Quick Hits for Excelling at Trade Shows You Attend

Sohil Adyanthaya:

Being able to story-tell in someone else's language I think is huge. Team by team, it's not like everyone speaks the same language or has the same KPIs so being able to communicate the value of things in their language is major.

Alyssa Peltier:

Great events create great brands, but pulling off an event that engages, excites, and connects audiences, well, that takes a village. And we're that village. My name is Alyssa.

Rachel Andrews:

I'm Rachel.

Felicia Asiedu:

And I'm Felicia.

Alyssa Peltier:

And you are listening to Great Events, the podcast for all event enthusiasts, creators and innovators in the world of events and marketing. 

Hello everyone. What has been going on in this wide, wide world of events? My name is Alyssa, and I will be your host for this week's episode. Today, we are going to be talking about the events that you attend, specifically trade shows. So whether you work for a small company, a large company, an association even, or even a huge global enterprise, trade shows are a core function of genuinely any business. I personally started in a very small organization that was actually a trash company. I believe I referenced that in the past, but we even went to trade shows. I went, and I put the whole pop-up stand there, I had business cards in the bowl, and now this was 10, 15 plus years ago, but trade shows were a common practice for our business as well. So whether you work for a trash company, like I said, or a huge, well-known brand, trade shows are commonplace.

And why is that? Because they generate leads, they increase your brand exposure, they help you make connections, you're engaging, you're networking with not just your non-customers or your prospects, but you're existing with your customers as well in that precious face-to-face setting. Now, I will say while Cvent has been kind of synonymous with helping event planners and marketers with those events that they tend to host themselves, capturing those registrations, supporting an on-site experience, we also have recognized the need for solutions that can support any event that you're either going to or you're hosting, so those have included trade shows.

Proof of this investment in this space has been two quite large acquisitions and growth to the Cvent family that took place a little bit earlier this year. We welcomed Jifflenow to our suite of solutions, and this is a solution that's aimed at helping to manage and maximize the representation at these types of trade shows with more preset or pre-booked appointments. We also incorporated iCapture into our solution set. This is more of an advanced lead capture solution that will help you to optimize those opportunities and really to capture more of the show value, and that's really to help expedite and create urgency around that relevant follow-up following those trade shows, whether that goes into your marketing automation platform, a CRM or whatever way you need to distribute information following your trade show experience.

So I've given you kind of the overview of the lay of land on trade shows, that they're important and some technologies that Cvent has that support them. But to help us take this conversation to the next level, I'm really excited to introduce a first-timer to the podcast, Sohil, who is a former Cvent. Sohil, can you tell the audience a little bit more about yourself?

Sohil Adyanthaya:

Yes, thank you for having me, Alyssa. My name is Sohil. I'm on the product marketing team here at Cvent, and I came on as the product marketer for Cvent's Trade Show Solutions, which, like Alyssa was mentioning, are products for the events you attend. Every trade show you attend, you have a consistent set of tools that is Trade Show Solutions. I was brought on board to represent those products and a lot of things have changed since I came on. Like Alyssa mentioned, the acquisitions took place, and now my role has shifted drastically. But yeah, that's a little bit about me and I'm happy to talk more about the products or trade shows as a whole, but I'll kick it over to Alyssa.

Alyssa Peltier:

Well, let's start with trade shows as a whole. So I mean, I just kind of said the value of trade shows in general, right? Is there anything that I missed in terms of the value to an organization from attending a trade show?

Sohil Adyanthaya:

I mean, you hit it, but I think there are a couple of studies that were published in Gartner and the Friedman Reports that highlight it a bit more. So, over 90% of event professionals agree that quality leads is the most important outcome of trade shows, under 10%, I think around 6%, actually believe they're properly converting leads. So you can see there's a huge disparity in what is needed and what people have. So I think that sort of highlights the importance of the events you attend. And like you said, trade shows are a critical marketing channel, and they drive significant amount of revenue for organizations. So it's important to make sure that you're capitalizing on it with the right set of tools and just the right tactics in place, which I'm sure we're going to get into in a second. But they're huge revenue drivers and making sure that you actually engage the employees that you send to these events is the biggest part of that for sure.

Alyssa Peltier:

Yeah, that's huge. We will get into that because that was a huge hurdle for us as engaging the employees, not only just engaging the attendees, but of course the enablement piece as well. Okay, so let's talk from the planner point of view, either field marketer, demand gen marketer, whoever is actually organizing this from the company standpoint, what are some of those pain points that honestly continue to be a challenge even today? I know what I just mentioned, the business cards in a bowl, right? That's kind of the analog problem, but what are some of those other pieces that you still see planners facing today?

Sohil Adyanthaya:

The biggest challenge is just not enough leads are being collected, not enough quality leads are being collected. And a huge piece of that if we're taking it even before the event is not enough quality meetings are set with the right people so that's where some of these tools come in handy. Setting the right meetings with the right people and assigning subject matter experts to these meetings is huge, like I said, to make sure that the employees that are being sent are being engaged properly, the right people are being scanned.

And not having a consistent set of tools is also huge. So not having a consistent set of lead capture tools event to event is a huge problem because it wastes a lot of time just having each employee learn a new set of tools each event, and it takes training time, it's a heavy investment, it's a lot of money wasted. So that's why we always say a consistent set of tools at every event for any event is the way to go. A lot of manual work and data inconsistency is a huge piece of this too, and not getting to sales teams fast enough and them not being able to follow up fast enough is a major issue because, I mean, I'm sure it's been said on this podcast a bunch, but just if the leads are not hot and they're not acted on quickly enough, it's a major issue.

So taking it to the meetings that I was talking about also, last minute meeting changes and no context for the person that is attending the meeting is also a major issue because they're not coming prepared with the right mindset or what they even expect to get out of that meeting. So it's really just prepping the people that you're sending to these events with the right set of tools to manage those meetings, and then also making sure they're getting actual quality leads and they're talking to the right people. I think the key is working smarter, not faster or harder, it's just more so just making sure that you're talking to the right people, engaging the right people, and collecting the right leads.

Alyssa Peltier:

So let's talk about these technologies kind of across the trade show journey, if you will, from the planner lens and also how you're enabling, because we're talking really about a lead capture device, we're also talking about an appointments tool that can do things both pre, during and post-event. So while I know there's even more tech to manage than that, just those tools alone can be a lot to manage. So can you kind of walk us through kind of a pre, during and post journey with both of those technologies in mind to help you capture the most out of the overarching trade show experience?

Sohil Adyanthaya:

For sure. So a meeting scheduling tool and then one consistent lead or retrieval tool, those are the two tools that you need to make sure you're capitalizing on these events. So I'll use Jiffelnow and iCapture as just an example. So with Jiffelnow, before the event, pre-event, you're going to want to make sure you schedule the meetings with the right people. You want to find a tool that has an automated scheduling feature and making sure those B2B meetings are with the right people. I can't stress that enough.

Managing appointment workflows is also huge and making sure that calendar notifications and calendar notifications are set with the right people. And then being able to report on the actual meeting and being able to see what's actually extracted out of those meetings that you have at the trade show is also a big piece of it, and this is through Salesforce integrations and what have you. We're able to see the actual ROI of those meetings. They're not just calendar invites and Outlook and then nothing comes from them. That's pre-event.

And then during the event, you want to make use of that lead capture tool. So just improving the overall lead volume and the lead velocity and driving more qualified leads with one set of tools. So if you have one set of tools from event to event instead of having your team learn it at the very beginning, you're able to create a consistent process each show, and you're able to have your employees basically take advantage of the features that relate to segmenting, lead scoring, that sort of thing, and then they're actually having the conversations and getting the right leads back to their sales teams for fast follow-up. And then you're able to track the return of the trade shows, like I said, with reporting. So yeah, so very high level, but pre, during and post, it kind of just goes into that automated meeting scheduling, proper lead retrieval, lead capture, and then true lead activation.

Alyssa Peltier:

Yeah, and from my point of view, it sounds like these really are similar to the events that you host tight conversation, you really need to take considerations across all three of those phases in an event experience, right? Despite it being an event that you attend, you can't, despite me trying at the trash company, show up, put the pop-up stand, put bowl out and expect goodness to happen, there really is a strategic approach in which technology assists through the pre, during, and then post, which is where you're really reaping the value of what happens. So it takes a lot of planning. It starts with a good plan, right? Every great outlook starts with a good plan. So I think oftentimes we do see organizations going and saying, "We didn't get that value," you just said 10% and the reason why you may only be getting 10% is that you don't have a plan for technology and an outcomes-minded approach in play.

Sohil Adyanthaya:

You have to be super intentional about it. There was another stat, I don't know if I remember the exact, but it was between 12 and 13%, I think, annual marketing program budgets are spent on events you attend. So people are investing in these events so you should be intentional about the planning, like you were saying.

Alyssa Peltier:

Yeah. And we need to be able to have that business conversation to say, "This is the return that we got," or, "This is the return we didn't get," and not go to that thing next year, right? It's not just we have to be there. Oftentimes we'll hear that either from sales or from marketing, "Well, the data should really tell the story," and how do we have better data? We create standard processes around that data capture to what you were just talking about.

Let's talk about the people involved in this. I know we're talking about sales, we're talking about marketing, we're talking about planning, like a high level, but who are some of the most common teams that support the trade show? Because I know from my experience at Cvent here that that's not always the same team that's supporting the events that you host, right? It's not your conference team per se.

Sohil Adyanthaya:

Yeah, I mean, when we're talking about a set of tools for events you attend, we're usually directing the conversation at trade show program managers. So I'm sure if you work for an event company, you have someone in mind when I say that. But this person is responsible for organizing the trade shows that their organization is going to attend that year, and then responsible for figuring out who goes to that event. So all those challenges I mentioned earlier, that mostly falls on them. Some of this is on marketing executives and field marketing managers, but primarily trade show program managers are the ones that are dealing with a lot of those headaches.

Alyssa Peltier:

The tactical execution, less so the overarching experience? Got it.

Sohil Adyanthaya:

Yeah, 100% and they're responsible for the planning like we've been talking about, and making sure a lot of these teams are put into place to succeed. So dealing with the tools that they use and then making sure the pre-event list is in place and everything like that, that all falls on them a lot of the time. So the conversation with specifically the Trade Show Solutions and these tools are primarily there to help them.

Alyssa Peltier:

Now let's talk about kind of the sales partnership. I'm going to throw a curveball your way because I think a huge component to the success of any trade show is not only those that are staffing, oftentimes as a sales rep, a marketing rep or a field rep that is in the region in which that event is taking place, but there is a certain level of sales investment in the post-event followup that's required. So do you have any recommendations for how to kind of shore up the relationship between either your trade show program manager or your marketer or whomever is executing your trade show program and establishing a better and improved relationship with your sales kind of endpoints?

Sohil Adyanthaya:

Seems kind of basic, but I think just communicating the value of what we've been talking about here today. I think a lot of people are not educated on what is the point? I think a lot of people for optics or like you said, for the organization, just thinking, "This is something we should be at this year," I think a lot of the sales teams also view it like that. So they're not seeing the reporting, they're not seeing the backend, they're not seeing the actual ROI that's being taken from these events.

So I think just communicating that and just with numbers, with numbers and reporting and just making sure they know, "Okay, this is an actual critical driver of revenue and this is something that's important. This is not just for show or something fun that we're doing, this leads to things." Making sure that's there for them to see, not just something that's just like, "Okay, you're going to this thing, or the teams are going to this thing. Can you just support it?" I feel like if they have an idea on the story, I think maybe it's a more storytelling thing, just give them an idea on the story like we've been talking about here today from pre during post, the challenges that we talked about and why this matters, and I think they'll be in the position to succeed.

Alyssa Peltier:

Yeah, I drive that adoption of not only the technologies, but just being a participant in the trade show experience itself, right? They get excited about the potential of what could be as opposed to, "Oh, man, I got to go staff this thing and I got to scan these things," and it can sound like a chore as opposed to, "This is going to fuel my funnel for Q3. I'm going to close business." If you can kind of generate that enthusiasm around it, but in their language, in their terms, in whether it's a KPI or whether it's just kind of how they qualify themselves or quantify their own success, you're right so just kind of driving that storytelling, but through their lens, right? Because salespeople can be quite selfish, right? Because they're adherent to these big numbers and lofty goals and they're held accountable to those. So the more that you can say, "I'm going to help you through this tactic or this channel," namely a trade show, the stronger the partnership, right?

Sohil Adyanthaya:

Yeah. And I think you said it, like speaking their language. I think maybe if we're taking it outside of trade shows for a second and just talking about, I guess, business tactics that are important for everybody, being able to story-tell in someone else's language I think is huge. Team by team, it's not like everyone speaks the same language or has the same KPIs so being able to communicate value of things in their language is major.

Alyssa Peltier:

I love that, and I think that's a perfect way to wrap up this conversation. Short, sweet, to the point. I love this about trade shows, so hell, we don't talk enough about the events that we attend as much as we talk about the events that we host, but they are very important. And like you said, with perfect data starting this conversation, there's a lot of investment that goes into these, so we need to make sure that we're reaping the value. With that, thank you so much Sohil for joining me as a first timer podcast, cohost, interviewee, you did a fantastic job, would love to have you back. And for all of you fellow listeners, thank you so much for joining us today and we'll see you next week.

Sohil Adyanthaya:

Thanks guys.

Alyssa Peltier:

Thanks for hanging out with us on Great Events, a podcast by Cvent. If you've been enjoying our podcast, make sure to hit that subscribe button so you never miss an episode.

Felicia Asiedu:

And you can help fellow event professionals and marketers just like you discover great events by leaving us a rating on Apple, Spotify or your preferred podcast platform.

Rachel Andrews:

Stay connected with us on social media for behind the scenes content, updates and some extra doses of inspiration.

Felicia Asiedu:

Got a great story or an event to share? We want to hear from you. Find us on LinkedIn, send us a DM or drop us a note at greatevents@cvent.com.

Rachel Andrews:

Big thanks to our amazing listeners, our guest speakers, and the incredible team behind the scenes. Remember, every great event begins with great people,

Alyssa Peltier:

And that's a wrap. Keep creating, keep innovating, and keep joining us as we redefine how to make events great.