The Complete Guide to Successful Trade Shows, Conferences, and Consumer Shows

Trade shows, consumer shows, product launches, sporting events,
and other opportunities to interact face-to-face with customers
have become an important part of the marketing mix. Recent studies
show that the percentage of the total marketing communications
budget spent on event marketing ranged from over 9% to a staggering
29%. In 2003, North America alone hosted over 13,000 trade and
consumer shows, each one with hundreds of exhibitors, and thousands
of visitors. Beyond traditional trade shows, there are countless
other opportunities for exhibitors to interact with their customers
directly and improve the bottom line, such as mall displays,
corporate events, road shows, and permanent displays.

Well chosen and executed events can shorten the sales cycle
significantly and put you miles ahead of the competition, but you
need to have an exhibit plan that's well thought out, organized,
and executed. While some large organizations have a dedicated
exhibit staff, often the role of exhibit management lands on the
desk of an unsuspecting, overworked, or unwilling sales or
marketing person who needs to get results from their exhibit
investment, but doesn't know where to start. The Power of
Exhibit provides the step-by-step advice you need to exhibit
successfully. This definitive guide to trade shows and other event
marketing shows how to set objectives, budget for your event and
measure its success in ROI, choose the right show and find the
right audience, turn leads into business, design booths, work the
show, gather information and intelligence, and much more.