Strategy Led Design

0:00
OK, Sean, today we're going to talk about strategy LED design and I have 3 common questions to ask you and I'd love for you to provide some feedback.

0:11
So the first question, how does an event planner design an exhibit that actually delivers ROI, not just looks great, We often times get on these input calls with clients and they want to dive right into what I would say are the tactical requirements of an environment.

0:29
You know, so many meeting rooms, so many demos, so many theaters, things like that.

0:33
And it's often where we have to kind of pull them back, especially if their tactics come from a past or from history.

0:40
It's sort of this is what we always do with the show and we want to sort of stop them, you know, just from thinking purely on building upon what you've done in the past and think about what is the task at hand?

0:52
What are we trying to do this year?

0:54
It's likely that things, especially now at the speed of everything that there's changes in their business, there's probably changes in their marketplace, changes in their audience.

1:03
And so we want to really start from really what are the objectives?

1:07
And it's only from there that you can even possibly measure what those returns are going to be.

1:11
OK.

1:11
So what I heard you say was ideally if an event planner could come into the design process knowing what they'd like to achieve.

1:21
So having a lot of clarity around what does success look like first and then creating an environment, not really being attached to the specifics of an environment until the objectives are very, really well designed and 11 trick for doing that.

1:37
Most of us in this industry are highly visual, right?

1:40
And so paint the picture you're you're there at the end of the show.

1:44
Take yourself to the end of the event and you're there.

1:47
And if there were to be some bottle of champagne that you're about to pop with your coworkers and teammates and celebrate the success of your show because you know you hit those objectives.

1:57
That's like a little bit of a visual trick for just imagining some would say manifesting those those language.

2:04
Yes, Yeah, start with the end in mind.

2:06
Right.

2:06
Exactly.

2:07
Cool.

2:07
I've heard you say that before.

2:08
OK, I have two more questions.

2:11
Second question, how can an event planner build a consistent brand story across multiple trade shows?

2:19
And then in multiple trade shows, let's assume then there are different audiences.

2:23
That right there is a real big one.

2:25
Many, many brands have offerings into multiple vertical markets and the audiences, the attendees at those shows can be vastly different.

2:36
And so for example, when you're designing booth engagements, for example, and you're going to ask the attendee to do something, it's very important to know the demographics of who that attendee is because based on the demographics, there's a certain willingness or resistance to do or participate into certain things.

2:53
There also might be scenarios where the audience, maybe they're more influencer and less buyer decision makers and so maybe they're on an educational journey.

3:02
And so that's going to require you to really design an experience for the that end in mind.

3:08
Whereas if someone has buyer decision making decisions, you might create other aspects of the environment that are really tooled to engage the attendee on that level.

3:17
There's the consistency is one thing, but that doesn't mean that you can't make something completely new, fresh and exciting time after time.

3:25
Yeah, think about some of the most dynamic brands that you know of, famous ones like Coca-Cola.

3:30
Look at the number of campaigns they are running constantly.

3:34
None of it dilutes the brand.

3:36
Well, you never question if you're in a Coca-Cola environment or like a Pepsi environment.

3:42
You'll always know.

3:43
They know where you're at.

3:44
Yeah, experiencing something.

3:45
But they activate those spaces in a different way each and every time.

3:48
And in fact, if they didn't, it would be a real danger to their brand.

3:52
It would become flat and old.

3:53
There's far too many challengers now.

3:55
How can an event planner keep their trade show design fresh year after year?

4:02
Well, I would say this, Hopefully there's a desire to keep it fresh.

4:06
Let's start that.

4:07
So the goal should be for most dynamic brand marketers to create a new experience each and every time these brands go to the shows on on a cycle year after year.

4:18
And the last thing that we want to do is have them show up in the same way that they've always showed up.

4:24
Then the attendees like just you know, well, I've seen that before.

4:27
I'm moving on.

4:28
And you think and, and yet part of, but I've seen that before, where that comes from is you used your graphics last year, so you didn't.

4:35
So what have we really accomplished there?

4:37
And so being very articulate about the differences of the objective, what is the strategy to meet that goal, right?

4:43
What are the tactics that we're going to use?

4:44
What's the investment?

4:46
What are the resources available for us to execute?

4:49
And you mentioned another thing which is all the shows are different.

4:52
Not every show.

4:53
It has the importance to each and every brand and therefore the companies might resource them differently, right?

4:59
So we see that all the time.