Content Marketing for Trade Shows, Part 1 of 3: Not sure how to begin your content strategy? Grab a pencil and answer these questions.
Content marketing has revolutionized the way conferences and trade shows engage audiences, turning previously stand-alone events into ongoing educational resources. Combining a consistently updated blog with video, industry trend reports, Infographics and live content produced from the show, events now have the power to hold attendee interest year-round.
Effective content marketing for trade shows and conferences starts with knowing your audience. Whether you’re speaking to consumers or other businesses, you can only inspire a commitment from your readers if you know what will motivate them. Before starting your next (or first) content marketing campaign, answer these five questions about your audience first:
1. What are my audience’s biggest challenges?
Good content marketers engage, entertain, and most importantly, inform. Helping your audience solve problems relevant to your industry will establish you as an authority in the field while giving readers good reason to continue visiting your site. Make sure every piece of content you publish offers something of value beyond a catchy headline, and you’ll soon build a loyal audience of potential event attendees.
2. Where do my readers spend time online?
Aside from a strong internal blog, custom landing pages and targeted Facebook ads can be tremendously effective in turning readers into registrants. Article submissions and guest posts on relevant blogs Knowing your audience’s interests allows you to reach them while browsing their favorite sites.
3. What value do I offer my audience?
If you intuitively know the answer but have a difficult time articulating it, spend some time writing out a few bullet points that succinctly explain what your conference, trade show or event provides. How do you make attendees’ lives easier, and what value do you provide participants? Think about ways you can provide that value in-between shows, and in the process, you’ll become an invaluable resource.
4. What industry announcements will affect my audience?
Staying on top of industry announcements, like travel advisory alerts for tourism professionals or Instagram’s advertising platform release for digital marketers, help to position you as an authority in your field while further establishing you as a go-to resource for your audience. Make sure you leave room in your content calendar (something we’ll discuss in greater detail in the next post) for industry trends and breaking news.
5. What inspires my readers to share?
Ultimately, the more your audience shares your content, the more chances you have to engage new potential attendees. What makes your audience laugh? What inspires them? Think about what personally inspires you about your industry and the kind of emotion you want your content to evoke.
Asking these questions ahead of your event can help make your content strategy more effective. Check back next week for Part 2 on this series on content marketing for trade shows and events, where we’ll talk key campaign components and why timing matters.
Have thoughts on trade show marketing? Send your insights to our editorial team, and we may use them (and of give you lots of credit) in our next post!
818 Agency provides creative B2B content marketing and social advertising campaigns to Fortune 500 companies and growth-oriented startups. Purveyors of real-time event content marketing.