Bizsuccess

Friday, December 30, 2011

By: Susan Gunelius

Trade show marketing is an often overlooked marketing tactic by short-staffed and budget-minded small business owners. However, with strategic planning, trade show marketing can be affordable, and it can deliver great results.

When it comes to trade show marketing, a huge expense is often trade show booth graphics. A booth with no name, no color, and no messaging isn’t likely to get much attention from busy trade show attendees. You can’t speak directly with every person who walks by your trade show booth, so your booth graphics have to do part of the job for you. They need to capture the attention of passersby and communicate the appropriate messages to motivate people to stop and speak with you.

Your trade show booth graphics are not something you want to cut corners on. However, there are ways to create affordable booth graphics that still look great. Following are some tips for creating trade show booth graphics that look amazing but don’t break the budget.

1. Choose the Best Provider for Booth Graphics Design and Production

Don’t let the company that provides your trade show booth to design and produce your booth graphics, too. These companies typically charge a lot more than graphic designers and printing companies do. Shop around for the best design and printing prices.

2. Keep It Simple

Don’t try to fill every part of your booth with graphics. Less is always more when it comes to design. Passersby can only digest so many messages at once.

3. Stay Focused

As mentioned in #2 above, people can only digest one or two messages when they walk by your trade show booth. Therefore, your booth messaging should be highly focused on just one or two key messages that the show audience would be most interested in.

4. Consider Reprinting Costs

Create trade show booth graphics that either stand the test of time in terms of messaging or that can be reproduced at an effective cost. You never know when you might want to change your messages, particularly if you attend trade shows for diverse audiences who respond to very different messages.

5. Use Large Text

Don’t use overly fancy fonts on your booth graphics or fonts that are too small to be read from more than 10 feet away. Again, passersby need to be able to digest your messages without physically walking into your booth space or you’re wasting your time and money at the show.

6. Use Laptops and iPads

Don’t spend large amounts of money on trade show booth graphics when there are other ways to share your messages. For example, if you own a laptop or iPad, bring that to the show and load up messages, images, and so on that tell your story. You can also invest in a television or projector that projects your messages on your booth wall where people can see them. Instead of paying to redesign and print new graphics with new messaging from show to show, you can make the changes on your computer and you’re done.

7. Don’t Wait Until the Last Minute

Plan ahead so you have the maximum amount of time to design and produce booth graphics in order to avoid rush printing costs or separate shipping costs to send your graphics to the show.