On 6 October, the Social Selling Day 2022, will take place, a day on which to discover the keys and benefits of applying «social selling» to your sales strategy, taking advantage of tools such as LinkedIn and other digital channels as a competitive advantage for your sales teams.

You may not have considered it, but this type of event, whether conferences, conventions or trade fairs, is a great opportunity to network and increase your sales.

That is why today we want to talk about how you can make the most of these events to consolidate and expand your B2B business.

Why attend events?

You should bear in mind that the connections you establish as a company at a conference, fair or other event can easily become a long-term business relationship.

This type of event is often focused on a specific sector, for example, technology, industry, health, among many others. This attracts the attention of many companies, as they offer a good space to make themselves known and present their products in exactly the right circles.

Social Selling Day, for example, includes both talks by sales experts and a networking space for companies. In other words, it offers a double opportunity for companies: to keep up to date with what is happening in the sector so as not to be left behind and at the same time to connect with the right people. People attend with a great willingness to make contacts.

Therefore, it is a golden opportunity for B2B businesses to generate leads. By putting companies directly in contact, the sales cycle is reduced by 50%.

But so that you can really take advantage of this opportunity, we tell you how to prepare to attend an event in a way that is positive for your business.

How to prepare for a trade event, in 4 steps:

1. Choose the right conference to attend

Although it is clear that this should always be the first step, it is often the most complex. And at the same time, the most important.

Move in the right circles

Firstly, a good way to choose the right event is to find out which ones your current clients or your competitors attend.

You can look at the blogs and social networks such as LinkedIn of these companies to find out which events they will attend, or ask directly during visits, as an informal part of the business relationship.

In this process, a great ally can be, intelligent sales software that helps you keep your client portfolio well organised. In B2B, although clients tend to have similarities with each other, each one is a world of its own. This type of software gathers valuable information about each client, which allows for a more segmented approach and helps detect sales opportunities.

You can take advantage of this to distinguish which type of business relationship benefits you most and in which market niche it is worth expanding your presence. Take advantage of the good relationship with your clients to establish contact with potential clients in the same field and study which success stories could be a good example to present at events.

In addition, the statistics you can extract with intelligent sales software give you many clues about the characteristics of potential clients.

Do not underestimate the “smaller” events”

Bear in mind that once at the event your team will not be able to talk to all attendees, so do not limit yourself only to the most famous and prestigious events.

It has been studied that local attendees tend to attend events for a short time and then leave, while those who come from far away and stay temporarily in the area show greater interest and tend to spend more time talking to companies.

Therefore, we recommend that you do not ignore those smaller conferences that take place in smaller cities, as attendees will surely be more willing to listen to you, and there will be fewer people who are just passing through.

2. Ensure favourable circumstances on the day of the event

These events always have a fairly limited duration. Therefore, if you have a stand, it is very important that you ensure it is located in a good location, that it is very visible and is in a place with a lot of foot traffic. Some places where it is always advisable to be located are: near the food area, in an entrance or exit area and next to other valuable sponsors.

The case of stand is a very visual example, but there are many other circumstances that make a difference at an event. This could be the time of day when you can give a talk or where the brand's banners are placed, for example.

Although not everything can be controlled 100%, it is always positive to express your preferences to the organisers, to wait to know these details before signing the contract and, above all, not to wait until the last moment to choose the circumstances in which the company attends the event.

3. Prepare the content you will present in advance

At these events many companies tend to want to communicate as much information as possible to attendees, but this works against them. It is very important that at the event you are able to convey the message you want to give in a short time and concisely.

In this sense, a very good option is to have an intelligent sales platform that allows all valuable content to be well organised in advance. In this way, all teams, including the people attending the event to represent the company, will find it much easier to prepare the content. What's more, they will be able to do so with real insights into which content works best with customers in the day-to-day running of the company.

Ask yourself what information is really relevant for attendees, and spend time before the event editing the content to keep only the essentials. In this, an active collaboration between Marketing and Sales is key to preparing the best possible material, preferably something that already exists as standard practice before the event.

The result should be a unified pitch that concisely conveys the advantages of the products or services, accompanied by well-designed material that captures attention and perfectly summarises the essence of this pitch.

As for physical material, we recommend that you avoid handing out an overwhelming amount of brochures, catalogues and folders to attendees. It has been proven that attendees are more receptive to accepting a single sheet than a multi-page pamphlet.

With CatalogPlayer, you can also digitise the sharing of information with new Leads, with the cost savings this entails. Easily select and share the commercial content of interest for each contact, in a single click from the app, generating a personalised and unique commercial capsule for the potential customer, with traceability on it.

4. Establish key contacts in advance

Finally, a good way to ensure a successful day is not to rely too heavily on the luck of all potential customers coming to you. Before attending, find out as much as possible about the attendees. Try to connect with those who are of greatest interest, whether through LinkedIn or by making use of a previous contact.

As for your existing customers, having a smart sales platform with a unified communication channel makes getting in touch much easier, whether to speak directly with those who will attend, or to invite others who might be interested and thus consolidate the relationship.

As far as potential customers are concerned, it is very positive to opt for conferences and trade fairs that make some kind of communication channel available to sponsors and attendees to connect among all attendees. As we were saying, it is very positive to have software that offers statistics and valuable information about current customers to better detect these prospects and know how to approach them.

Once you have this clear, our advice is that you arrange some meet-ups with these potential customers who attend the event, a first contact to have a coffee or lunch. Another very good option is offer them a demo of the product in advance, so that they are already familiar with it before the event, where they can continue finding out more.

The success of these events lies in generating valuable leads, and not in handing out brochures with information to as many people as possible. To do this, preparation before the event is essential, something in which Sales Tech tools will be your best ally.

This way you will be able to get the most out of the conferences and trade fairs you attend to increase your sales.