How to Attract More People to Your Exhibition Stand

Trade shows, exhibitions, conventions, and other gatherings where you set up a booth and try to gather interest are a key part of growing a business. You're there to demonstrate a product, announce new developments, attract attention from vendors, resellers, and investors, and much more. Whether it's the networking, the sales, or the awareness you're after, you need one thing above all else: traffic.

That means you need to do everything you can to get more people to your exhibition stand. The only question is, how? Here are some of the most useful strategies to boost traffic, engagement, and throughput to your booths and stands.

Advertise Before the Show

A big part of a successful exhibition is letting people know it's going to be happening. Depending on the scale and location of the show, you may want to start promoting your presence months in advance. That way, dedicated fans and interested parties can make sure to schedule a visit. This is doubly true if people may need to book accommodations and flights to swing through.

There are a ton of different ways you can advertise, from posts on your blog, to flyers, to advertising on your website, to PPC ads, to mass mailers. Use as many as you can, and try to track results to see which channels are most effective for your desired outcomes.

If you're planning an exhibition far enough out, you might consider attending the exhibition without being a vendor first. This can give you a feel for what the show is like, whether or not it's worthwhile for a brand like yours to have a space, and what your competition is doing at the event. You might find it's not actually worthwhile or that you can get more done by attending and visiting other brands than you could in your own space.

Book a Prime Location

Every exhibition space has a sense of flow to it. The best spaces are the ones that run between entrance and exit, and between entry points and key locations like restrooms, refreshments, and the biggest anchor brands. In other words, the places most people are going to go.

Prime locations tend to cost more, of course, but the results can be well worth it. Just make sure to actually track those results so you know if it's worth the investment next time.

If you can't get a prime location, you can consider a two-booth strategy. Book two smaller, out-of-the-way locations and tie them together. Maybe make each one do half of a demonstration and provide half of a prize, which can be redeemed with the other half elsewhere. Not all shows allow this, but if you can pull it off, it can be pretty engaging.

Make Your Exhibition an Experience

Passive demonstrations and non-interactive shows can be fine and even effective, but the modern trend is to push for more interactive and experiential demonstrations.

Whether it's hands-on with a product, an interactive demonstration, or even a full AR or VR experience, you can do a lot to create an event that people will talk about and remember for a long time.

Draw Attention with a Giveaway

Giveaways and contests can do a lot to bring people in who otherwise might just walk on by. There are many different kinds of giveaways you can try, ranging from show-long raffles to wheels with immediate prizes to technologically-connected instant-win digital scratch-offs.

We've written a whole guide to eco-friendly giveaway ideas you can set up, so give this post a read and see if anything catches your attention.

Use Social Media

Before the event, use social media to engage with anyone and anything that might be relevant. For example, if the event has a hashtag, post using that hashtag when you mention the event. If you know other vendors who will be attending – especially if you want to network with them or engage with them while you're there – mention them and strike up a discussion.

During the event, you can keep the train rolling. Post regularly about your event, how it's going, and how you're doing. Come up with a branded event hashtag you can use for your own content and another hashtag that visitors can use to post their own experiences at your stand. Encourage visitors to post their own content – possibly with a giveaway – and have a dedicated social media monitor respond and engage with users.

After the event, you can use social media to write a wrap-up report and follow up with people you've engaged with along the way.

Use Screens to Grab Attention

At the event itself, one great way to grab attention is to have a couple of screens near the entrance of your booth. There are a lot of possible strategies here. The simplest is a looping video that attracts and engages with people walking by, encouraging them to stop in. More advanced ideas might include things like a webcam that monitors people walking by and an app that identifies them and calls them out specifically or otherwise plays with the crowd footage in some way.

The tricky part with this idea is that it really needs to match your brand. There's a ton you can do with technology, but if it doesn't reflect what your brand is actually about, the disconnect will feel disappointing when the visitors stop inside.

Provide Refreshments

One sure-fire way to get the attention of people going by is having a snack or drink available for anyone who stops in. The best brands to make use of this are the ones making and selling those drinks and snacks, of course, but other brands can have things like cookie jars, candy bowls, granola bars, and bottles of water available just as easily.

For an added twist, repack your snacks with a custom label that includes branding and contact information; it's like a business card your visitors can put in their mouths!

Stand Out From the Competition

One of the best ways to draw attention is to stand out from the other exhibition stands near you. There are many different ways you can do this, from contrasting colors to a unique layout, but the most effective come once you have some idea of what other brands are around you. You can run counter to, play off of, or otherwise engage with the environment if you know what's coming. It's not always possible to find a layout with exhibitor information, though, so you may just need to run with what you have.

You can also use design elements that are unusual in a trade show or exhibition to stand out. Things like carpets, subtle scents, and unusual motion can all work. The best options are ones you can deploy once you know what's around you so you can adapt to the circumstances.

Hire Engaging Staffers

Your exhibition staff need to be trained, engaging, and deeply knowledgeable about your company and products. These people are the cream of the crop amongst your customer outreach and sales crews, and need to be the charismatic face of your booth.

Think about the amount of space you have available, as well, and consider how many people should staff your exhibit. Maybe two or three are all you need (per shift throughout the day), or maybe you need more. You want to have enough people that no one walks by because everyone is too busy, but not so many people that your own staff crowd out the audience.

Insulate Your Space

Another compelling way to help attract people is by providing an oasis of clam in the otherwise bustling exhibition. If people can stop into your space for a brief respite from the noise and the crowds, it can be a great incentive for more traffic to stop in.

Some trade show advice blogs will say you can do a lot by providing a source of free wifi for your attendees. Truthfully, this isn't great advice anymore. Convention center wifi tends to be overwhelmed, yes, but whatever cell repeater you use isn't likely to be much better, won't extend far beyond the walls of your space, and probably won't be very fast either. It's also more likely to be overwhelmed, less likely to be secure, and potentially ripe for cyberattack. It is, essentially, a liability.

Plus, if more than a couple of other booths are doing the same thing, signal interference causes even more problems for everyone.

Have Strong, Visible Branding

Whenever possible, try to have some elements of eye-catching branding that rise above the crowd and stand out. Your goal is to have anyone who walks down by your exhibition space see these elements of branding. Then, later, they can remember you, even if they didn't stop in directly.

If nothing else, you can get some awareness marketing out of the exhibition.

You can also add to this with light and sound. The key, though, is to make sure any lighting you use isn't garish and disruptive to other booths or to your customers, and any sound you use is kept low and non-disruptive. You want something enticing and memorable, not something that feels like walking through a theater when an action movie is half over next door.

Try a Scavenger Hunt

One interesting trick is to engage visitors with a scavenger hunt.

There are a few different forms this can take.

• Hide a small decal or illustration in various places around your space, and challenge visitors to find them.
• Create a list of semi-common items and concepts, and challenge visitors to take photos of them to complete the list and redeem it for a prize.
• Partner with half a dozen or so other brands at the show, and challenge visitors to get stamps for attending presentations at each, and redeem them for a prize.

As you can see, different kinds of scavenger hunts have different scopes, so find the one that works for your brand and keeps people coming through.

Support a Uniform Appearance

In another recent post, we talked about what to wear and what not to wear to a trade show. All of the same advice applies to an exhibition stand as well.

Dress in a way that is comfortable, includes branding, and conveys a uniform appearance from your team. You can read that post for more detailed advice, of course.

Hire a Mascot

Many years past, one of the most common ways to get people to stop into your exhibition space was with a "booth babe," a conventionally attractive woman often in branded – but skimpy – outfits, whose sole job was to attract attention and funnel people in.

This is, obviously, a sexist and ineffective strategy. These days, it's all about mascots. Whether it's a person in an animal suit or a full big-head chibi mascot outfit, there are tons of options. The best is, of course, your brand's mascot, but if you don't have one, you can consider something more thematically appropriate to your brand or even just your presentation.

An alternative is to hire a special guest. An industry figure who can speak or simply help with presentations, and whose name recognition alone can bring people in, can go a long way towards attracting an audience.

Give Out Useful Swag

Swag makes the trade show ecosystem go 'round. The key is to make sure the items you give out are useful. Things like a t-shirt or jacket can be nice to have, hats and accessories are handy, and tools like towels and umbrellas can be situationally very useful. Higher-value prize swag, like electronics, can be very attractive but expensive. One of the best options is simply a branded tote, something your visitors can use to carry the stuff they get from other exhibitions and rep your brand all the while.

If you're interested in seeing some of the most useful eco-friendly and ethically-produced swag you can have, all you need to do is browse our store. We offer a ton of cool products you can have branded and ready to go quickly and easily in time for your next exhibition.