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at trade shows
Signage, bags, product samples, guerilla stunts...
By Kathy Prentice
The marketing events cropping up outside of trade shows are creating a buzz before the doors to the annual assemblies even open.
Trade shows, where suppliers meet with consumers, providers of goods and services with users, now number in the thousands annually, including the out-of-home industry’s meeting in Palms Springs this week.
To find out how to get your clients out on the street and in front of their industry trade shows, read on.
This is one in a Media Life series on buying the new out-of-home venues. They appear weekly.
Fast Facts
What
Guerilla marketing campaigns outside industry trade shows.
Who
Massivemedia, headquartered in New York City, is one agency that
specializes in putting together trade show campaigns.
How it works
An advertiser can dominate a show without stepping
foot inside the
convention hall, says Rob Rukstalis, managing director of Massivemedia.
Typically several different elements, including wrapped vehicles, costumed
company reps handing out samples and chalk drawings in front of convention
center entrances are the foundation of many trade show campaigns.
Wrapped vehicles include Hummers or SUVs instead of the typical
busses, Rukstalis says.
"Or we might wrap a couple of little shuttle
busses and meet VIPs coming in at the airport. The first image they see is
your wrapped vehicle."
After shuttling company reps and their guests to the convention each
morning, the wrapped vehicle is then parked outside the convention center,
as a billboard.
Signage can be placed at exit ramps, on door hangers at hotels and
appear as wild postings around the convention center. Sidewalk graphics,
in either chalk or vinyl, can be put down each morning near convention
center entrances.
Once the sun sets, signs move to the sky.
"Video projections or
still images on walls are really, really big and bright," Rukstalis
says. "They’re a nice way to reinforce the brand image as consumers
leave a show."
Coffee cups and shopping bags that are handed to participants are also
signage vehicles.
"Hands down, the most effective marketing aspect is
to be the person with the biggest bag," Rukstalis says. "If you
go for a 13-inch bag, somebody is going to hand out a 17-inch bag and put
yours inside it. At any trade show people are going to accumulate stuff
and will be happy to get a free bag to put it in. From an advertising
standpoint, the bags are carried around all day, taken back to the hotel
at night, and brought back to the show the next morning."
Staff or so-called ambassadors, often in a company hat or costume
related to the product, work the trade show entrances, handing out freebies
like samples, bags, hats and pens.
"We train them to be
concierges," Rukstalis says. "Besides being the client’s
spokesperson about the product, we make sure they know where the bathrooms
and taxi stands are."
Sample products are often stuffed into the bags. For example, Redken
recently filled bags with a substantial amount of product
for hair stylists attending a trade show in Florida.
When giving product samples isn’t practical, related freebies and
coupons can be handed out at the entrances.
"For instance, at an
electronics show a company can’t give away CD players, so maybe they put
a CD in a bag or a flyer directing consumers to their booth at the show to
get a free CD," Rukstalis says.
Literature is best distributed as participants leave a trade show,
Rukstalis says.
"Everyone is competing for just so many eyeballs at a
trade show, and the only place to have someone’s full attention is before
they get there and immediately after they leave. And people are more apt
to take something on the way home that will make it to their desk at work,
so we load them up with literature, company brochures and product
specs."
Guerilla-style marketing usually happens outside an official presence
at a trade show, but it can happen in conjunction with a booth or presence
inside the show. At the recent Premiere Show in Orlando, Redken handed out
15,000 bags crammed with full-sized products before participating hair
stylists even stepped inside the convention center. A street team
wearing Redken baseball caps and t-shirts handled the distribution.
"They studied up on the products and really knew what they were
talking about," says Shae Kalyani, assistant vice president of media
for Redken. "The bags were beautiful, and the stylists used them for
the whole show. No matter where they went, in the show, walking on the
street, the image of Redken was constant."
Additionally, Massivemedia wrapped an SUV and a trolley with Redken
ads.
When an advertiser has purchased a presence or booth inside the show,
there is often more tolerance for guerilla tactics outside the show,
Rukstalis says.
"The bigger presence you have inside, the more the
trade show will be accommodating to the shenanigans you’re pulling
outside."
Service is turnkey, including removal of unauthorized signage at the
show’s conclusion.
Direct sales to participants is usually the goal of advertisers at
consumer trade shows. "The purpose is to sell jewelry, electronics,
fashion, restaurant supplies," Rukstalis says.
Creative is provided by the advertiser. Using big, bright labels and
logos turns a water bottle or shopping bag into a mini-billboard,
Rukstalis says.
Trade shows can be geared to industry reps or the general public.
Campaigns are individually designed to take into account what type of
demographic is the targeting goal.
"What we would typically suggest is all very customer-focused," Rukstalis says. Campaigns can range from a simple coffee
cart--free coffee in branded cups--at the trade show entrance to
multi-day, multi-element events.
Markets
Trade shows typically take place in big cities and resort areas.
Rukstalis says that Massivemedia is willing to travel to any market to
stage a campaign.
Numbers
There are over 15,000 trade shows each year in the U.S., according to
tsnn.com. That makes trade shows the 22nd largest industry in
the world.
How measured?
One method of measurement is to count the number of trade show
attendees.
The quantity of product distributed is another method, though common
practice is to budget samples for 25 percent of conference-goers,
Rukstalis says. "You can’t hit everybody. They’re moving in the
doors too fast."
Research
The rate at which trade show attendance, exhibits and square footage is
shrinking decreased during the first quarter of 2002, according to the
Tradeshow Week’s Quarterly Report of Tradeshow Statistics. Specifically,
the decline is smaller when compared to the fourth quarter of 2001. The
report states that the lessening in the rate of decline indicates an
improvement in the industry.
The average exhibition held in the first quarter of 2002 offered 643
exhibiting companies and drew 13,736 attendees, according to the report.
What product categories do well?
Automotive, fashion and accessories, gifts, cosmetics, electronics,
liquor, commercial supplies like restaurant equipment, boats and other
recreational items are regularly featured at trade shows.
Demographics
Groups are targeted. Most attendees either work in the industry
featured at a trade show or are shopping for product.
"We were targeting hairdressers going to the show because they
have the biggest influence over consumers," says Redken’s Kalyani.
"If you win the stylist over, you win over the people buying the
product."
Making the buy
Lead-time to staff a sampling program is 24 hours, with samples in
hand.
Production times for other materials vary. For example, t-shirts take
longer to print than logos on paper bags. When 10,000 to 100,000 of items
must be produced for a campaign, lead-time is four to six weeks.
Factors that affect pricing include elements of campaign, number of
samples and size of staff needed to distribute them, number of days of
campaign and costs for other items like vehicle wraps. "For a strong
presence at a three-day trade show including a couple of wrapped vehicles,
staffing and bags (but not the samples), it would cost about
$40,000," Rukstalis says.
Who’s already on display outside trade shows?
Redken, Zenith and other advertisers have used guerilla marketing at
trade shows including Comdex, Hair World and CES (consumer electronics
show).
What they’re saying
"To create more of a presence and to increase our brand image we
decided to do these events this year. It was a matter of getting our
products into the hands of the people who use them…the hair stylists who
have a big influence over their customers. People loved it. Wherever they
went Redken was in their face. It’s almost like we took over the
show." – Shae Kalyani, assistant vice president of media and public
relations at New York-based Redken
Web site info
Massivemedia at www.massivemediainc.com
August 26, 2002© 2002 Media Life
-Kathy Prentice writes about out-of-home advertising for Media Life, penning her stories from the resort town of Traverse City, in the upper reaches of Michigan.
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