Whether it’s a conference, trade show, or an upcoming convention your company is attending, social media should be one of your top marketing strategies for the event.
Events like trade shows are brimming with people, each carrying at least one cell phone, and likely checking social media periodically throughout the day. Not to mention everyone who wants to attend trade shows and conferences but has to live vicariously through the attendee social media posts. This means you’ll need to make sure you’re ready leading up to the event with social media trade show marketing ideas and interactive trade show booth ideas for your brand.
Trade Show Social Media Hashtag Campaigns
Social media hashtags campaigns are perfect for trade shows, conventions, and conferences. When using social media hashtag campaigns for events like trade shows, keep in mind that it’s important to establish the hashtag you want to your for your brand at the event ahead of time. Then you can use that hashtag for posts leading up to the trade show, during the trade show using interactive booth displays, and even after the event is over.
It also helps to see if there’s a hashtag being used by the trade show or convention itself and mirror your brand’s hashtag to fit that style. That way anyone attending the tradeshow finds the hashtag easier remember. You should also use the event hashtag in tandem with your brand hashtag to increase the reach of your posts to a larger group of tradeshow attendees.
Trade Show Contest Ideas Using Social Media
With the number of people that attend these events, social media contests are a great way to engage people that pass by your trade show displays. There are a lot of different kinds of social media contests and other trade show games to choose from:
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Vote, Like and Comment to Win Contests
These contents encourage trade show attendees to vote, comment, or like a post on your Facebook page, Instagram account, or other social media account. The post could be new product options, potential new services, logo changes, user submitted artwork, etc. Entering the contest by voting and sharing their favorite option gives them a chance to win the prize. -
Sweepstakes
A raffle offering a prize to a random winner from a group of entries. -
Photo and Video Contests
A contest where trade show guests will submit photos or videos and must attain the results you define for the contest (for example: top voted, most number of shares/likes/comments, selected by a panel of judges, etc.)
Trade Show Social Media Walls
Social media walls have a number of advantages during a trade show event. Not only are they great for sharing posts, photos and videos using your hashtag during the event but they can also be used to aggregate product or service reviews for your company. Social media walls are one of the best trade show booth ideas because they give you the opportunity to easily automate your company or product’s praise during the trade show.
Another example of trade show booth display design ideas using social walls is using them to display your company’s employee posts to give event attendees an idea of your company’s culture. This is a great way to connect with attendees during recruitment conferences and networking events.
Social media walls can also be used to broadcast the current standings of a social media contest during the tradeshow. Having a live representation of where contest participants stand is a great motivator for the contestants.
Trade Show Social Media Photos
Photos are everywhere on social media during large trade shows and conventions so your brand should be adding to the mix! Take photos of attendees visiting your tradeshow booth, trying your product or engaging with your brand. But don’t forget to get consent from any of the people you’re taking photos of to make sure they’re okay with you posting the picture on your social media channels. One of the most popular and creative trade show booth ideas guaranteed to attract visitors is to rent a photo booth and encourage visitors to take fun photos they can share on social while stopping by your company’s tradeshow booth.
Trade Show Social Media Videos
If your brand is launching a product at any upcoming conventions or trade shows, use teaser videos on social media before the event to add some hype to the highly-anticipated launch. This is a great way to encourage attendees to plan to stop by your tradeshow booth ahead of time and to spread the word about your product launch.
Another way you could use videos during the event is by recording any visitors at your tradeshow booth who are testing out your product and sharing them on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and any of your other social networks. Just be sure and get proper consent from the person testing the product that they are okay with being filmed.
And if anyone from your company is speaking at the trade show, conference, or convention, be sure and record it and/or live stream them on your social media channels.
Trade Show Social Media Influencers
If there are social media influencers or brands you work with attending the trade show, make sure to connect with them before and meet up during the event. Collaborate on a post together and share it on social media during the event to garner additional engagement. You could even partner up with a social media contest, promotion or giveaway.
There are endless awesome trade show ideas out there and not all of them will be the right fit for your brand but you can always adjust and adapt an idea so it better fits your social media marketing strategy. Let us know of some social media trade show ideas that your brand uses!
