Simple data that can improve your next exhibition

Exhibition organisers have got it tough! Their event is a massive project, they have to deal with bigger venues, bigger numbers, more exhibitors, more logistical issues, more legal concerns, greater awareness of the locale and transport links, a bigger demographic spread attending, from a wider area, and tons more data to analyse. Any way to make next year’s event an easier experience is always on the agenda. One way to do this is to use that data you already have. Here is just some of the info you have at your disposal:

Number of attendees – use a spreadsheet as a replacement for an abacus not rocket science.

Number of non attendees – Useful information to know, badge scanners linked to a database of registration information. Excellent and simple metrics to get a very basic understanding of your market

Badge scanners – great way to gauge entrance numbers, broken down per hour, giving you optimum time to plan next year’s seminars and event opening closing times, should they need a tweak. Hidden bonus, you can figure out who are the smokers, any smoking cessation hypnotherapist will be heavily interested in that information!

Seminar attendances – often the big draw for a section of the attendees, always remember “Content is King”. Alongside the marquee signings of a high profile celebrity or business guru, a great way to add significant value and boost attendances of delegates and exhibitors.

Badge tracking – Now it gets interesting, chips can be used in badges to track the length of time a person stayed in the exhibitor hall, map which stands they went to, how long they were there, when they had lunch, did they attend the networking functions etc. Not used extensively as yet due to cost of investment by the organiser and/or the venue and the ease of extracting the real valuable data from this kind of analysis.

Post event feedback – only the only real qualitative analysis that asks for the thoughts of the market you are targeting. Linking registration information to this gives you a complete view of who the attendees were, when they came, where from, how they got there, and how they rated every aspect of your exhibition. Wouldn’t it be great to know that the people at the back of the seminars couldn’t see the visuals very well, or the networking session was too short, or that the exhibitors weren’t easy to find with the current layout?? This is where you can enhance next year’s offering even before you’ve decided on its venue.

The exhibition organiser has so much data at their disposal, but by using the right mix, and employing the right analysis, could save you a lot of time in the coming year targeting the right exhibitors, or picking the best media channel for PR, now that you know what works best.

You have lots of data, so make sure it’s used wisely and used well.

Crunch