Hosting a boat show and wish to increase your attendance rate? Are you following up with your customers after the show?
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Here are 5 pointers to help you have a successful boat show and increase boat show traffic.
- Free tickets to your boat show with goodies:
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When contacting and inviting your customers to an event, make them feel special. Let them know they are a valued VIP customer and for being a part of the family you would like to give them complimentary tickets with a swag bag or a glass of champagne for the show. Have a will call booth set up for the customers so when they arrive to the venue they know where to go and receive their free tickets, their bag of goodies, and a glass of champagne, all with ease. This alone will set you apart from your competition and increase the number of attendees. By doing this you are showing your customers your appreciation for staying loyal to your brand while continuing your relationship with your customers. Everybody loves free, especially your customers!
- Set yourself apart from the rest:
A boat show is a place where buyers and sellers come to meet. The benefit is that buyers come out to a trade show looking to buy and obtain more information on the products you carry. Now there is a lot of competition you'll have in the venue, so be different! Since they are a VIP customer go over and beyond for them, have valet parking set up for them so when they arrive they don't have to look for parking. Have them drop off the car by the will call booth and have one of your team members valet for the car for them. This will boost your customer’s confidence in your dealership and ensure they will stop by your booth to thank you for the free tickets and for having a team member valet their car. You will immediately notice foot traffic being driven down to your booth by doing this. A dealership did this for their boat show last year and had a great turn out with nothing but positive feedback. In fact, the turnout was so great that the dealerships customers spread the word on social media on behalf of the dealership. Anytime you have customers posting positive feedback on social media for your company you know you're doing something right!
Make your booth approachable, have an appealing design with a variety of different display options that appeal to different people. Offering snacks and drinks at your booth for customers that are walking around will be much appreciated. If you can match your drinks and snacks to match your company's culture or the theme of your booth would make it stand out more. Have your water bottles branded with your logo and business cards attached to them so the consumer knows where they got it from.
- Have product information available to your customers:
Make it easy for customers to understand your brand/products. Have some TV's and tablets set up that show information/videos on the products you carry. We recommend a standard tablet set up for each model you carry, with a brief video going over all of the specs and options of that specific model. This, paired with a related picture, is a great way to help your customers if one of your sales experts is busy assisting another customer. This way you can allow the customer to gain some information about the product while they browse or while they are waiting to speak to a rep.
- Promote your boat show with a calling campaign:
The best and proven way to invite your customers to an event is by doing a call campaign. By doing a calling campaign you can let your customers know ahead of time that you have a boat show coming up a week in advance, giving them time to plan and clear their schedules to attend. With a calling campaign you can also thank them over the phone and give them a special VIP invite. This will make it more personal for the customer while saving you the time and money it takes to get much less effective mailers sent out. The key to a calling campaign is call to thank, give, and invite - not to sell. Have a custom drafted script so you know what to tell the customers when you have them on the phone. By doing a calling campaign, not only are you personally inviting your customers but you tend to find customers who may have some service needs, are looking for parts, or are even in the market to buy/sell/trade.
- Follow up and thank them for attending:
Once the boat show has come and gone, it is always a great idea to follow up with those who attended and thank them for showing up and supporting your dealership. 80% of boat show attendees don't remember the names of who they met at their local show and 90% of customers that attended the shows say that they had no post follow up. This will give you a great opportunity to set yourself ahead of the competition. Find out how their experience at the show was and if they got all of their questions answered. By following up with your attendees you could be setting leads as they could reveal to you that they are interested in something they saw at the show. Another great idea is to call those who said they would like to attend but didn't make it. (You can keep track of this by looking at your will call list.) Once you've made contact with the customer let them know you are aware they weren't able to make it out to the show and you would like to extend your invite and have them come out to your next show.
These 5 tips/pointers should help your business grow size in attendance for your next upcoming boat show and help you get more leads which, in turn, can become sales.
Find out more about how a call campaign can help drive traffic to your event and/or dealership by clicking the button below.
