The Next Frontier in Digital Marketing for Trade Shows
October 8, 2015
By Elizabeth Johnson
Conventional marketing wisdom tells us “go where your audience is.” Recently, Facebook announced 1 billion users logged on in a single day, and earlier this year, global internet usage on mobile devices surpassed internet usage on desktops or laptops for the first time. These signs make it clear trade show planners and marketers need to invest more online.
Beyond email marketing campaigns and social media pages, trade show planners and marketers have a wealth of digital marketing tactics available to them. Many are adding them to their strategies to engage with their audiences and find new prospects. Tactics include social media and pay-per-click advertising, retargeting campaigns, mobile advertising, remarketing campaigns, gamification and many more.
Social Media Advertising
Social media advertising can be an easy first step in adding digital tactics to a marketing strategy. Sites such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram offer platforms for placing advertising messages to targeted, customizable audiences. The marketer controls a daily budget and can edit or stop the ad at any time.
MINExpo INTERNATIONAL is a quadrennial mega show held in Las Vegas. Ahead of its September 2016 event, it’s using two types of Facebook advertising.
The first is a Page Likes campaign aimed primarily at international prospects and designed to increase the number of people with whom it can share its organic content. A Website Clicks campaign to drive traffic directly to the MINExpo website to register will follow early next year.
“With four years between shows, social media is a way we can stay connected to our audience and find new people who have entered the industry since the last show,” said Moya Phelleps, senior vice president at NMA.
In the first three months, MINExpo’s Page Likes campaign increased its Facebook page’s international audience by 25 percent.
Instagram is emerging as a strong platform for marketers as well. Nielsen Brand Effect measured 400 campaigns globally and found ad recall from sponsored posts on Instagram was 2.8 times higher than Nielsen’s norms for online advertising. In addition, GlobalWebIndex found 53 percent of Instagram users follow brands (the highest of any social network) and 44 percent conduct brand research on the network. Because 70 percent of Instagram’s audience is under 35 - it could be the right place to target a younger audience.
Retargeting Campaigns
Retargeting campaigns focus on potential attendees who have visited the show site and left. Using a retargeting vendor, marketers show web banner ads to these people on other websites in order to drive them back to the show website and convert them into attendees. It has a high ROI because the audience is more engaged than a “cold” audience viewing a web banner ad placed on a website.
Traction, a digital marketing conference for entrepreneurs, employs a number of digital tactics including an ad retargeting campaign to drive attendance to the conference. It used a third-party URL shortener that ties any content it shares to its ad retargeting campaign.
The retarget links enabled Traction cofounder, Lloyed Lobo, to promote the conference by sharing interesting content from others. Lobo, who runs growth at speakeasy.co and is also cofounder of Boast Capital, managed the process. “Eighty percent of the time we share interesting content across our social channels that educates our target audience on how to become better at what they do.”
The retargeting campaign is not a standalone tactic and supports Traction’s robust email marketing campaign.
“Our last conference sold out 45 days ahead of schedule,” Lobo said.
Additional Options
There are many other tactics worth testing. Mobile advertising uses predictive data to target your audiences when they use their mobile devices. Remarketing campaigns combat “empty cart syndrome” by emailing people who stopped in the middle of the registration process. Gamification through contest and trivia can creatively engage audiences.
Digital technology has revolutionized the way planners can market trade shows. It has broken open a world of possibility for connecting with target audiences. All this possibility comes with a learning curve. Show marketers who overcome that challenge and test new tactics can find success in raising brand awareness, maintaining brand relevance, finding new audiences and converting more prospects into attendees.
Partner Voices
HERE, hosting responsible meetings and caring for our communities are top priorities. Through its 'Focused on What Matters: Embracing Humanity and Protecting the Planet' philosophy, MGM Resorts commits to creating a more sustainable future, while striving to make an impact in the lives of employees, guests, and the communities in which it operates.
Water Stewardship Efforts
MGM Resorts understands the importance of using water efficiently, especially in the desert destination of Las Vegas. Conserving water has always been part of the mission, but MGM Resorts has expanded its ambition into water stewardship.
In 2022, MGM Resorts President and CEO Bill Hornbuckle signed the CEO Water Mandate—a UN Global Compact initiative mobilizing business leaders to advance water stewardship. MGM Resorts International was the first gaming company to take this important step.
MGM Resorts replaced 200,000 square feet of real grass with drought-tolerant landscaping in Las Vegas.
MGM Resorts pledges to reduce water withdrawal intensity by 33% by 2025 and by 35% by 2030.
From 2007-2021, use of more than 5.6 billion gallons of water was avoided because of conservation efforts.
Caring for One Another
MGM Resorts’ Food Donations Program collects and preserves unserved food from conventions held at MGM Resorts properties, then safely donates to food insecure people in the community. Since the program’s launch in 2016, more than 3.7 million meals toward a 2025 goal of 5 million meals have been donated into the community. Donations include:
Unserved perishable prepared foods from events
Perishable unprepared food from MGM Resorts’ kitchens
Nonperishable food items from minibars and warehouses
The collaboration with Southern Nevada’s primary food bank, Three Square, has developed the infrastructure needed to safely collect, transport, and store food from MGM Resorts properties in Las Vegas, reducing food waste while serving the community.
Fostering Diversity and Inclusion
To MGM Resorts, a diverse and talented workforce is essential to success. By cultivating innovative strategies that consider multiple perspectives and viewpoints, the company creates an inclusive workplace culture that benefits its employees and community. MGM Resorts takes pride in being a welcoming home for veterans, individuals with disabilities, people from diverse backgrounds, LGBTQ+ community members, and more. This commitment to inclusion is reflected in the company's recruitment and hiring practices and its social responsibility initiatives. From the workplace to the community, MGM Resorts' commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion remains unwavering, and its efforts continue to create a more equitable and sustainable world for all.
MGM Resorts understands its responsibility to contribute to the social and economic progress of the communities in which it operates. HERE, we embrace humanity.
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