Microsoft Dynamics Convergence Tradeshow Marketing

The Tradeshow is over. Go home. No, Really. Go home.

You know your Tradeshow booth concept was on target when you have to ask people to leave at the end of the day.  Of course, the 400 leads were a pretty good indicator as well.

For many companies, trade shows and other events are the biggest waste of money, time, and resources ever. They just won’t admit it. But there are ways to stand out and make these events pay off.

Microsoft Dynamics Convergence Tradeshow Marketing

For instance, this picture was taken at a software tradeshow held in New Orleans with over 300 vendors and the sponsoring company had attended it many times before. The goal was to double the number of booth visits, influence at least $500k in revenue and create a lasting impression within their reseller channel. Their sponsorship included a 20’x20′ booth, which was outfitted with a large overhead sign, 4 demo stations, a customer theater with 60” screen, a raised, white hardwood floor and a custom photo area.

The custom photo area was set up so that attendees could get their photos taken on a mock event stage where they chose one of 6 life-size celebrity cut-outs to stand with them. Cardboard “Sheldon” from Big Bang Theory was far and away the most popular (tech conference) followed by Ron Burgundy, Elvis, Spock and others. Pictures were taken using a Microsoft Surface tablet running photo booth software that automatically posted the pics to the company’s twitter and Facebook sites (after attendees provided us with their information, of course). On the second day, a third option was added that allowed attendees to provide their mobile numbers as well so they could receive their photos by SMS at the end of the show.  They couldn’t wait to provide their info.

Attendees would then hurry to pass it around to everyone they knew, which in turn helped to promote the company. They even managed to dominate the mega-social screen that was placed in the middle of the floor to share traffic using the conference hash tags. It was fun, viral and productive. Attendees were always happy to stick around and discuss technology needs as we were able to build rapport during the setup of the shot.

What more could we ask?

By the end of the show, they were sifting through 400 leads from nearly 700 booth visitor scans and had already delivered over 60 personal demos at the booth. This was a 295% increase in leads captured the previous 2 years. Revenue generated from these leads over the following 24 months exceeded the $500k goal.
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