This is a message for trade show vendors: At your next show, sneak up on your own booth. That’s right, pop out from around a corner about 10 yards back and take a good, honest look at your investment.

Do your booth staffers look like sad little wallflowers?

Do they look like kids at a high school social afraid to ask someone to dance?

Is there a guy sitting expressionless in front of a glass bowl of Hershey’s Kisses, wondering why no one is coming up to talk to him?

This “condition” is more common then you might think, especially with the smaller booths. At one recent show, I walked around and paid particular attention to the 5 x10 and 10 x10 booths. Often they’re manned by just two or three people who are so uncomfortable they’re burying their heads in books or dabbling with smartphones — just sitting there waiting for it all to be over.

I looked at these people and found myself thinking about Neil Strauss, a contributing editor at Rolling Stone best known for penning a book called, The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists. This was the inside story of guys who despite NOT being the most attractive males out there, pick up women with absolute ease. Strauss not only researched this “secret society,” he became arguably one of the top pickup artists in the world and actually started conducting workshops for the undesirable and uninitiated.

At the heart of this book is a philosophy about “how to engage people.” He argues that if you’re going to try to pick up a woman in a bar, you don’t say, “Can I buy you a drink?” You don’t ask anything that could elicit a “no” response. Instead, you “engage” her. You contrive a story seemingly playing out before her eyes and ask, “What do you think?” Yes, it’s an opening line. But it’s an opening line that’s not clichéd or overwrought; it’s a question that pulls this woman into a story with you through her advice or involvement.

Strauss’ philosophy is hardly limited to the world of pickup artists. “Engagement” is something that most certainly can be applied to trade show marketing. I was observing the booth staff at this recent trade show, and they weren’t engaging anyone. First of all, they’re sitting. Rule No. 1: No sitting! Secondly, even when standing, they look positively miserable. If you’re spending that kind of money at a trade show and you’re planning to go there with the attitude that you’d rather be anywhere else, then don’t go! And before you say a couple of staffers don’t represent the “enthusiasm of the company,” remember that these faces are your company for the purposes of these crucial three trade show days. They are the representative image of you and the images that attendees will remember.

Honestly, if I had some sort of magisterial banishment power, King Newman would have sent home half the people working this particular trade show. If you’re going to look bored — if you’re going to feel miserable — find another way to market your services.

Here’s the ironic thing: A lot of these same people will spend a fortune on search engine optimization, which is designed to drive traffic to their site. But they don’t spend any energy driving traffic into their booth. And that doesn’t necessarily mean hiring a trade show presenter like me but perhaps a crowd gatherer — at least someone with people skills! If the person in your booth is not the type who can go up to a perfect stranger and strike up a conversation, then they’re the wrong person to be at the show.

You need to find someone who is not just a technical expert; you also need your company’s best pickup artist.

Have an industry-related question? Send “Newman” an e-mail and get your inquiry answered on the blog.

2) Make sure your booth staff is ready to talk to attendees
That means don’t sit down. Avoid standing in groups of two or more fellow staffers. Stand near the aisles.  Look out at the crowd and make eye contact. Smile. Don’t say, “Can I help you?”  They’ll say, “NO.”  Instead, look at their name tags.  Use their name. Ask them what their company does. Invite them into the booth. Now you’re getting somewhere.

3) Quickly follow up on leads
Three-quarters of the leads generated at trade shows are never followed up on … and when they are followed up, it tends to be way too late. Those 2,000 leads you got don’t mean anything if you don’t do something with them. You need a way to categorize your leads as “HOT,” “warm” and “cold” — and with hot leads, there’s no such thing as getting in touch too soon. First contact should come within days of the trade show’s end. When weeks or months go by, you just end up lumped together with all the other SPAM.

4) Use giveaways to build booth traffic
BUT, don’t just give stuff away. USE that giveaway item to quiz the audience on what they’ve just heard. Use it to get them to ask questions. You can also use higher-priced giveaways (from thumb drives to HD TVs to wads of cash) as an incentive to get people to the demo stations and get them into the booth. And consider “green” giveaways. Cheaply made swag just ends up in the trash and then in landfills. You want your giveaways to last … so that attendees hold onto your branded item as long as possible.

5) Keep product demos short
Seven minutes is ideal. Ten minutes is the limit. Fifteen minutes … Get the hook! Trade show attendees have a lot of real estate to cover. Don’t feel you have to tell them your entire story. Pique their interest. Get them to want to know more. Get them into the booth.

6) Limit your seating
A seating area with 50 chairs is intimidating. Few people want to be the first to sit down. Also, if you have an audience of 25 people, it still looks half empty. But with a dozen or so seats, you’re looking at a standing-room-only crowd. People walking by will be more interested in what’s going on if all the seats are full. It’s only natural to wonder what could be going on over there.

7) Have at least one crowd gatherer
We are not talking about scantily clad eye candy for your booth. We’re talking about warm, engaging, gregarious greeters. We’re talking about men and women who know how to chat up people in the aisles, ask them questions, invite them into your booth, introduce them to your knowledgeable (and well-trained) staff. These crowd gatherers will continue to invite people to stop and listen even after the presentation has begun. If you skip the crowd gatherers because of the stereotypes, you’re doing yourself a disservice.

8 ) Insist on an “open” booth design
Think about the lines. Think about the traffic flow. And think about how much you enjoyed the last time you couldn’t find your car in a parking garage. Try to design your booth in a way where there are virtually no impediments in any direction for someone coming in or someone going out. Make the booth’s architecture as open as possible to create maximum flow. You want people to just stroll through and almost accidentally find themselves in the booth. Booth layout and thoughtfulness has much more to do with success than booth size and “impressiveness.”

9) Do your pre-show work!
Promote in advance using social media. Send e-blasts to prospective attendees. Offer up a promotional tease to get people into the booth before the show even starts. Tweet from the trade show floor with your latest news and special offers. Utilize video. Do a “Live from the Trade Show Floor” spot and a daily wrap-up. Announce news and promotions with all the fanfare a live recording can offer. Make it short, interesting and something to get people excited in anticipation of your event.

10) Utilize a professional presenter
Bippy the Mime making a workstation out of balloons may be impressive, but it’s not likely to ensure you qualified leads. Have someone represent your company who is engaging, knowledgeable and will interact with the audience. Most trade show demos seem to be staged readings of marketing white papers. Whether you hire a professional presenter or not, don’t do this … under any circumstances.  Everyone talks about “24/7, valued-added solutions.” Your audience will tune out. Say it in layman’s terms, and say it with passion. Find a reason to truly care about your subject matter.

This article originally appeared as a guest contribution on the ChoiceVendor.com blog. We’ll return next week to the usual Q&A format. If you have an industry-related question, send “Newman” an e-mail and get your inquiry answered on the blog.

As part of our ongoing dialogue with the green marketing experts at The Good Mix, we’d like to turn our attention this week to the incredible toxicity of trade show carpeting. You can smell it when you walk onto the trade show floor. Some people have allergic reactions. It emanates from the backing materials and carpets themselves. Breathing in the fumes for three days is bad enough for trade show attendees — and for those of us who make a living on trade show floors it’s an even bigger issue. Inhaling VOC (volatile organic compounds) can absolutely give you a headache. But far more seriously, those VOC’s have been linked to asthma and cancer. And when that carpeting ends up in landfills, it becomes an environmental problem that affects us all. Trade shows should be about the fun of dynamic presentations and the excitement of new products; it should be about the “atmosphere” of the event … not the actual atmosphere.

The good news is the trade show floor is an environment that’s controllable. It’s temporal (built and shut down) as opposed to the L.A. freeway. We can change the materials at these events. We can even change the trade show culture, and with it the “default” materials and products used.

There are companies that create carpet squares made from 100% recycled materials, lowering the amount of carpet that ends up in landfills releasing toxins into the air. There are low- and no-VOC paints for booths. There are plenty of alternatives to using vinyl, which is one of the greatest toxic offenders in the industry (and most industries).

Management companies pride themselves on giving out presentation awards such as “Top New Product.” What if they created incentives for their exhibitors buying booth space along with a “Top Green Exhibitor” award? What if the following year that exhibitor got a discount on booth space or better yet, preferred exhibit space in a prime location for having the greenest booth, most sustainable giveaways and smallest carbon footprint?

There are ways to have a friendlier trade show environment and incentivize the process to keep all parties happy. It will just take a few good ideas and a lot of commitment.

And if you’re looking for some information on how to “green” your trade show presence, please contact Janet at The Good Mix. She’s a great resource.

Do you have an industry-related question you’d like answered on “Hey Newman”? Send him an e-mail and get your inquiry answered on the blog.

Tom, you don’t have to pay a fortune to get people to pay attention.

You can re-skin your booth. You can have a smaller trade show footprint (and in doing so have a smaller carbon footprint). You can use a small space to reduce your costs while keeping your booth packed with people, which looks better anyway.

Too many companies choose large booths because it’s a status thing. Look how big we are! That model just doesn’t work anymore. It’s not essential and it’s not cost-effective. Think about it like this: People will always cram into the smallest room at a party. The same psychology exists at a tradeshow. There’s nothing more depressing than a 50×50 booth with four people walking around … and three of them are the exhibitors. When you have a 10×10 and people are bumping into each other and crowding around a single kiosk or a single monitor to watch a demo, that creates a wow factor and the impression that “there’s something really exciting going on here!”

I say use a small footprint and then put more money into what’s going on IN your booth.  Consider a three-hour training session for your staff.  Then, create real excitement in your booth with a live presentation.  I’m seeing more live presenters than at any time in recent memory performing in the smallest booths at the show. At a recent trade show, the big players had 60×60s and 80×80s—enormous footprints with 12 kiosks. But there were a considerable number of big companies with booths as small as 8’ X 10’.  One had a magician. Another, a juggler. A third had a professional speaker on a podium telling a half-dozen different stories in rotation, with each mini-presentation lasting just a few minutes. Each one played to consistently large crowds.

At this same exhibit, our client had one of those 8’ X 10’ booths.  With a registration desk and two demo stations, that left virtually no room to spare.  I did my presentation on a small riser at the very edge of the booth, stopping attendees as they walked by.  I delivered a short, entertaining pitch to anywhere from 10-60 people per show.  Those people would then come into the booth, get their badges scanned and many would hang around and talk to our booth staff.

Our client for this three-day event got over 2,000 leads. Considering the size of the booth, they paid a heck of a lot less for their leads than the large booth next door.  And, they got much bigger bang for their buck.

So, no, you absolutely don’t have to have the biggest footprint at a show. If you make the biggest splash, create the most buzz and get the highest value for your investment, then that’s a success.  A big success.

Note from Ken: If you’re interested in booth re-skinning or a smaller,  more efficient booth design, a great resource is Tim Patterson with Interpretive Exhibits.

Do you have an industry-related question you’d like answered on “Hey Newman”? Send him an e-mail and get your inquiry answered on the blog.

We all know the “Three R’s” of green responsibility: Reuse, Reduce & Recycle. As it relates to trade shows, there’s a “Fourth R” you can remember to enhance your trade show (and overall marketing) presence: Rebrand. Find opportunities to tell your company’s story in ways that create a positive association between attendees and your company.

I came across a rising star rock musician who instead of giving out CDs at industry events and conferences, hands out biodegradable download cards that actually sprout flowers when you plant them in the ground. How’s that for telling a positive story while self-promoting and greening your public presence?

Start simple. Instead of giving out landfill-destined water bottles at trade shows, give away health- and eco-friendly Klean Kanteens branded with your company identity. Provide a water source and you’ll be a hub of activity with an item that people will use for years instead of days or hours.

As for marketing materials, instead of expensive four-color brochures, provide thumb drives that can contain far more marketing information than an attendee would ever otherwise take home—including video, Web site links and anything else you can think of. And if you must have some printouts, just make sure it’s 100% post-consumer recycled paper with vegetable-based (nontoxic) inks. Water bottles = landfill. Paper = trees + landfill.

Rebrand Through Re-Skinning

One of the best opportunities for green rebranding is booth re-skinning, a technique for which I’ve already professed my love in this blog. Just think of all the resources that go into constructing a new booth every year and for every show. You can save a boatload of money recycling an already-built booth and giving it a “fresh face” with your company and product identity.

Lastly, ask the show decorators to provide recycling and composting. It’s possible to recover about 95 percent of tradeshow waste simply by having recycling and composting available. In some cities, the facility will actually spend less money by recycling and composting than by hauling waste.

Forty percent of what most people consider waste is food or food-related products. Suggest compostable flatware made from corn-based products and compostable paper plates. Trade shows look great when they take these steps; it’s a marketing message that can really be used in public relations and outreach … while diverting a lot of unnecessary waste from landfills.

Once again, if you’d like more information on eco-business strategies (or anything green), please visit Janet at http://thegoodmix.com.  Or follow her on Twitter at @thegoodmixer .

Do you have an industry-related question you’d like answered on “Hey Newman”? Send him an e-mail and get your inquiry answered on the blog.

Bob, in this economic climate pretty much all companies are trying to save money. So, what are they doing in regards to their trade show presence?

Well, if you can’t afford a 10,000-square-foot house, you don’t buy a 10,000-square-foot house, right? You buy a 3,000-square-foot house, and if necessary, you rent some storage space.

In stark contrast, companies have been totally consumed with “bigger is better” at trade shows and having the biggest possible booth. But the real estate you rent from the management company is one of the biggest expenses … and then you have to fill up that large space (more $$$).

At Magnet Productions, our argument has always been to prioritize filling your space—not procuring the largest one. If you don’t need a 50×50 booth, don’t rent one. If you can get away with a 30×30, then get a 30×30. Frankly, having a small booth completely overrun with people makes a much stronger statement than having a large booth that’s half-empty.

As an experienced trade show presenter, I advise not to have the maximum number of seats because you’re not going to fill them. And if you don’t fill them all, it will give the impression that the presentation going on isn’t very interesting. Now, if you have 10 filled seats and 40 people standing and watching, that conveys a very different impression: Your product is so compelling that you have a standing-room-only crowd.

So, booth size is a great way to save some money. Booth design is another area where the savvy spender can achieve great results for far less money than other companies are shelling out. Magnet Productions partners with a number of booth designers who “re-skin” existing booths. That’s the process by which the designer will strip the signage off a booth and repurpose the existing design to save the client a fortune.

For more information about booth design consultations, feel free to contact us.

Do you have an industry-related question you’d like answered on “Hey Newman”? Send him an e-mail and get your inquiry answered on the blog.

John, way back in 1960 there was an experiment called the “Visual Cliff.” It was a study on depth perception where psychologists Eleanor J. Gibson and Richard D. Walk designed a runway for infants to crawl across, “ending” with a sheet of plexiglass that created the appearance of a precipitous drop. It was really a perfectly safe surface to crawl on, but it didn’t look that way. Most babies would crawl really, really close, but they wouldn’t go “over the cliff”—even with their mothers beckoning them from the other side.

That’s kind of how people are at trade shows.

If visitors feel like stepping into your booth is like stepping out onto that plexiglass, it might not matter what you do to try to beckon them in. Let’s take your booth carpet color, for example … yes, the carpet color! If there is a dramatic difference between the color of the carpet in the aisle and the color of the carpet in the booth, lots of people won’t step over it. They see that carpet and it’s like they’re falling into the abyss. As soon as that carpet changes from the blue or gray that runs down the aisles of the trade show to the green or red that’s in your booth, people stand there and lean but won’t go any farther.

As a trade show performer, I’ve been on stage actually seeing this happen. I’d say, “Come a little closer; we have a couple of empty seats,” and they’ll respond, “No. I’m okay right here.”

They just don’t want to make that commitment. It’s as if there’s something about stepping into the booth that’s suddenly opening themselves up to the possibility of being descended upon like the wrath of God by an army of booth salespeople.

So, when I do booth consulting, one of the things I always tell people is to make the process of entering the booth as easy and seamless (literally) as possible. So, make the booth’s architecture as open as it can possibly be to create maximum flow. You want people to just stroll through and almost accidentally find themselves in the booth. Try to design your booth in a way where there are virtually no impediments in any direction for someone coming in or someone going out.

I ran a “Visual Cliff” experiment of my own—one of the trade show kind. I told a client to find out well in advance what the color of the convention hall carpet was going to be in the area of his booth. Then, I told him to get his booth carpet in the same immediate color family. A little softer blue (or gray, etc.) would be fine, but keep it close.

Now, I’m not Eleanor J. Gibson and Richard D. Walk, so I can’t tell you the quantifiable difference. But it sure felt like it mattered because trade show attendees were wandering around and then, “Oops! Oh, my gosh. I’m in your booth! Would you look at that?”

The key point is that booth layout and thoughtfulness has much more to do with success than booth size and “impressiveness.”

It’s not about trying to blow someone away with the architectural beauty of your design. That’s really not the point. Qualified leads will say, “Wow! What an incredible booth” … and then walk right by it. That’s because it doesn’t have flow. It doesn’t invite you in.

At one recent trade show I attended, there was an elaborate booth with kiosks all around the perimeter. It was fancy, but because of the kiosks there was literally only about a 5-foot-wide entryway. So, it was like pulling teeth for people to get into this expensive, extravagant booth. Yikes!

And to think, all they really needed was a little thinking into the flow of booth traffic—and perhaps some blue carpet to get those leads to jump off the “Trade Show Cliff.”

Do you have an industry-related question you’d like answered on “Hey Newman”? Send him an e-mail and get your inquiry answered on the blog.