Tradeshow Booth Design

How to Make an Impact

Your tradeshow booth design must clearly and impressively communicate who you are, the benefits you deliver, and why you are the best choice to meet your target audience’s needs. You have only a matter of seconds to attract the attention of potential prospects during a show. That means your exhibit design must quickly and clearly deliver your message and communicate your image.

While most exhibitors partner with tradeshow display companies to create their booth concepts, a growing number are opting to do their own trade show booth design by accessing free exhibition software design tools that are available online.

A number of companies offer low-cost or free,3D software design tools that run on a web browser. These easy-to-use tools enables exhibitors to quickly and precisely create booth configurations and design components.

No matter who designs your exhibit, the key is to ensure the overall layout, graphics and booth elements work together to powerfully deliver your message in a way that resonates with your target audience.

Simple Design, Strong Message Delivery

Keeping your trade show booth design simple – yet arresting will enable you to send a compelling message on the exhibit floor that attracts high potential prospects to your booth.

As you begin to conceptualize your booth design, first identify the single most important message you want to communicate. Then, take into consideration the purpose for tradeshow participation, your target audience, brand positioning, competitive arena, and unique benefits.

Appeal to the Senses to Enhance Success

To enhance the effectiveness of your tradeshow booth design, use other marketing strategies that appeal to your prospects sense of sight, touch, sound and smell.

To maximize the sense of sight, your graphics and images must be bold, colorful and serve as the focal point of your exhibit. Through imagery and minimal verbiage, they must convey your story and benefits in a way that makes you stand out from competitors.

Providing opportunities to touch and experience your product will engage your visitors, make a positive impression, and facilitate your sales effectiveness. There is no substitution for getting prospects involved with your product. When they have first-hand interaction, they will be more likely to buy from you. Plan your booth design so an area is designated for prospect trial of your product.

Effective use of sound in your exhibit area can attract visitors and further your overall tradeshow sales impact. Examples of sound utilization in your booth include live demonstrations, speakers, media presentations, music or entertainers that incorporate your product into their show content.

Having aromas or smells that enhance your exhibit’s environment – such as the appealing scent of baked goods, fresh popcorn, quality coffee or flowers – will serve to attract more visitors. They also set a warm, friendly mood that will keep people at your booth for a longer period of time, and enhance re-call of your product after the show.

The key to effective tradeshow booth design and implementing sensory marketing strategies is to carefully craft your efforts to target potential buyers of your product – rather than simply drive a lot of booth traffic who will never become customers.