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Characteristics, Planning,
Follow-up and Evaluating
Read this article to get information about the objectives of exhibition, its
characteristics, planning and follow-up actions.
Exhibition is the only promotional tool that brings buyers, sellers and the
competitors in a commercial setting. Since customers have to spend time and
money in attending an exhibition, customers who attend an exhibition are
interested in the product.
In that sense, exhibitions as a promotional tool is very targeted, i.e., only the
intended audience gets the message. Exhibitions are usually designed to
create a form of mass hysteria. Some exhibitions are annual affairs and attract
a lot of media attention, which helps in attracting more customers and also
more exhibitors.
They are very expensive as only a small numbers of customers can be
accommodated in an exhibition. Also, space is very expensive in popular
exhibitions and there is lot of expenditure in logistics.
1. Objectives of exhibitions:
An exhibition is an important part of the promotional mix of industrial markets.
Exhibition is an important source of information in industrial buying process,
and is second only to personal selling, and is way ahead of direct mail and
print advertising in terms of providing information to the industrial buyer. The
number of exhibitions, exhibitors and visitors is growing.
x. Make a sale:
An exhibition is always a good place to book orders from customers, though
this may not be a major objective of the company. They pay more attention to
educating their customers and getting their feedback.
In no other mediumadvertising, publicity, sales promotion or product
demonstrationsdo sales staff, key management personnel, present
customers and prospects join together in a live event. An exhibition offers the
company the opportunity to impress customers with its operations and
products.
will not be able to collect the information that it wants and visitors would have
left the stall with a bad impression of the company.
4. Follow-up:
Exhibition visitors, who are of interest to the company, should be tracked even
after the show is over. The database of these visitors should be developed
when the exhibition is on.
People will visit a booth for many reasons. Some will walk in just to have a
look. Some others might be interested in placing orders. Some will require
information while others will be interested in establishing business relations
with the company. It is important that the company establishes a procedure to
categorize the visitors without antagonizing them. A preliminary talk with a
visitor while being polite will also reveal their intention.
They can then be directed to suitable personnel. It is important that the
company maintains a data of the visitors and categorizes the data according
to the purpose of the visit. Back home, this data should be fed to concerned
departments. The data about prospective customers can be supplied to the
sales department while those of prospective business partners can be
5. Evaluating an exhibition:
Quantitative measures should be collected for:
i. Number of visitors to the stand
ii. Number of key influencers and decisions makers who visited the stand
iii. Number of leads and enquiries generated
iv. The cost per lead and enquiry
v. Number and value of orders
vi. Cost per order
vii. Number of new distributors opened or likely to be opened
viii. Worth of competitive intelligence gathered
ix. Interest generated in new products