Trade events are a great place to showcase your business, find new customers, and network with other business leaders so you can form relationships that may benefit you in the future. But you’re up against a lot of competition at a trade show and if you don’t do something to get yourself noticed, you won’t see any of the benefits. People are going to see hundreds of different businesses and they’re going to forget 99 percent of them immediately. It’s your job to make sure that you’re in the 1 percent of businesses that they actually remember, and that can be tough. If you want to stop yourself from blending in with the hundreds of other businesses that are there, you need to think outside the box and do something different. These are some of the best ways to make your business stand out at a trade event. 

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Build The Hype 

Getting people to notice you and actually stop at your stand is harder than you think, which is why you need to build hype before the event gets underway. In the weeks leading up to the event, you need to be active on social media so people know that you’re going to be there. You can tease a few details about what people might find at your stand, but don’t give too much away. You could also hold online polls on social media asking people what kind of freebies they want you to hand out or what they would like to see included in your stand. If you post regularly and make sure that your posts are engaging, you can start to build a bit of hype, just like you would before a product launch. When people arrive at the event, they’ll head straight for your stand and ignore everybody else. 

Check Out The Competition 

It’s important that you know what you’re up against if you’re going to beat the competition, so do your research before the trade event. Have a look at your competitors’ social media pages and see if they have posted any details about their stand. Find out what kind of displays they have, what kind of freebies they’re giving away, and whether they are doing any demonstrations. Once you know what they have planned, you can make sure to come up with something that will blow it out of the water and set your business apart from the rest. 

Give Away Something Interesting 

People are going to get hundreds of free pens and mugs with company logos on at a business event, and they don’t even want them because they already have hundreds of them from the last event. You won’t entice people with boring freebies that everybody else is giving away, which is why you need to come up with something more innovative that people will remember, and try to think of something more useful that people will actually want. For example, you could get some cakes or fortune cookies with your business logo on them. Who doesn’t like free food after all? Or maybe you should get some branded headphones or laptop cases to hand out. These kinds of things are actually useful compared to the normal junk that people get, so you’ll get more people flocking to your stand. 

Have Fun With It 

A lot of businesses are pretty boring at trade events and they just give people a middle of the road presentation or video about their company. That kind of boring display isn’t going to get people talking about your stand, which is why you should try to be the life and soul of the party. Have a bit of fun with it and create an interesting display that doesn’t take itself too seriously. Something interactive is also great because it gets people to engage with you more and it’s a lot more memorable. 

Document It 

If you want people to remember your stand and get them excited about the next event, you need to document it and put it on social media. Video content plays very well with users on social media so while you’re at the event, make sure to take plenty of videos of your stand and the people that are interacting with it. You can use all of that footage to create a great highlights reel and post it on your social media pages. People will see it and be reminded of how great your stand was and how interested they are in your business, which should drive sales. 

These are all great ways to make sure that you stand out and people actually remember you after the trade show has ended.