5 Hacks to Maximize Sales at Your B2B Trade Show Exhibit

Be the first to know when new content like this is available!

Subscribe to our newsletter to receive notifications of new posts, local news and industry insights.

Thank you very much! Your submission has been received!

Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.

To maximize revenue from your trade show presence at business-to-business (B2B) cannabis industry events, you need to know the tricks that are effective today. The five “hacks” discussed below can mean the difference between just collecting business cards and attracting viable leads to your business that will generate a positive return on your investment.

1. More digital

It goes without saying that trade fair visitors are busy. They see dozens of stalls (or more) each day as they walk through the fair, and they’ll likely forget most of what they’ve seen and heard once they exit the exhibition hall.

Traditionally, exhibitors provide attendees with plenty of printed takeaways to peruse in the evening or after returning to their offices. However, most event attendees cannot remember why they picked up these brochures in the first place. With a long list of things to do after returning to work, most brochures end up in the bin.

The trick is to get them to engage immediately and easily with content that is highly relevant to them. Use QR codes as well as RFIDs, NFCs and Bluetooth beacons to provide your exhibition visitors with the most relevant content and interactive experiences before they leave. In fact, some companies are getting very creative when it comes to how they use RFID at trade show booths. It’s a great way to draw attention and traffic to your booth to collect leads and attract potential customers.

2. Easily digestible content

The content you make available to booth visitors should be easy to digest. Remember those long pamphlets mentioned in #1 above? You’re the opposite of what you should give prospects at trade shows if you want people to remember you for the right reasons.

Instead, the content you give prospects at your booth and in your first follow-up calls and emails should be short, concise, and extremely digestible. To do this effectively, you need a process that allows you to quickly identify who each prospect is and what’s important to them, so you can provide them with the most relevant content.

The lead capture process is covered in more detail in #3 below. Here the focus is on digestible content. For example, imagine you had a sign at your booth with a QR code that visitors could scan to watch a fun and relevant 30-second explainer video.

At the end of the video is a link that leads to a landing page on your website where they can choose the next step in their content journey (e.g. view a relevant infographic, read a report, watch another video). , access your catalogue, read a case study, submit an inquiry form, etc.).

This works because prospects are in control. They can choose the type of content they want from your brand, and hopefully they’ll be so intrigued by that content that they’ll contact you for more information.

3. Multiple choice lead capture questions

While it can be tempting to simply scan someone’s event badge (if the event offers it), doing so doesn’t capture the information needed for effective tracking. Your lead capture form should be streamlined and consistent so both sales and marketing teams can effectively follow up after the show is over.

To do this, use multiple choice questions in your stand lead capture forms as much as possible. Your sales and marketing teams need to create these forms in advance so that the right questions are included.

Of course, using lead capture forms doesn’t mean that booth sales reps can’t ask open-ended questions during conversations with visitors to learn more about them. Sales reps should ask these questions to build a more complete profile of each lead.

The lead capture forms can be filled out by visitors themselves, or the sales team can fill out the forms while speaking to a prospect as they exit the booth. Digital lead capture forms available on iPads at your booth are extremely effective for both visitors and your sales reps to fill out in real-time.

4. Experiences, not transactions

A trade show booth hack that isn’t used often but works very well is to focus less on offering materials and signage at your exhibit that show why your company, products, and services are great. Instead, focus on why visitors stopped at your booth in the first place. Focus on their problems and pain points so they can immediately see why your stand is important to them.

With that in mind, use touchscreens at your booth to let visitors choose their own journey. The content on these devices should be problem-solving based and not “here are all our great products and services”. Content that’s particularly good for creating experiences at your booth is video and visuals like infographics—things that grab attention, address visitors’ concerns, and encourage passers-by to stop and ask questions.

Another great trick besides offering touchscreens at your booth is to provide charging stations (if it makes sense for the event at hand) so people can stop and charge their mobile devices. It’s convenient for visitors and gives your sales team a chance to spark conversations. And by the way, it’s also important that people have their devices charged when you’re offering digital content and experiences at your booth!

5. Consistent lead qualification and follow-up

As mentioned in #3 above, your sales and marketing teams need to agree on how leads will be captured at your booths and what information will be collected. Additionally, they must collectively define what defines a lead as unprofitable, viable, marketing-qualified, or sales-qualified.

This is critical to properly scoring leads after the event and determining which leads should be abandoned, which should be included in email marketing nurturing campaigns, and which will receive personal follow-up via phone, email, etc. from a should be a member of the sales team.

Finally, a process should be developed to follow up on leads from trade shows and continue to engage with prospects who may not be ready to buy but may be interested in buying from your company in the future.

Learn how to convert trade show leads into customers with the Ultimate Guide to Cannabis Industry B2B Event Lead Follow-up for Sales.

Key insights on hacks to maximize revenue from your B2B trade show presence

The five hacks presented above can help you attract and convert more leads from your cannabis B2B trade show exhibits. This improves the return on your event investment!

Looking to add your B2B cannabis industry trade show leads to a CRM pre-populated with tens of thousands of cannabis and hemp license holders in the US, Canada and international markets? Subscribe to the Cannabiz Media License Database for sales and marketing. Schedule a demo to see how a subscription can help you achieve your goals.