Attending an expo or event is a big investment. Done right it can yield a great number of leads and sales.
The key to achieving a great return on investment from an expo/event is coordinating the on-the-ground efforts with a digital marketing strategy in order to generate qualified leads for your sales team, and help your business grow.
Understand Your Investment
Whether you’re already committed to an event or are considering one for the future, take the time to quantify the true cost.
You have to pay to exhibit and need booth design and construction, marketing and promotional materials, staffing, travel, accommodation, shipping, and lead capture tools.
The cost ranges by event, industry and footprint, but generally, businesses spend $10,000-$30,000 on each event1. This is why it’s so vital to maximise the lead capture and conversion from this investment.
Digital Marketing Can Maximise Your Return
Often businesses are so consumed with the on-the-ground work that surrounds an event that they forget to build a digital marketing strategy to accompany it.
A good strategy should be executed over eight weeks, with the event itself being in the middle. Our Maximise Your Lead Generation From Events & Expos worksheet breaks this down as a worksheet your team can follow.
The steps include:
Lead Capture: strategically planning how you will capture leads.
- What is the value offering
- What details need to be captured
- How will details be captured
- How will additional information be captured/consolidated
- Prepare the CRM
Organic Social Media & Email: engage your existing database and following to drive attendance
- Design social media posts for before, during and after the event
- Post at the right time
- Email your database before and after the event
- Encourage a social media following
Digital Marketing Campaigns: leverage digital marketing channels to drive conversion
- Create audiences on LinkedIn, Google and Meta
- Prepare campaigns for these channels
- Reach out to likely attendees on LinkedIn pre-event
- Load leads as audiences post-event
- Create lookalike audiences from these leads
- Launch and optimise campaigns
Outbound Sales: Follow up and convert leads following the event
- Prepare a post-event value offering
- Consolidate leads in your CRM
- Qualify and prioritise leads
- Call leads
- Email leads
Plan and Delegate
As the Maximise Your Lead Generation From Events & Expos worksheet shows, planning is crucial to ensure you get the most out of exhibiting at events and expos.
Ensure that everyone in your team understands the investment and expectations from the event and stress the importance of an aligned on-the-ground and digital strategy.
Delegate tasks appropriately and where necessary, work with a marketing partner to ensure that your digital strategy does your investment justice.
Summary
In summary, success at an event or expo can be greatly enhanced by a complimentary digital marketing strategy. Taking the time to pan that out is crucial and working with a good digital marketing partner can help maximise your lead generation from those events/expos and beyond.
