A Trade Show Is Not A Marketing Strategy

Posted June 30, 2010 - 11:54am by Jim Worrell

ImageDIA is over for another year. How many leads did you collect?

What kind of follow-up are you doing?

Where are the business cards?  In a database or in a drawer?

While at DIA this year, I spoke with several of my international friends about their marketing strategy for the USA market. They said, "I do this show every year". When asked about how their sales are in the USA, they replied "not growing at all." No wonder...a trade show is not a marketing strategy.

Trade shows are a great place to network with other CROs, and most of the really intelligent exhibitors will have 10-15 pre-arranged appointments at the show. Yes...10-15 appointments. Most of the CROs I speak with usually have none...or only 1 or 2.

And they wonder why their business in North America is not growing.

Let's be clear...a trade show is just ONE ELEMENT of the marketing program and should be combined with several other marketing and sales programs, such as:

  1. A targeted list of prospects based on your therapeutic expertise.
  2. A well-developed value proposition based on your customers BENEFIT, not on your company.
  3. A direct-marketing program (email and snail mail) to keep your name in front of your clients and generate a direct response.
  4. Social media program (how does your profile look on LinkedIn?)
  5. A STRONG web site: After all, this is the FIRST place an American company will look when they want to check out.
  6. A good content marketing program:  You should be communicating with your prospects on a regular basis (like I am), giving them good information that they can use in their business. Think: White papers, articles, insights, websites, thoughts, etc.
  7. A regular sales effort to follow-up on all leads.
  8. Video's to share information about the benefit your company offers.
  9. Speaking engagements at shows and events.
  10. Press releases to keep you high in the search engines.
  11. Search Engine Optimization (SEO): To help new prospects find you.
  12. Constant Networking: When was the last time you reached out and updated your LinkedIn or Xing profile?
  13. Oh yea, and Tradeshows: Done properly, these are very effective.

You can see that a trade show is just ONE of many ways you need to stay in front of your customers and prospects. Prospects can only do business with CROs  / Service Providers they KNOW ABOUT.

It is hard to establish a reputation with US prospects when you show up once per year.

Think about it.

Dedicated to your success in America.

Jim Worrell