Trade shows offer valuable marketing and public relations benefits, including sales leads, media coverage and brand exposure.
Trade shows are also expensive. Booth space, attendee registration, booth design and setup, giveaways, promotions, employees to man the booth and staff travel expenses all add to costs. If companies don’t measure ROI, they cannot be sure trade show investments pay off. Despite widespread uncertainties about the costs versus benefits, vendors typically pack trade show space.
Almost half (44 percent) of business owners and marketing managers don’t measure ROI of their trade shows, according to a survey by Display Wizard. Many exhibitors (39 percent) called trade shows a profitable marketing tactic and cited their benefits: the ability to reach many customers in a short space of time and give consumers the opportunity to see the people behind the company.
“It’s crucial for businesses to have a good understanding of the return on their marketing spend in order to sensibly assign budgets for the following year,” says Display Wizard Co-owner Diarmuid Beary. Inability to measure ROI of trade shows could allow inappropriate or unnecessary spending, which directly impacts the performance of the entire business.
The Four Steps
In an article for MarketingProfs, Peter Symonds, Display Wizard trade show marketing expert, outlines four steps to measure trade show ROI. Here’s an overview:
Set a simple goal. Select a quantifiable, actionable goal and an appropriate metric to measure it. Keep things simple. Set one goal for your first show. “If your goal isn’t measurable with a concrete “yes” or “no,” it’s too vague or complicated,” he says.
Track and update leads. Most trade shows provide systems to record visitors by badge number. With a customer relationship management (CRM) tool, track your leads to see which ones produce sales. Create a custom tag within the CRM system to identify and measure leads from trade shows.
Calculate your lifetime customer value. Lifetime customer value (LCV) tells you the total amount of profit a new customer produces over the long term. After tagging tradeshow leads in CRM software, you can group leads from one event, then divide the total profit by the amount of leads.
Continue measuring and optimizing. Many businesses make the mistake of measuring their trade show ROI once, then assuming that it will not change. Because every trade show is different, it’s essential to track and monitor each event.
If companies don’t measure ROI, they cannot be sure trade show investments pay off.Obtaining clean data is essential for measuring ROI, yet often challenging, according to a new ebook from Shift Communications. For instance, trade show registration lists often don’t jive well with automated marketing systems.
“There must be reliable data in the marketing systems, and marketers must make accurate use of that data, to truly determine trade show ROI,” it states. “How did the brand reach people? When people provide information at the booth, are they giving up-to-date information? What information does the conference provide through its badges?
Shift Communications suggests that marketers considering attending trade shows ask these questions:
- Are our customers there? Are our competitors there?
- Should we speak there? Should we become a sponsor?
- How large is the event’s media attendance? How many briefings can we secure?
- Should we pull a stunt to stand out?
- What is our budget? The answer to this question is necessary to measure ROI.
- Is the marketing team dedicated to engaging with the audience?
Measuring Public Relations Activities
Major trade shows often attract a large contingent of consumer and trade press. Most major shows also have their own daily publications and/or TV broadcasts available to attendees. Trade shows therefore offer significant opportunities for public relations activities to obtain earned media placements that create greater awareness of the organization’s products and services. Measuring results of PR activities connected to the trade show, therefore, should factor into assessment of trade show ROI. A media monitoring and measurement service can provide, segregate and analyze data from trade show publicity.
Bottom Line: Although trade shows may offer substantial marketing opportunities, they’re extremely expensive. That means quantifying and measuring the concrete results of trade shows is imperative to sensible budgeting of future marketing and PR expenses and, ultimately, to business success.
William J. Comcowich founded and served as CEO of CyberAlert LLC, the predecessor of Glean.info. He is currently serving as Interim CEO and member of the Board of Directors. Glean.info provides customized media monitoring, media measurement and analytics solutions across all types of traditional and social media.
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