Building Better Exhibition Teams
How would you encourage your exhibition team to work seamlessly and become a more cohesive team? It’s a very good question, especially as the economic difficulty of the last few years have made it more important for exhibition teams to operate better. Here are a few ideas about what you can do before, during, and after a trade show to help your sales team become more cohesive.
Before the trade show:
- Set and communicate your exhibition goals, such as number of leads, sales revenue targets, new product introductions, increased brand awareness and ensure your staff understand them so that they have great reasons for ensuring success.
- Ask your sales reps what information they need from attendees at the show and add that to the lead card.
- Work together to set in-booth appointments before the show
- Train your staff on how to work a trade show booth, so they are less nervous.
Right before the trade show:
- Let your trade show staff know that it okay to ask each other for help with attendee questions they don’t know the answer to
- Re-emphasize that each staff member needs to record what attendees were interested in, and what follow up was promised, so the representative who receives the lead can make a good follow up phone call
- In the rush before the show opens, make sure you treat the sales and marketing people are treated equally.
During show floor hours:
- Hold all staff equally accountable during show hours and coach them all with the same level of urgency if they need assistance.
After the trade show:
- Report back to the booth staff how they all either achieved or did not achieve the show goals
- Share positive anecdotes from the exhibition staff, for instance each time a salesperson spoke with a potential customer who liked your recent branding, or staff member who heard from a client how much they value their sales person’s customer support skills
From the outside it looks like that what do you during the show matters most, but preparation before the show and follow up afterwards can help you see what works (as well as what doesn’t) for the next show. Employing some of these tactics may result in a tighter, more seamless exhibition team, and create better results.