subject: Fishing for Trade Show Leads [print this page] Transcribed from Anders' Trade Show Video Coaching Series. Hi, it's Anders the infotainer and as you can tell, I'm dressed a little bit differently than the normal. I am not wearing a suit. I'm on vacation! I'm at the Lake-I'm sure you can hear it. Now, I'm here on the floating dock and it's bouncing all over the place, but the reason I'm here, is I went fishing and I was lucky enough to catch a one-pound Jack and what does that have to do with tradeshow exhibiting? Well, I think it has a lot to do with it. There's a nice metaphor, a nice analogy there where you're trying to get leads, usually that is one of your objectives at a trade show-sales leads, trying to bring those leads, those prospects into the booth and the same thing with fishing, you're trying to catch fish, you're trying to bring the fish into your boat. So the booth is the boat, the leads are the fish, nice little analogy. There's other analogies that I think are nice. Sometimes, when you're fishing, you have a favorite fishing spot where you've caught a lot of fish before, well those would be the shows that you go to that are effective for you that are making-that are creating a return on investment for you. So if you're not seeing that at your shows, maybe you should choose a different fishing location, maybe that show is not right for you. These are some of the things that you have to think about. Another analogy is the fact that you use lure or bait when you're fishing to try to catch the fish, to try to get them to bite the hook, right? And your lure or bait would be your giveaways or any way you incentivize your prospects that come to the booth to check out your wares, to check out what your company does and how you can help them. Now, this can also be maybe a demonstration that could excite people to get in there or some sort of giveaway to draw a prize-all that stuff. Here's another analogy. Now you can fish with a rod or you can fish with a net. Now, fishing with a rod is very pretty conventional, just cast it out, keep casting out until you get one to come in, bring in one fish at a time. Now, that's just like you're sitting in your booth, you're waiting for someone to come by, someone shows a bit of interest, maybe see some graphics or what have you, you're able to actually talk to them and pull them in with your words. Now, you can also fish with a net. Fishing with a net is a little more productive and that's why, of course, commercial controllers on the East Coast or wherever, they throw the net, they drag it behind them and they pull in a bunch of fish. Now, some of the fish aren't the ones that they want, well, the same thing when they're casting with a rod. They might not be the fish you want, you might have to throw it back and the same thing with the net, but there's going to be some that you throw back, but there's always going to be some that you want to keep and the analogy of that in the trade shows is use an infotainer, a trade show presenter or trained communicator to communicate your message, but first, they gather the crowd so there's lots of people to talk to. So they're not just talking one on one, you're talking to a huge crowd of people, hundred plus people perhaps, right? And then once you can tell them about your company and motivate them and send them over to the sales team and then they can fill up the fish if you will. So, these are the things that you have to think about. What are you using for lure? Do you want to fish with a rod or a net, this is homework. Do you have the right fishing holes? Maybe you need a bigger boat, a bigger booth. Who knows! These things you have to test for and if you're getting results, then you're doing the right thing, do more of it. Until next time, wish you all the trade show success. Thanks for watching.
