What Do You Do When The Trade Show Is Over?

Working with a full-service exhibit company to participate in a trade show is an intensive period of both time and investment. A lot happens over just a few days, and a good trade show grows business significantly when it’s done right.

But what happens once the dust settles, exhibits are taken down, and it’s time to return home and resume business? Here’s what you should be doing once the trade show is over.

Work That Database

Trade shows are often about generating leads, acquiring new clients or customers, and making new business contacts. However, all of this is information, and information is more useful when it is properly stored and organized. It’s critical to take all that new incoming data and make sure it is entered into a database and categorized. Priority leads should get priority ranking.

Act On The Highest Potentials

There will be specific meetings and potential clients where staff and management know these will lead to productive results. These high-priority contacts should be reached, preferably with phone calls or an online meeting shortly after a trade show. This often means within a day or so of the trade show ending.

Follow-Ups

For the other potential leads and contacts, it’s still important to establish contact, but “as soon as possible” isn’t a necessity. Direct interaction isn’t necessarily required either. Email follow-ups are usually sufficient in these cases, though it’s still important to personalize these rather than sending out an obviously generic mass mail. Within 48 hours of the trade show’s end is often the best timeframe.

Social Media

The online space is now also dominated by social media, so if any potential contacts have a presence on standard platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, or others, now is the time to ensure that social media engagement is also established. LinkedIn, in particular, may be important for networking and business reasons.

Post-Mortem

It’s also critical to take stock of what happened during the trade show and evaluate the entire experience. What worked well? What didn’t? What could be improved? Should this trade show be attended again, or would another be more suitable?

Take the time to digest what happened and process the trade show experience to see how close you came to achieving your established goals and how you can improve things for the next trade show.

If you’re thinking of taking part in a trade show and want to plan your exhibit, we can help. Contact Lighthouse Exhibits, and we can assist you with designing and constructing your trade show exhibit.