While many trade shows are in-person, offline events, there are a number of ways to mix in social media to extend your face-to-face event connections online. While not everyone at the typical trade show will be social media savvy, many of your key influencers with large networks will be.
What to do:
- Live tweet from the floor. Tweeting from an event is a great way to make new connections as well as share the show with your fans online. Be sure to use the event’s official hashtag or create your own if one isn’t being promoted.
- Post pictures of visitors online. Take pictures of your booth’s visitors and post them to your blog, Facebook, Flickr, or anywhere else you share photos. They’ll not only connect with you later, but they’ll also show the photos to all their friends.
- Invite them to join your Facebook group at your booth. Encourage people to connect with you on Facebook (or Twitter or whatever) right from your booth with a laptop set up for people to join on the spot.
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Hi!
I speak on this quite a bit with my clients and have yet to see a truly effective use of virtualization when it comes to tradeshows. The most overlooked and most obvious platform is SecondLife Grid (http://secondlifegrid.net/)
It is my belief that ALL tradeshows should have virtual presence as well as real life presence in a convention center. I could go on and on about the benefits but I think they are VERY obvious.
Anyone interested in furthering this discussion should feel free to reach out to me, my contact information is embedded below.
Best regards,
Nathan
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Nathan Egan
Founder & Managing Partner | Freesource Agency, LLC
O: 484.732.8018
C: 215.806.8018
negan@freesourceagency.com http://www.linkedin.com/in/nathanegan http://www.twitter.com/nathanegan
NACS did a great job of this at Camex 2009. Members were invited to follow them on Twitter and and become a fan of the show on Facebook, and were encouraged to tweet from the floor once the trade show began.
One example of how it was used well was a tweet of a particular exhibitor's offering of a free item if you mentioned that tweet from NACS. http://tinyurl.com/opz894