Getting a stall at a trade fair or industry expo can be immensely helpful for building up your brand, drawing in new customers and sourcing new suppliers. However, with every business wanting to ‘be seen’ at an event, it creates a competitive environment where everyone is trying to one-up each other.

So, short of hiring a professional spruiker to stand in front of your stall and drown out the competition, how can you make your business stand out? We’ve put together some helpful tips for your next event.

Spend enough time pre-planning

It’s all good and well to book your stall and be excited about an upcoming event, but there’s still plenty of work to be done in the pre-planning phase. You’ll need to think about how the stall will look, what products you’ll bring along, the type of branding you want to display, as well as whether any staff will be joining you.

Make sure you answer these questions in the months leading up to the expo:

  • What is my budget for the event? (Including marketing spend, printing costs, lost work hours for additional staff attending.)
  • Who will be manning the stall, and do they have the interpersonal skills to draw in passers-by?
  • What products do we need printed, such as banners, flyers, brochures and more?

What to do at the event

The day before the event is set to run, sit down with your team and strategise about the ways in which you can attract visitors to your stall. Maybe you’ll want to strategically place banners around the venue. Perhaps you can get your people to walk around the event space with brochures and direct them to your stall. Either way, ensure your branding is eye-catching and inviting. Also make sure to choose extroverted staff who are comfortable – and good at – interacting with attendees.

The worst possible thing you can do at an event is sit in your stall and wait for people to come to you. With the amount of competition at industry expos, you will have to be proactive about getting people to your stall.

6 print solutions to elevate your brand

How you brand your business is one of the most crucial ways to draw people into your stall. You need to make your company stand out among the crowd, and the best way to do that is by designing and printing attractive marketing material. These should include – but are not limited to:

You can take things a step further by investing in special embellishments like foiling and embossing, which can give your brand an edge long after the event has finished. Think about whether you have the budget to give mini-gifts to your customers. These don’t have to be pricey – a small, custom-branded box that contains a keyring or a fridge magnet, for example, can keep your business front-of-mind for a potential customer in the weeks and months to come.

Bring these ideas into the real world

These ideas shouldn’t be restricted to expos. If they are attracting customers at a busy event, then why not test them out in your shopfront or as part of your marketing strategy?

Also consider adding extra features to your store to make it more COVID-safe. People’s opinions about shopping in physical stores – rather than purely online – mean it’s more important than ever to create a welcoming and safe experience for customers. That might mean printing off COVID check-in QR codes at your store’s entry that hero your brand colours, or getting floor decals that remind shoppers about social distancing, how many customers are allowed in the store at one time, and maintaining good hygiene.

Finding the right partner

Whether it’s for an upcoming trade show or you need to get a new product designed, printed and packaged for a seasonal run, you’ll want a print partner who provides fast-turnaround, high-quality and affordable solutions. Citywide Print can help you meet those hard deadlines while delivering cost-effective print and packaging products that truly stand out among your competition.

Contact us today or call the Citywide Print experts on (02) 8231 9988 to find out how we can go above and beyond for your printing needs.