Month: February 2021

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5 Tips To Make The Best Virtual Trade Show Booth

5 TIPS TO MAKE THE BEST VIRTUAL TRADE SHOW BOOTH

What if you could get all the benefits of having a booth at a major trade show without ever leaving your office?

Well, you can. Even before COVID sent us into quarantine and cancelled in-person events, virtual trade shows helped connect buyers and vendors across the globe without firing up a single jet engine.

As technology improves, virtual trade shows are becoming more and more popular across industries. So if you haven’t already, it’s time to learn how to create the perfect virtual trade show booth. And lucky for you, we’re going to tell you how to do just that.

What Is A Virtual Trade Show?

You’re probably familiar with the idea of “regular” trade shows, and have most likely been to quite a few. But what’s all this about virtual trade shows?

Well, a virtual trade show is a sort of digital replacement for trade shows. They’ve become more and more popular since COVID-19 hit, but they were around before then, too. Like other virtual events, they’re great because they’re often more cost effective and accessible to a much wider audience.

A virtual trade show is an online event that runs for a limited amount of time with the goal of connecting exhibitors and visitors. It’s sort of like an online hub where visitors who are interested in a particular niche or industry can find out more about your services and products.

What Is A Virtual Trade Show Booth?

A virtual trade booth gets you a space on the digital stage at the trade show. Your “booth” is an online space for visitors to learn more about your product or service through videos, audio, and text. You can even include a chat bot or live chat features to talk with visitors in real time. Or you can funnel them to a form or link so you can contact them later.

Typically, there are two different types of trade show booths.:3-D Booth Modeling: These events try to use 3-D modeling to recreate the look and feel of an actual trade show booth.Page-based Design: A page-based virtual trade show lets exhibitors create a website or webpage to educate visitors.

5 Tips and Tricks For The Best Virtual Trade Show Booth

Now that you know the basics of virtual trade shows, it’s time to learn how to make your virtual trade show booth better than all the competition.

01.

Start Before The Event

If your plan to attract and convert visitors starts on the morning of the virtual trade show, you’re already behind. You want to start wooing visitors as soon as possible! That means doing everything you can to capture their attention and make them want to visit your booth.

To get some exposure, ask the event host about sponsorship opportunities and putting your logo on the event website. You could also sponsor a pre-event email so attendees know to look out for your booth. And don’t forget to send an email marketing campaign inviting any leads you have who might be attending to visit your virtual booth.

02.

Know Your Audience

This is another thing to check off the list way before the event starts. Any event veteran knows that the key to trade show success is knowing your audience. Somethings to research are:

  • Audience demographics (gender, location, age, etc.)
  • Pain points
  • Values and interests
  • Product needs

The more you understand your audience, the better you can deliver content that interests, educates, or helps them. It can even help you figure out the best way to deliver that content, whether it be through videos, text, live demonstrations, or one-on-one convos.

And don’t forget the old saying, “keep your friends close but your enemies closer.” It’s also a good idea to know your competition. Who else has a virtual booth at the event? What are their value propositions and how can you better your booth?

03.

Top-Notch Visuals

First impressions matter, so you want the visuals of your virtual booth to impress the visitor and encourage them to spend more time with you. It’s important to take the time to make a well-designed, attractive booth for the event. That means using brand colors, modern designs, and high quality images. People want to see what they’re buying, so make sure to have plenty of product images on hand to help them imagine using it themselves.

This isn’t shallow–it’s part of your brand. People base part of their opinion of you on how your virtual trade show booth looks because it’s a reflection of how you work. If it’s modern, informative, and clean, then that reflects well on you. If it’s sloppy, old-fashioned, or hard to understand, people won’t even bother spending the time getting to know your company.

04.

Make Sure Everything Runs Smoothly

Now that your virtual trade show booth looks great, it’s time to make sure it works just as well. It’s important to make sure the user experience (UX) of your booth is smooth and pleasant. The goal is to have users enjoy visiting your virtual booth, so it needs to run quickly, be easy to navigate, and have appropriate functions.

On the other hand, having responsive content and interactive tools at your virtual trade show booth can help send you above and beyond the other vendors. You want your booth to be memorable for the right reasons.

So before the event launches, make sure to test-drive your virtual booth from the POV of an event visitor. Check for all the little details, from spelling errors to coding mistakes. You want to give the impression that you’re meticulous and do quality work.

05.

Get The Conversation Going

If your event offers instant messenger or live group chat features, make sure to use them to the fullest extent. The point of a trade show–virtual or not–is to make connections with people who are interested in your products or service. Real-time messaging helps you communicate with them and start to form a relationship.

It’s also important to let visitors talk amongst themselves. You can monitor the chat to figure out what their first impressions, pain points, and concerns are.

Need Help With Your Virtual Trade Show Booth?

If you’re not exactly tech savvy or you’re just too busy to create the perfect virtual booth, it’s time to call in the professionals. Our team of virtual event pros can help you with everything and anything for your virtual trade show.

Call or email us today to learn more about what we can do for you!

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How To Create Amazing Content For your Virtual Event: 5 Tips and Tools

HOW TO CREATE AMAZING CONTENT FOR YOUR VIRTUAL EVENT,

5 TIPS & TOOLS!

It’s pretty safe to say that “Zoom fatigue” was one of the most used phrases in 2020. And as virtual event planners, we understand why. After almost a year of quarantining and cancelled events, our industry has missed the mark with most virtual events.

Even though we have some seriously cool and cutting-edge technology, most virtual events end up being last minute quick fixes that are more likely to bore the audience than inspire them.

But in 2021, we’re saying that enough is enough. We won’t settle for less anymore when it comes to planning and executing exciting, intriguing, and beautiful events.

So, to help reach that goal, here’s our 5 tips, tricks, and tools to make next-level content for your virtual event.

How To Create Killer Content For Virtual EventS

01.

Go Back to Storytelling

If you want to put on a great virtual event with fantastic content, the first thing you need to do is go back to storytelling. Storytelling is the foundation of our jobs. Events let the audience experience the story for themselves.

When virtual events become boring and lifeless, it’s because we forgot to tell a story. When you’re not storytelling, all you’re doing is dumping information on them. It’s like the difference between reading a novel and reading the phone book. They’re just not the same.

So before you do anything else, you need to figure out what story your event is trying to tell. And then build your content strategy off of achieving that goal.

02.

Get the Right Tools

Back in February of 2020, it might have been excusable to think that virtual events were just a temporary replacement for live events that didn’t require any major investment. But by now it’s obvious that virtual events are here to stay, pandemic or not. And if you want to make them any good, you’re going to have to invest in the right tools.

It’s time to say goodbye to the belief that virtual events are always majorly cheaper than in- person events. Sometimes you have to make a calculated investment to put on the best virtual event possible–in the same way that you would invest in a venue or caterer for a live event.

When it comes to must-have tools for putting on a high-quality virtual event, this list is a good place to start:

  • Green screens-If you’re planning on doing some post-production work, green screens are a great investment. After recording you can insert maps, graphs, videos, and other interactive features that will bring your content to life.
  • Microphones-When you’re recording sound, external microphones are a must. If you’re laying down an audio track, an XLR microphone would work. But when you’re videoing a speaker, it’s best to have lavalier microphones that can clip to their shirt and record their voice no matter where they are. Crisp, clean audio is a gamechanger for virtual content.
  • Video editing software-If you want to edit your videos in-house, do yourself a favor and invest in video editing software like Adobe Premiere Pro or Final Cut Pro. You might also need to invest in a computer that can handle the video-editing in the first place.
  • Lighting–If you’re shooting professional video content for your virtual event, lighting is a must. Depending on your budget and needs, this could be anything from a ring light so a soft light set-up or even studio lights. The right lighting will take your content from “home video” to “professional presentation” just like that. 

03.

Know Your Audience

There’s one simple rule to remember when you’re figuring out what content to produce for your virtual event: know thy audience.

After all, the audience is the focus of the event. So when you’re picking speakers, brainstorming topics, and creating content, you need to always keep them in mind. Some things to know about your audience are:

  • Pain points
  • Concerns
  • Goals
  • Aspirations
  • Education
  • Job level

At the end of the day, you’re putting on an event to serve the audience. The more you know about them the more successful you’re going to be–because that’s how you get genuine engagement. 

04.

Switch Things Up

After a year of Zoom meetings and webinar overload, most people are sick of sitting in front of their computers watching people talk. But don’t take that as defeat. Instead, you just need to be a little creative and find ways to keep people interested and engaged.

One way to do that is to vary the type and tone of your content. Nobody wants to watch a video of someone reading off of a PowerPoint for an hour. Encourage your speakers and content creators to break up their presentations with Q and A sessions, short videos, or graphics. And don’t forget to spice things up with real-life stories and context; like we said before, it’s all about storytelling.

05.

Warm Up the Crowd

Sometimes at a live event, a video will play before a presentation giving context or preparing the audience for what’s coming next.

Creating these little videos for your virtual event is a thoughtful touch that can whet the audience’s appetite for the upcoming presentation. And when your event has attendees with wide ranges of experience or expertise, contextual videos can help bring everyone up to speed.

Making Content For Your Next Virtual Event

If you want to create amazing content for your virtual event, there are 2 things to keep in mind: Know your audience, and tell a story. If you do that, you’ll be able to create amazing content that your audience actually cares about. So spend the time getting to know your audience and the story you’re telling and your virtual event will have some seriously incredible content.

Need some help along the way? That’s what we’re here for.

Contact us today for help planning and executing your next virtual event!