The Zimbabwean exhibition season is coming to an end with the last events of the year being held this month as the nation heads for the December/January holidays season. For those show organisers whose events were held during the course of the year, it is time for planning next year’s edition of their shows.
This includes strategising how to get exhibitors to take up space for the events. Getting repeat business from exhibitors is not assured. According to Irish exhibitions expert, Stephan Murtagh globally businesses lose about 17 percent of their customers. This is worse for Zimbabwean exhibitions which operate in an economy beset by many challenges.
In view of this, exhibition organisers should work hard to leverage the relaxation of Covid-19 safety protocols such as lockdowns to not only retain their traditional exhibitors but secure new ones and keep their shows and businesses afloat.
There are a number of strategies that exhibition organisers could employ to retain their customers. These include the following
- Assisting them to plan for their participation
When economies are going through challenges, the tendency for many businesses is to just sell whether or not the customer really needed the merchandise or service. The same applies to exhibition organisers. They may succumb to the temptation to sell without providing value to exhibitors. Organisers need to provide value to exhibitors as opposed to reducing themselves to mere merchants of exhibition space. When exhibitors buy exhibition space they are buying more than a physical space. They are buying means of achieving their business or brand objectives. Organisers should understand that they have a duty to assist exhibitors by selling what the latter needs rather than selling what the former has available.
In this regard, organisers should be prepared to help exhibitors to make the most of the exhibition for the benefit of their own businesses. This is especially very important for first-time exhibitors who need handholding in using exhibitions to market their goods and services. Organisers should establish exhibitors’ needs and assist them to set their objectives and targets. It also means teaching them the importance of setting objectives that are realistic and how to use the show to achieve them.
2. Assisting them to set realistic expectations
Even after assisting exhibitors to set realistic objectives, they may still have unrealistic expectations. For example, they may expect a certain number of visitors to their stand based on wrong assumptions. Based on the information that over 5 000 people visit the exhibition annually, an exhibitor may assume that all of them will pass through their stand. This is unrealistic. Visitors to an exhibition do not visit every stand. Another expectation is that the event organiser will do all the marketing which is required to ensure that the exhibiting entity meets its objectives.
Organisers should make it clear that they market their events to attract visitors but it is the participants’ duty to market their presence at the event to the correct people who can enable them to meet their objectives. It should be clear to exhibitors that the success of their participation at an exhibition is their responsibility. This is the reason why some entities chalk success at events that are described by the market as lacklustre when compared to previous editions.
3. Introducing them to other companies that can contribute to their success
An exhibitor’s success at a show is not only dependent on them securing space and the marketing of the event by the organisers. On the contrary, it also depends on other business event players such as stand designers, and suppliers of various items like promotional products, corporate wear and other necessities.
Organisers of exhibitions and other business events know most of the suppliers of these items and services. They may not know them all but through their vast business networks, they will be able to point exhibitors to the suppliers who can assist them to put their best foot forward on the show day.
This is very important for first-time exhibitors who have no previous experience. A first-time exhibitor may be troubled over what size of the stand they can pay for. The organiser can assist them to come up with the correct size based on the size of their (exhibitor’s) operations and the organiser’s wealth of experience with different sizes of exhibitors and their disparate needs. The organisers also know of the previous year’s first-time exhibitors whose experiences could benefit the current year’s first-time exhibitors.
It is these experiences that can see exhibitors coming back to participate at the subsequent editions of the exhibitions.
4. Being there for them from paying for a stand to post-event evaluation
The moment a prospective exhibitor pays for exhibition space marks the beginning of a business relationship between them and the organiser. The organiser’s team members should stand ready to respond to exhibitors’ queries and requests for assistance from the day they pay for their stand and other related services until even after the event. Even during the show, the organisers’ teams should be roving among stands to note any complaints and needs and address them. Exhibitors would be wowed if a member of the organiser’s team visits or calls them to check on them and their exhibition plans. Even if they had decided against exhibiting again such gestures are likely to see them reconsidering their position.
Organisers should have a call centre kind of arrangement where exhibitors can call for assistance with services such as a cleaner to mop up spilt beverages during product tasting or an electrician to attend to replace a dysfunctional light bulb. While no show can progress without any hitches, exhibitors will appreciate organisers who go out of their way to readily address any glitches however minor.
Exhibitors will also appreciate organisers who put together training workshops for them ahead of their events to enable the latter to make the most of the planned shows. In Zimbabwe, the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair Company, the organisers of the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair, has distinguished itself from the common herd of other exhibition organisers by arranging an exhibition training workshop ahead of the trade fair every year.
These workshops assist exhibitors to appreciate the role of exhibitions in marketing their brands, setting objectives and targets, the importance of training stand staff, lead generation, post-event evaluation and follow-up.
5. Organising networking opportunities
While exhibitions are organised to provide opportunities for businesses to showcase their products and services to visitors, they also present a gathering of businesspeople or senior employees from the same or different economic sectors who can benefit from the networking opportunities presented by the event.
Exhibition organisers should take advantage of this opportunity to provide more value to exhibitors and enhance their experiences at the event by organising concurrent networking events. These could take the form of dinners funded by sponsors who stand to benefit from the event through marketing their brands to those who attend the concurrent events.
Other networking concurrent events that organisers can put together for the benefit of exhibitors include golf tournaments where senior members of the exhibiting companies can participate.
The foregoing is just a small selection out of a multiplicity of strategies which exhibition organisers can use to retain exhibitors at their shows. If you are an exhibition organiser, please share your exhibitor retention strategies with others by using the comment section at the foot of this article.