Five common trade show communication mistakes

A successful trade fair appearance is associated with many challenges.1. announce trade fair appearance too lateYou should inform your employees about the trade fair appearance in good time: Where and when will it take place? What is the motto? And what is the purpose of the trade fair visit? Make sure that this information, including updates on the progress of preparations, is also posted on the intranet or on the notice board. In the second step, you can then send the message to partners, service providers, customers, interested parties and the media.2. waiting too long to communicateThe media often start their preliminary reporting very early - in the print sector, for example, the editorial deadlines are usually three months before the trade fair date. You should therefore plan your communications work well in advance. This includes, for example, publishing a press release on time, but also preparing press kits for journalists. It is best to offer these via USB or download on your website. You should also ensure that you communicate your trade fair presence across all channels, publish social media posts and blog posts and prepare invitations to the trade fair and send them out by email at the right time.3. create a press release without news valuePress releases are the ideal way to draw attention to your trade fair visit in advance. The news value of your press release is important here. "We are also at the trade fair" is not enough. Instead, present a new product or an innovative service from your company, for example. State the important information first in the release (key data of the trade fair such as name, date, location, hall and stand number) and answer the W questions (Who, Where, When, What, How?). Each press release should also contain a backlink to your website or specific subpages.4. forgetting to maintain contactsYou can make lots of new contacts at a trade fair - and collect data and addresses in the process. For example, set up boxes at your stand where all interested parties can easily leave their business cards. If you want to use the trade fair to generate leads, you should also provide useful and ad-free content - e-books, checklists or white papers - on your website at an early stage. Interested parties can download these if they provide their name and email address. You can also contact your leads directly: For example, if a visitor is interested in your product, you can send them a whitepaper or video tutorial explaining how it works. Many contacts will also be grateful for a summary of the most important trends and trade fair highlights.5. let the follow-up work slideAfter the trade fair is before the trade fair: Proper and early follow-up of your trade fair appearance is crucial to its success. If you only contact interested parties weeks later, the lead has gone cold - which is why you should start developing leads straight away. In order to maintain communication after the trade fair, all available content should be used and tailored to the interests of the addressee. Also important: proactively approach journalists who write a summary of the trade fair, for example by offering them a statement. The data and information collected at the event can in turn be used to create further press releases, statements on future trends presented at the trade fair, specialist articles or blog posts.You can find more tips and information in the e-book "Content is king in trade fair communication", which is available in German only. here can be downloaded free of charge.