Joe Greeley here, with Nimlok Minnesota.
Good sucks, doesn’t it? Think about it. When people say, “Hey, how you doing?” “I’m good, I’m fine.” “How’s this going?” “It’s good, it’s fine.” You kind of know they’re just being polite, right? They really don’t want to tell you. Hey, maybe I’m prying too much, who knows. I ask my kids when they come home from school. Guess what I get? Well, they’re teenagers, so, “Good, fine…” usually followed by, “pffft…whatever”. Something along those lines, right?
Good is a great ‘“Minnesota polite” term. Your Aunt Margaret asks, “What do you think of my famous lutefisk?” “It’s good…nope…it’s good.” Or your Uncle Bob walks in with his new toupee. “Hey, what do you think of my new rug?” Whew…. “It looks good on you”, right? It’s just polite, you’re not going to tell him the truth, huh? That it looks like he’s wearing a divot on his head? No, no, far from it. You don’t want to hurt his feelings right? You just want to be polite.
However, too often our clients and prospects tell us, “Hey, how is your exhibit program going, how is this working?” “Oh it’s good. It’s fine.” Really? Again, is that just the polite part? How come we never hear, “It’s marvelous! It’s fantastic!” Or, “Boy, it sucks – we really could improve.” The point is, when I hear that, most of the time you know that there’s room for improvement. They don’t want to be rude, I get it. And they probably don’t want to admit things that they’re not doing that well. But how come they’re not telling us when they are really going well?
But anyway, there is room for improvement. So the suggestion I have today is this – get your entire team together. Everybody! And I mean somebody from the executive side, sales, marketing and logistics. Talk about a couple of things, talk about where you can improve. But follow this guide, and I think it’ll break it down into sections and make it easier.
One is goals. General goal. Why do we go to the show? What are we trying to achieve? Can we measure it, and how are we going to measure it? Make sure that everybody is on board with that goal. Without a goal, you’re just going to the show and you’re spending a lot of time, money and effort and not getting anything out of it. Or maybe you are, but you don’t know it. So make sure that the goals are crystal clear.
Next move on to brand, move on to messaging. Is what we’re doing in the booth in sync with our current marketing message? Does it resonate with the people on the show floor, especially the ones that don’t know us, but may need us, right? Make sure it’s crystal clear and you can tell them quickly what you do and how you solve problems.
Next is engagement. Are we doing things, are you doing things to engage people longer, better, differently? Again, it’s something measurable. How do you measure it, right? I shouldn’t say measurable, I meant memorable.
And then move on to people. Are we sending the right people? I’ve talked about this in past vlogs. You’ve got to make sure, again, as a team, are we sending the right people? “Ah, we just send our sales people.” Well, are they the right ones? Half maybe – maybe some are and some aren’t. Maybe some of the technical people are really good. But figure out that you’ve got the right people. A couple of wrong people can make an entire booth and goals nose-dive!
And lastly, execution. Are there things you could be doing better – more efficiently – to save time, money and effort? Do you need to leverage companies like us?
Look at all of those buckets. So, goals, brand, engagement, people and execution. But look at it after each and every show.
Anyway, I hope this helps. And let us know how we can help.
Thanks!
