B2B events can be a tremendously effective marketing channel provided that you’ve selected the proper event and have formulated a plan conducive to driving leads, awareness, and customer acquisition. Event sponsorship can give you exposure to a broad audience within your target market. Conferences and trade shows can get a bit pricy when you include travel, lodging, and marketing materials. This makes it imperative that you have a well thought out strategy to maximize your return on investment.

Decide Who From Your Organization Will Attend

A combination of salespeople, marketers, and those with intimate knowledge of the attendees and their businesses will give you a well-rounded team to draw in your prospects.  You’ll want to have outgoing, organized, knowledgeable people that can engage your prospects and explain your solution.

Cultivate And Personalize Your Messaging

You’ll want to decide which of your products or services you want to focus on during the event and tailor your messaging around those offers.  Personalize your pitch and content to your audience and the specific pain points that your company solves.

Assemble Your Marketing Materials

Business cards, flyers, giveaways, and contests all help to draw attention to your company and leave a lasting impression.  Branded giveaways such as coffee cups, t-shirts, stress balls, and electronic gadgets will serve as a reminder of your brand for the weeks and months to come.  Business cards provide your contact info, and flyers outline your products and services.  All necessary for a successful event.

Refine Your Booth Design

Your booth design should be clean, heavily branded, and designed to stand out.  Some must have items include a company branded table cover, backdrops that outline your services and a computer monitor for running power point or Prezi presentations.

Pick Out The Key Players You Want To Connect With

You'll rarely get a chance to speak with everyone that attends an event, which makes it important to outline who you most want to speak with and create a plan to connect with them.  In person meetings are the most effective way to build relationships, which is essential in today's sales process.

Develop A System For Capturing Leads

Whether it’s an online form, a business card basket or the old-fashioned pen and pad, you need some method for capturing leads.  Running raffles that require prospects to fill out an online form is an accurate and professional way to capture the contact information of the masses.  For your more highly targeted prospects, an intimate exchange of business cards and a conversation is the way to go.