Tools to Measure the Success of Your Trade Show Event

trade show event
Trade shows require a lot of work from those involved in them. Everyone has to work hard in order to nuture current clients, attract new customers and create brand awareness. However, estimating success based on your personal experience and instinct at the show isn’t enough. You must be able to prove to your superiors that the money and work invested in making it all happen wasn’t a complete waste.

When planning a trade show and creating a budget, you have to determine a method for keeping track of all the expenses. Once the budget is set, your next task is to figure out how you will measure what you gain from participating in the event. There are numerous tools available to capture data and calculate the actual benefits that your company receives from an event.

Here are some of the tools you can use:

  • Applications for Lead Capturing

These tools can be either rented at the show or purchased from the various options available by vendors online. Applications will enable you to gather information about your leads effectively and download the data into your own CRM or lead management system. You can also utilise them to capture key information of your prospects, including answers to some questions that sales and marketing can use to determine how interested the leads are.

  • Software for Lead Management

There is a lot of software available for tagging and importing all the leads you acquired at the show and nurture them. You can create email templates which can be personalised for follow-ups after the event based on their activity, the information requested, the activities they attended and their answers to specific questions.

  • CRM System

CRM, also known as Customer Relationship Management, is a system often bundled in various lead management software. It’s the database system that allows the sales team to keep track of the leads they are contacting, considering things like if they made a purchase or not and when they should get back to them. Even when using these tools, the marketer must follow up, request downloads or get access to all the data from the sales team for all the shows planned and the events attended. You may also need to explain the benefits of having all this data.

  • Spreadsheets

It’s a simple tool, free of cost and extremely handy. It’s so easy to use that it can even be handled by an amateur. Reading all the data and information about sales deals can be easier using the same spreadsheets. With this tool, you can manually keep track of all your prospective clients who’ve visited your booth during the show. You may attract a lot of visitors by incorporating appealing graphics and various creative booth ideas, but how can you count them? This can be done using a spreadsheet. You can always hire staff for your booth to be responsible for taking the leads into consideration and also converting them into customers.

Most exhibitors forget to measure the success of their presence at a trade show and focus mostly on display and booth ideas. Keep these tools handy and include them in your trade show planning.