What are Trade Shows?
Trade shows are promotional campaigns run by companies who want to announce something about their business, especially the launch of a new product or service. Big companies will usually do this with a lot of fanfare and they will also invite people who are in the same field. These shows also invite marketers because they can leverage the publicity the show gets to seek their own business targets and also the company can benefit by the promotion done by the marketers. In that way, it becomes a win-win situation for the trade show organizers as well as the marketers that are invited to the show.
Since these are most times big ticket events, a lot of preparation and planning goes into it, even for a marketer who wishes to attend the show. The marketer will probably attend with several name cards and informational material about his or her opportunity in order to facilitate prospecting. For them the trade show won't be as much an opportunity to know about the product as it will be to market their own venture.
What are the Pros of Trade Shows?
The immense publicity that these trade shows get becomes undoubtedly their biggest point. The marketers who attend can get a lot of leverage from this publicity.
There is a strong likelihood of getting customers from the people who have attended because only people who are interested in such businesses will attend these trade shows. It is even possible to prospect them in a much shorter time and hence increase the prospecting quantitatively.
What are the Cons of Trade Shows?
Trade shows do not happen everyday; they happen only for some special reasons. They are extremely expensive for the organizers and hence they will take every effort to ensure that they promote their product well. The marketers who attend these shows will definitely be sidelined.
It is necessary to be charismatic and have a good personality here because of the impact needs to be made in a short while. Also, these trade shows are very competitive places to campaign because there will be several other marketers sharing the same space.
