Lead follow up
General research shows that 74% of leads gained at exhibitions are not followed up, which is strange when you consider that 90% of the orders come from these follow ups. Remember that for every order you get at the exhibition you could get another 9 by following up the leads you obtained at the show. You need to plan your lead capture and management before you get to the exhibition. Make someone responsible for this and ensure the plan is carried out.

Firstly create a lead collection form. Print them out on the office printer and take them with you to the show. This form should contain all the information you will need to contact your prospective customer in the days and weeks after the show. You should get everything on an A5 sheet of paper, print 2 on an A4 sheet and cut them in half. Head the form with the name of the exhibition then add date, contact name, position within the company, company name, company address, company telephone number, email address or if not a company the prospects personal details. Leave plenty of room to write in the details. Keep the form as simple as possible but complete it in full even if the prospect gives you a business card. Using a form to record the details of each visitor to your stand gives you the information in a standardised format making it easier to add them to your customer/potential customer database when you get back to the office. It is a good idea to have a box somewhere on the form so that you can prioritise the leads. Put a letter, number or coloured tick in this box such as:

Red tick - Hot prospect ready to buy now
Orange tick - May have a requirement in the next few months
Black tick - Gathering information for future

You will need to follow up these leads more than once. Decide your follow up strategy and make people accountable for carrying it out – on average a prospect needs to be asked five times before the buying decision is made. Follow ups will include telephone calls or personal visits, emails, printed literature, DVDs, invitations to demonstrations, etc.

Make sure the exhibition pays for itself
Keep a record of how much money has been spent on the show
Count how many leads you obtained.
Count how many orders you received from these leads and the value of those orders.
Work out how much each order has cost you and compare this against other forms of publicity you use.

Even if the cost of orders from the exhibition is higher that the cost of orders from some other form of publicity it does not mean the exhibition was a bad idea. What it does mean is that you need to look again how you presented your company at the show, at your pre-show publicity, your stand design, the literature you had available and all the other variables to ensure that you get better results from future shows. Everyone’s favourite question is “What is in it for me,” If WII FM was a radio station it would have the largest audience of any radio station ever. Make sure you tell potential customers what is in it for them, before they even step on to your stand. By obtaining the visitor figures from the exhibition organisers and comparing them to how many of these visitors actually came to your stand you can see just how well you did.

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