I won’t beat around the bush…
On July 20, 2020, I attended the online “Virtual” Semi-Con West show.
During the show, I requested information from the digital booth of an $83 billion-dollar company in the semi-conductor industry.
On August 29 (40-days later) I received a written “Thank you” letter for visiting their booth via snail mail in a 9×12 envelope with a 12-page 4-color printed brochure.
The letter was written under the signature of their “Industry Manager,” who either condones this behavior, or doesn’t even know, that he doesn’t know, that it took ‘someone’ in his organization 40-days to reply to a virtual trade show lead.
This was/is not a one-time occurrence. I’m still waiting for other exhibitors to respond. I’m jus sayin… No one wants to face this familiar 800# gorilla, as trade show organizers are blamed by their exhibitors for poor trade show results.
Personally, I’m not convinced that the traditional (face-to-face) experienced trade show exhibit manger, should be the person managing virtual trade shows.
Brick-n-Mortar has gone digital. A difficult pivot for someone used to sitting on carpet roles waiting for labor to set up their booth. A dramatic difference from standing in a physical booth on a carpeted show floor, talking to visitors and wondering where to go to dinner that evening.
Considering that Zoom is the go-to-platform of choice, today, exhibitors are finding that using Zoom efficiently and effectively goes far beyond clicking on a link someone sent them to ‘Join a Meeting.’
Since the face-to-face world of trade show exhibiting has been interrupted, indefinitely, on-line exhibiting in virtual trade shows has become the (hopefully temporary) new normal. Therefore, exhibitors have to pivot from the familiar world of in-person, to the unfamiliar virtual world of on-line.
Exhibit managers and their booth staff (generally the company’s sales force) have to learn all the features of Zoom to be effective. That includes proficiency in…
- Camera settings
- Lighting adjustment
- Background mastery
- Screen sharing
- Breakout rooms
- Recording meetings
They also need to be able to use Zoom…
· PREshow – to invite prospects to their on-line virtual trade show booth.
· DURINGshow – to ask the right questions of visitors that qualify their interest and worthiness of further contact after the show.
· POSTshow – to open a virtual ZOOM room (office) and send prospects an invitation to meet one-on-one to make a presentation that focuses the specific interest visitors’ demonstrated during the virtual show.
That’s a lot for a company to expect people to just know.
Can your company pivot from exhibiting face-to-face to virtual? Can your exhibit manager adapt from brick-n-mortar to digital?
Serious questions to be asking before you exhibit in your next show.
By Richard Erschik.
Contact Richard Erschik by email at Richard@ExhibitorTrainingWebinar.comor by phone/text 630-642-6500