanned 🔥

Learn how ExpoPlatform helped @DWTCOfficial improve exhibitor ROI at the biggest tech event of the year:https://t.co/YSzdyw2gor pic.twitter.com/d1h7IWAz6G

— ExpoPlatform (@ExpoPlatform_) January 31, 2023

We hope you enjoyed reading this article and found it useful. At ExpoPlatform, we want to help you build better events and communities. Please get in touch and ask for a demo here. Thank you 😀