Marketing Your Shows the 4 C's Way

Traditional marketing is changing: Customers are more sophisticated and price sensitive. They expect products and services to be delivered faster and more conveniently. And they have no qualms about switching to competitors. At same time, traditional marketing tools are less effective than in past. Products are not much different from each other, pricing is quickly matched by competitors, advertising is expensive and less effective, and sales force costs are rising. Consumers are constantly being interrupted by thousands of marketing messages, making it easy for one message to get lost in overwhelming clutter of communications. Plus, consumers no longer have a well-defined set of products and vendors that they will consistently seek out to fulfill a need. So how do you create, win, and dominate markets today? According to marketing guru Dr. Philip Kotler, "marketing must help company deliver more value to customer." What does this mean in trade show terms? It means that you need to focus on services both exhibitors and attendees perceive as valuable ... and deliver them with perpetually fresh appeal. Customer Value Customers are getting more and more value conscious. You can fulfill their expectations by constantly "thinking exhibitor" and "thinking attendee." You need to live and breathe for your customers -- they make your job possible. Encourage your team to do whatever it takes to get projects accomplished and wow your customers. Follow examples set by Disney, Ritz-Carlton, and Southwest Airlines. If they can do it, why can't you? Brainstorm ways in which you can continually differentiate yourselves from competing shows. Don't be shy about inviting your exhibitor advisory members to be part of your team. Insist that they evaluate your employees on job. Training also needs to be a major consideration. If your employees need more skills, offer to pay for specific training courses in your area or push them to pursue continuing education opportunities online. Change Is your show successful way it is? Do you think you have perfect formula that works? If you say yes, you might be heading for decline. Your team needs to fall in love with change. If you don't grow and change, you'll become stale, your competition will outdo you, and then your show will be history. Change, however, has to be in line with essence of your show -- it needs to be relevant. Just as your attendees expect to see and experience something new and exciting from visiting your exhibitors' booths, that expectation should also define your overall show. The challenge is that results need to be visible to bottom line.

Top 10 Blog Writing Tips

Most of "rules" about writing for ezines and newsletters apply to writing posts for your blog, but there are some important differences. Keep these 10 tips in mind and you'll be publishing great blog content that attracts prospects and clients in your niche market. 1. Write with reader in mind. Remember WIIFM? It’s marketing jargon for What’s In It For Me? That’s what you should be keeping in mind. Your reader will read your post looking for what’s in it for them. 2. Make it valuable and worthwhile. Don’t waste people’s time. If you don’t have anything to say, no problem, plenty other people do. So share their articles, do an interview, review a book. 3. Proof-read for typos and glaring grammatical errors. You wouldn’t go out of house with dirty hair or missing a sock, so why would you publish spelling mistakes? Respect your readers by polishing up your stuff. 4. Keep it short and simple, sweetie. (KISS). Most people are scanners. You may have a lot to say and think it interesting, and it may be. But people are reading online and out of time. Get to point quickly. Publishing short posts more frequently is a better format than publishing lengthy articles every few weeks. 5. Keep it lively, make it snappy and snazzy. Even if you aren’t a natural born writer, you can write for your blog. Just write like you’re speaking to your friend…or to yourself! Remember though, get to point quickly. Keep in mind journalist’s rule of 5 W’s in first paragraph: who, what, why, when and where.

6. Link often. This builds credibility and positions you as an expert in your field. People don’t have time to know what others are doing, you should tell them. Linking to other blogs and websites also helps you build a network of associates who will in turn link to your blog. 7. Use keywords often. This will help you stay on purpose, and search engines will love your blog. Your rankings will go up. This is one of reasons we have you write out your purpose statements before beginning your blog. The clearer you are about your purpose, more consistently you will deliver messages that are on target. And more often your keywords show up, better your search engine results.