Grow Your Business Exhibition

How to get the best out of visiting an exhibition

Exhibitions can be a fun day out of the office, but how do you make sure you get the best out of them?

Why you should visit exhibitions
• See new products and services. See demonstrations, hear explanations, see, touch experience products first hand..
• Meet the sellers face to face. Find out more about the company and the people behind the products and services, especially those involved behind the scenes.
• Compare products or services by visiting competitive stands. Make a short list of likely suppliers
• If you have something to buy, there are often special prices on offer, especially towards the end of a show.
• Slightly cynical maybe, but if your suppliers are exhibiting, let them see you going on to competitors stands – keep them on their toes.
• Give honest opinions – feedback – you may well be valued by the exhibitor concerned as exhibitions are a valuable source of information.
• Find out what’s really going on. Exhibitions are a great place to get the inside information on an industry or business in a particular location.
• While you are there, check out your competitors. You can gain a great deal of invaluable information keeping your eyes and ears alert in the aisles.
• With discretion maybe, but exhibitions can be a useful place to recruit new staff.
• While you should not try selling to exhibitors – not good practice as they have paid to be there and promote themselves, not be sold to, you can still build up a useful data base of potential clients.
• A little cheap perhaps, but you can pick some very nice ‘freebies’ on your way round an exhibition.
• Collect product information. Find out what’s best. Weigh up the best deals.
• Expose new employees to an exhibition. Its an enjoyable and rewarding way of learning a lot about a business in just one short day.
• Finally and most exciting of all, you never know who you might meet at an exhibition. Everyone is on neutral territory, everyone is equal. You could meet someone who could change your life and your business for ever.

And why visit Grow Your Business?

• It will be a great learning experience with so many excellent seminars featuring so many excellent speakers to choose from.
• If you need some specialist advice, the free one-to-one clinics with Business link and Chartered Institute of Marketing could be invaluable.
• There are also quite a few very useful organisations to be seen in the exhibition hall such as Surrey Enterprise Hub, Surrey Chambers of Commerce, Business Link as sell as a number of commercial organisations with valuable expertise and knowledge at their disposal.
• You can find new suppliers of products and services that might offer better prices and be closer to home than your existing suppliers.
• Meet the media. Always useful to meet and talk to representatives from Surrey Advertiser and Eagle Radio.
• Enjoy some great networking. You will meet colleagues, old friends and some interesting new people – any of whom could end up making your visit more than worth while

Paul Webster is organising Grow Your Business on 30th April.

Guildford supports New Business Event

Major business and civic stakeholders from Guildford came out in force to support the launch of a new initiative designed to help local companies grow their businesses.

Around sixty people gathered in the delightful Circle Bar at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre on Thursday 24th January to hear the organisers lay out their plans for Grow Your Business 08, which takes place at the Guildford Spectrum on 30th April.

Paul Marcus, managing Director of Eagle Radio, one of the key sponsors, along with Surrey Advertiser, introduced the Mayor of Guildford Cllr Mike Nevins, who warmly welcomed the initiative. He added that he was glad that Guildford Borough Council was supporting an event that would benefit local businesses in the area.

Paul Webster, the event organiser thanked the other sponsors, including Surrey Chambers of Commerce, Business Link, Printing.com and Ecademy and announced that Vodaphone and Surrey Car Telephones had just agreed to sponsor the Grow Your Business Seminar Programme. He went on to say that, unlike many other local business exhibitions, this event had a very clear focus. The seminars, the one-to-one clinics and all the products and services that would be on display were geared to inspiring the visitors and providing them with information and advice that would help them grow their businesses. He added that admission to the exhibition, the seminars, the clinics and even the parking were all free.

Fiona Humberstone of Printing.com, responsible for marketing the event explained what was being done by the organisers and the sponsors to meet their ambitious target of attracting 1000 visitors.

A reminder for exhibitors at Grow Your Business - and all other exhibitions

Paul Webster, from The Webster Partnership Ltd, has some important advice for exhibitors

As someone who has organised exhibitions for over thirty years, I, like most other organisers, know that it is in my best interests to make sure exhibitors make the most of their opportunities when exhibiting. That is why many of us send out information or run seminars on How to Exhibit more Effectively.

There are many ‘essentials’ to bear in mind, most of the important ones relating to the stand personnel, but I would like to mention one other – your display material.

Your display material might consist of display panels fixed to the stand walls, an expanding pop-up display or a roll-up display. Whichever form you use, there is one very important matter to consider and that is what goes on them.

Stand display copy, like copy used on a sales letter, an advert or even on the web must have a powerful headline. One of the great American copywriters, Ted Nicholas, says the headline has five main jobs to do:

∑ Attract attention ∑ Communicate a strong benefit ∑ Appeal to the self-interest of the reader ∑ Set the tone of the offer ∑ Attract the right audience

Just remember, when a visitor to an exhibition walks past a smallish stand, it takes only a few seconds and British visitors, being the retiring souls they are, don’t stop unless they are pretty well forced to. One thing that will stop them – apart from having great people working on the stand – is a strong headline.

If you make it absolutely clear what you are offering and include a major benefit, and this happens to be what the visitor is looking for, the chances are they will stop. I would say that about half the stands at most exhibitions, don’t in fact make it clear at a glance what is on offer - and they are missing a trick.

So, when you exhibit at Grow Your Business – or any other exhibition – make sure your display material is working for you.