Are Trade Shows All They Are Cracked Up To Be?

People are genuinely looking for solutions and are prepared to act on the solutions they find.  Tire kicking may have been the norm 10 years ago, even 5 years ago.  The combined effect of higher postage, paper and lower response rates has created a new ROI for advanced marketing solutions. 

Expect even the most traditional cataloger to be looking at email and e-commerce solutions, persona and data targeted marketing and bundled services that take less time and produce twice the results.  Technology advances have kept pace with customer demand to provide some phenomenal opportunities.  Reacting to the market is a thing of the past, cutting edge is the new norm.  Growing a business will depend on how quickly high tech communication methods, like podcasting, blogging, and professional networks can be incorporated into the marketing strategies of forward thinking companies.  As expected conversations range from improving response and lowering costs to cutting edge and speculative options.  Marketers are probing for the right balance of mail and multi-channel contact.  Mail cannot operate independently nor can it be removed from the equation.  Companies that stop prospecting completely, even for a short term, are creating long term problems.  Prospecting is the life blood of a catalog business, acquiring and sustaining customers still requires a book, although the web pushes that definition.  Some players are watching and waiting for the solutions to be refined, fractional allocation is a perfect example.  Most want it, most vendors want to provide it, but the cost and customization make it prohibitive for everyone to partake.  That should change and the demands increase and vendors react to that demand.  One obvious change is in the exhibit hall.  Traffic was down for the grand opening and that might change, but the real business was being conducted outside the exhibit hall anyway.  Marketers still value the show for the meetings that can be set, the face to face interaction that they require, even the introductions that can happen on the fly, but the exhibit hall is NOT where that happens.  Unless you consider the cocktail hour at the end of the day very little conversations started in or around the booths.  Everyone realizes the shows are trending down.  Some called for radical forum changes, others just planned to scale back attendance at the next event.The feedback from sessions was mixed.  While well attended, many individuals expressed a disappointment in the content, either it was not on target with the advertised message for the session or it had been done before too many times.  Senior members of the DMA community are not going to find the shows insightful beyond a couple ideas they might implement.But established meetings, planned in advance of the show or set while conversing in the elevators or Villa de Flora, seemed to produce significant interaction for most participants and kept the show from being a bust.  Traffic streamed in and out of the main restaurant continuously, even at $20 a head, the Villa de Flora offered a great spot for casual conversation.  If meetings were held in suites and meeting rooms around the atrium they appeared stuffy and uninteresting.While the ACCM cannot meet everyone’s needs or expectations the variety of subjects covered, in great detail, certainly makes it one of the most informative shows for the broadest possible group.  Combining it with the DMA Annual show might make sense going forward, with 2 days of sessions for each traditional show to start, and perhaps blending the sessions as the years pass.  Change is too common in this business to not be enacted in our events and gatherings as well.