Top Tips on how to use Social Media at a Trade Show

Here at Glass Shed Exhibition Stand Design London, we appreciate that there's far more to successfully exhibiting than merely booking your pitch and turning up at an event. While it pays dividends to work with an expert design agency like ours who can take care of every aspect of your stand design, build and project management to deliver stunning results, you also have another powerful tool at your disposal. We're talking about your social media platforms.

The promotional power of Social Media

From Facebook to Instagram, LinkedIn to Twitter, the world's biggest online platforms, is an excellent way to spread the word and create buzz and engagement as part of your trade show promotional arsenal.

For those of you still relatively new to trade shows and social media, Glass Shed Exhibition Stand Design in London has a few industry tips to help you understand how you can use your social media channels to promote your next exhibit better.

Study your competitors and learn from their successes

To get the fast track on how to create a successful trade show business, you need look no further than your competitors' Facebook page. Chances are it will be full of photographs and posts about their recent activity, and you can glean a lot by taking a look-see.

Spend a few minutes searching the Instagram and Facebook feeds of inspirational and reputable companies in your sector that you aspire to emulate. Look out for snapshots of their booths and examples of the marketing materials they're using that deliver strong, visual impact. We also recommend that you read authoritative industry blogs to better understand trends you should be adopting yourself in 2020.

There's nothing wrong with taking inspiration from what's around you to ensure your success.

Use social media as part of your pre-show research.

If you're new to trade shows, you're yet to experience how diverse they can be. They can have quite defined cultures and distinct atmospheres, so getting to understand the set up before you attend is vital. Social media offers a discreet way to do this. Some shows are focused around presentations, others around networking, while some have a very corporate, business to business feel. Do your research and get to understand the culture so you can ensure your money is well spent, and you're primed and prepared to engage with your audience.

Ensure social media is also a pivotal part of your overall branding

When it comes to connecting with existing contacts as well as identifying, engaging, and attracting new ones, social media is an excellent and inexpensive tool. All your outward-facing company touchpoints, from your Twitter account if you have one, to your LinkedIn page and your official Facebook page should be consistently and recognisably branded. They're all an opportunity to reinforce your identity.

If you are attending a conference or exhibition, be sure to post regularly about the location and dates and consider running some kind of competition to encourage sign-ups and more visitors.

Facebook versus LinkedIn

While Facebook is still very much the preferred channel for B2C style networking, you might find that LinkedIn works much better in the B2B sphere. If you haven't already done so, be sure to set up a Company LinkedIn page and not just your personal profile. Then make sure that everyone in your business has a consistent profile and is associated with this parent company account. You can also use LinkedIn to search for trade shows and groups which you should join to start networking with people in your target audience. You might be pleasantly surprised just how many sales leads and contacts half an hour spent on LinkedIn can throw up. Invite them along to visit you in person at your next show and put a face to a name.

Post-event follow up.

Following a trade show, you should be armed with lots of new contacts and business cards. If you've missed picking up e-mail addresses, though, you can always search the names of the people you met with and invite them to connect with you via LinkedIn. That way, you can do follow up via InMail. The same strategy applies to all the other popular social media channels. Don't be fair to connect and follow up with a Direct Message so that you can spark up a new business opportunity.

We hope that basic overview from Glass Shed Exhibition Stand Design London has got you thinking about how you can improve your social media strategy. Contact us today for expert advice on achieving your show objectives.