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Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Exhibitor & Visitor Surveys
Everyone's done them - and everyone has seen the results. Those interminable surveys that we inflict on exhibitors and visitors either at show or post show.
"What did you think of... ?"
"Whats were your reasons for... ?"
"Next time, will you be more likely, less likely or about the same to ... ?"
"What things would you change about.... ?"
The thing in common with all of them is that we are asking visitors and exhibitors to help improve our product - "the event".
But are they the best people to be asking?
Visitors and exhibitors are not sophisticated consumers of our industry's product.
They probably only attend a handful of events each year (at best).
Their experience is highly subjective - what products they are selling, how well their booth is designed and staffed can make a huge difference to how they see the event.
And they often have little - if any - understanding of what we as organisers actually do behind the scenes to make a "good" event work.
If you want to know how to make your tradeshow better, of course you need to know how your customers are feeling about it - but if you want real insight and truly constructive input you need to be asking people who do understand the business - but who simply have a different perspective to yours.
In this context the "experts" you should be asking are either other tradeshow organisers - or your own staff who work on other events in your portfolio.
So, who's doing that then.....?
Labels: visitor exhibitor survey trade show expo
Friday, October 10, 2008
The Event Industry & The Cold War
I recently visited the Victoria & Albert Museum's exhibition "Cold War Modern", which covers the role played by art and design during the Cold War.
One of the central claims of the exhibition is that both the Russian/Communist governments and the Western/US governments overtly and deliberately promoted their own culture's excellence in design innovation as part of the ideological clash of empires taking place during the 50's-70's.
As well as this being interesting in itself, the topic of exhibitions kept cropping up throughout. Exhibitions were the key cultural battlegrounds where East & West showcased their brightest talents in a bid to show the world that their political system was delivering the brightest future to their citizens.
Admittedly some of these events were events staged purely for political reasons, and some were "World Fairs" where national pride is always at stake. However there were also events who's names are familiar to us today, such as Germany's building fair "Bau" where showcase constructions from some of the giants of the architectural world set the tone for a generation's buildings.
With the end of the Cold War and the collapse of Communism the need for ideologies to do battle for hearts and minds has of course receded, and with it the funding to make it happen - and the exhibition industry has also evolved over this period as well, driven to deliver more value for its paying customers at every edition.
But a part of me couldn't help feeling that today's "sales & marketing"-driven exhibitions, where "ROI" is - quite rightly - the mantra of exhibitor and organiser alike, have also lost something in the process of evolution.
Events still deliver as a marketing medium, but the battle for hearts and minds is now being fought in other forms of media - and it's hard to see many of today's shows ever being seen a battleground for ideologies, whether Communism vs Capitalism ..or even Coke vs Pepsi.
But, is that because the paying customer has found better media in which to wage their ideological wars - or because the trade show community has lost the imagination and lacks the aspiration to deliver a product that is anything more than 3-D cost-effective lead generation?
And if an organisers had the vision - and budget - to turn their event into somewhere where the critical ideas of their industry were debated, what would that do for attendance and ROI ....?
One of the central claims of the exhibition is that both the Russian/Communist governments and the Western/US governments overtly and deliberately promoted their own culture's excellence in design innovation as part of the ideological clash of empires taking place during the 50's-70's.
As well as this being interesting in itself, the topic of exhibitions kept cropping up throughout. Exhibitions were the key cultural battlegrounds where East & West showcased their brightest talents in a bid to show the world that their political system was delivering the brightest future to their citizens.
Admittedly some of these events were events staged purely for political reasons, and some were "World Fairs" where national pride is always at stake. However there were also events who's names are familiar to us today, such as Germany's building fair "Bau" where showcase constructions from some of the giants of the architectural world set the tone for a generation's buildings.
With the end of the Cold War and the collapse of Communism the need for ideologies to do battle for hearts and minds has of course receded, and with it the funding to make it happen - and the exhibition industry has also evolved over this period as well, driven to deliver more value for its paying customers at every edition.
But a part of me couldn't help feeling that today's "sales & marketing"-driven exhibitions, where "ROI" is - quite rightly - the mantra of exhibitor and organiser alike, have also lost something in the process of evolution.
Events still deliver as a marketing medium, but the battle for hearts and minds is now being fought in other forms of media - and it's hard to see many of today's shows ever being seen a battleground for ideologies, whether Communism vs Capitalism ..or even Coke vs Pepsi.
But, is that because the paying customer has found better media in which to wage their ideological wars - or because the trade show community has lost the imagination and lacks the aspiration to deliver a product that is anything more than 3-D cost-effective lead generation?
And if an organisers had the vision - and budget - to turn their event into somewhere where the critical ideas of their industry were debated, what would that do for attendance and ROI ....?
Labels: exhibition culture Bau Ideology event industry
Monday, October 6, 2008
The Ugly Online Booth - that works
As tradeshow organisers, we are all programmed to be conscious of how a good booth display can project a positive image of the company it represents.
Big space, good design and high quality build says lots of positive things about the exhibitors organisation - in much the same way as an impressive office would do if you visited them.
Most show organisers can also evaluate a magazine pretty easily. Poor print quality, poor design, and poor editorial all stand out when you know what you are looking for, and you may choose to steer clear of tying your promo campaign to a poor quality book.
In the online world, we have all rushed off to apply the same (conscious - or subconscious) criteria to websites as we did trade show stands and publications. Slick design, fancy graphics & quick page load times are what you expect from a leading player, the site looks good, so it is good - QED.
However, in this Google-obsessed world, some of these traditional indicators of "good design" in the real world are suddenly no longer indicators of a "good website" in the online one - and in fact those great graphics and smooth animations may well be exactly the things that make a site less "Google-able" - arguably the only measure that counts today.
This means that applying your traditional criteria for "quality" in the online media you select to promote your tradeshow may be giving you totally the wrong steer on how to market your show.
Have you noticed yet....?
Big space, good design and high quality build says lots of positive things about the exhibitors organisation - in much the same way as an impressive office would do if you visited them.
Most show organisers can also evaluate a magazine pretty easily. Poor print quality, poor design, and poor editorial all stand out when you know what you are looking for, and you may choose to steer clear of tying your promo campaign to a poor quality book.
In the online world, we have all rushed off to apply the same (conscious - or subconscious) criteria to websites as we did trade show stands and publications. Slick design, fancy graphics & quick page load times are what you expect from a leading player, the site looks good, so it is good - QED.
However, in this Google-obsessed world, some of these traditional indicators of "good design" in the real world are suddenly no longer indicators of a "good website" in the online one - and in fact those great graphics and smooth animations may well be exactly the things that make a site less "Google-able" - arguably the only measure that counts today.
This means that applying your traditional criteria for "quality" in the online media you select to promote your tradeshow may be giving you totally the wrong steer on how to market your show.
Have you noticed yet....?
Labels: trade show marketing google
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Expo 2.0
I'm currently reading a Web 2.0 book called Wikinomics
which is all about how future models of collaborative commerce are changing the world as we know it.
Most of the examples the authors cite are either in the software business, in other content generating businesses (newspapers, encyclopedias) or in R&D functions of major corporations. All of the examples revolve around creating value through letting external parties get hold of your IP and help you create additional value from your intellectual property as a result.
Given events are in theory a very pure form of intellectual property business - after all, event companies have no assets other than their brands, ideas and skills - there should be applications in events. However I'm still struggling to see how any of the open, collaborative models in the book could be brought to bear (and monetized!!) in the events business.
For all the talk of "brands" and "communities" and "networks" at event industry gatherings, at the end of the day it makes you realise that the core event business model is still almost always about an in-house team or individual finding a way to either create (or piggyback an existing) community, and then restricting access to it in order to make money.
which is all about how future models of collaborative commerce are changing the world as we know it.Most of the examples the authors cite are either in the software business, in other content generating businesses (newspapers, encyclopedias) or in R&D functions of major corporations. All of the examples revolve around creating value through letting external parties get hold of your IP and help you create additional value from your intellectual property as a result.
Given events are in theory a very pure form of intellectual property business - after all, event companies have no assets other than their brands, ideas and skills - there should be applications in events. However I'm still struggling to see how any of the open, collaborative models in the book could be brought to bear (and monetized!!) in the events business.
For all the talk of "brands" and "communities" and "networks" at event industry gatherings, at the end of the day it makes you realise that the core event business model is still almost always about an in-house team or individual finding a way to either create (or piggyback an existing) community, and then restricting access to it in order to make money.
Labels: expo 2.0
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