Are You Promoting Your Participation at Your Next Exhibition?
Next month, two long-standing exhibitions will be opening their doors to exhibitors, delegates, visitors, and press; Nor-Shipping, a biennial maritime trade fair held in Oslo, Norway, 6 – 9th June, and SEAWORK, a commercial marine exhibition held in Southampton, UK, 13 – 15th June.
Why exhibit?
Participation at industry events and exhibitions is a key element of many of our clients’ marketing mix. They provide a unique opportunity to reach a range of stakeholders, including potential customers, existing clients, competitors, and industry organisation, while also keeping up with the latest developments, trends, and networking prospects.
Participating at an exhibition with a stand provides multiple opportunities to visually communicate your brand, its values and mission, as well as showcasing your products and services. It provides you with a perfect location to host your customers and prospects, launch or discuss your latest product or service offering, host press events or one-to-one interviews, and connect with your industry face-to-face.
Are you maximising your exhibition participation?
Whether you are booked to exhibit at Nor-Shipping, SEAWORK, or any other industry exhibition, boat show, or conference, be it trade or consumer, are you ready to stand out from the crowd? Make sure your brand is reflected in your stand design, in the digital or print collateral you offer to visitors, and your communication strategy to promote your presence.
Saltwater Stone has decades of experience in maximising clients’ impact at their chosen exhibition. From stand design that strengthens your brand, to identifying communication opportunities to promote your participation, from sharing news with your target audience, to managing your PR activities on site, the team are here to help you achieve your goals.
How can you increase exposure for your next exhibition?
Saltwater Stone has been supporting clients to increase their exposure, by tailoring bespoke PR strategies, including identifying communication opportunities at key exhibitions or conferences, and delivering a range of content, including press releases, newsletters, social media activities, collateral, and more.
With the vast number of shows over the course of the year (take a look at our Boat Show Calendar), having the support of an experienced PR partner that is specialised in maritime, commercial marine, leisure marine, and superyacht shows, will help you to maximise coverage opportunities, enabling you stand out from your competition.
Saltwater Stone will engage early with media and influencers on your behalf. Having decades of experience in the industry, you can benefit from our long-standing relationships with the industry media, allowing you to focus on engaging directly with your prospects.
How can you increase exposure yourself?
Don’t forget to promote your attendance through your own digital channels. Take advantage of your social media platforms, and get social ahead of, during, and post your exhibition participation. See whether there is a particular hashtag for the exhibition that you can use in your social media posts. Let us know if you need help to manage your social media activity and engagement. Remember, consistency is key.
Increase your communication with a blog, shared on your website, amplified through your social media. Create blog posts ahead of the event, covering subjects relevant to the exhibition. Increase posts, if you can, in the last few weeks leading up to the event, ensuring your key messaging is consistently used. This will help improve your SEO, drive traffic to your website, and increase brand awareness. Contact us if you need support in producing web or blog content.
Promote your participation at the exhibition to your prospects, customers, and industry partners with a dedicated newsletter. There are a number of platforms you can use to distribute your newsletter, e.g. Mailchimp, Constant Contact, etc. Drop us a line if you’d like help with producing regular or one-off content, or a branded newsletter template.
To complement your communication efforts, you could consider placing adverts aligned with your promotional content in the exhibition’s catalogue, or in one or more key titles for your target audience. Research who the media partners for your exhibition are, and evaluate their reach for your target market. Media partners will mostly have increased distribution ahead of, and during the exhibition. Placing advertising strategically across digital or print platforms, can enhance your brand visibility. Drop us a line if you’d like us to assist in identifying the best advertising opportunities, get the best deals, and give you the highest chance of achieving a successful campaign execution in support of your exhibition participation.
Catch up with the team.
The team at Saltwater Stone will be once again supporting clients at a range of exhibitions and boat shows this year, starting with Nor-Shipping and SEAWORK. From creating content, preparing press packs, and arranging interviews with the media, each of our clients will have their dedicated account manager working on maximising their presence.
The team will be on site in Oslo and Southampton, so do get in touch if you’re looking for new ways to communicate with your customers and the media.
Let us help you elevate and promote your presence at your next. Give us a call today.
