of B2B trade show visitors in North America decide which stands to visit before the show opens. CEIR, 3,719 surveyed
Want distributors who already know you to walk up to your stand at a trade show in Central Asia?
Before a trade show, a distributor opens the exhibitor list and decides whom to visit and whom to book a meeting with. At a large specialised show in Almaty or Tashkent that list runs to hundreds of companies, and judging by German trade fairs, a visitor has about thirteen business conversations a day. That is why we start three months out: by the show he already knows your name, has your terms and comes to the stand to discuss them.
The choice is made before the hall
Visitors arrive with a plan. In a survey by CEIR, the American centre for exhibition research (2018, 3,719 visitors to B2B shows in North America), 64% decided in advance which stands to visit and 45% planned meetings with exhibitors in advance.
He has little time to talk: AUMA, the German trade fair association, counted an average of 13.1 business contacts a day per visitor in 2024, chance ones included. A show like that has hundreds of exhibitors, so only a small share get a conversation. He picks that share before the doors open, and the names he has already come across shape the pick.
Hundreds of stands, about thirteen conversations a day
- 240exhibitors on the list, as an illustration
- 13business conversations a visitor has in a day
- 1of them yours, if he already knows the name
A diagram, one cell per exhibitor. 240 stands in for a large specialised show in Almaty or Tashkent; 13 is the AUMA average for trade fairs in Germany, 2024
Most visitors decide which stands to visit before they walk into the hall.
Why a familiar name gets picked
People prefer what they have seen before. Psychologists call it the mere exposure effect. In 1968 Robert Zajonc showed that a nonsense word or a stranger's face is liked more once it has been shown before. In 1989 Robert Bornstein pooled more than 200 such experiments, and the effect held. It holds even when people cannot recall seeing the thing.
The experiments used words, symbols and faces, so applying them to a distributor reading an exhibitor list is my reading. The effect also has a ceiling: after 10 to 20 exposures, liking often stops growing and the same picture starts to bore.
So over three months we show the distributor different sides of you: the product at work on a site, a certificate, your terms, the warehouse, the people. An ad launched a week before the show has time to show him one thing, an invitation to the stand.
What the distributor sees before the show
- the product at work
- a certificate
- your terms
- the warehouse
- the people
- an invitation to the stand
Three months, in order
Counting down to the show
- 90 daysLaying the ground
A site in Russian, social media, wholesale platforms, content that answers his questions. We build the list of companies in your category
The distributorHas not heard of you yet
- 60 daysHe starts to see you
Targeted and search ads; with social media, about a million in total reach by the show. Calls and emails in your name
The distributorSees you in his feed and hears your name on the phone
- 30 daysMeetings in the schedule
We book days and hours, send your terms, collect his questions
The distributorBooked for a meeting, with your terms in hand
- The showTalking terms
Meetings on schedule, our manager next to you
The distributorComes to discuss price, batch and country rights
We build what the distributor will find when he starts checking you: a regional site in Russian with minimum order, lead times, certificates and distributor terms, social media accounts, listings on wholesale platforms. We create content that answers, ahead of time, the questions he would ask at the stand: delivery terms, logistics, certificates. In parallel we build a list of companies in your category in the show's country, be it Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan or another: distributors, dealers, customers.
We launch targeted ads on social media aimed at people in those companies, and search ads on Yandex and Google for those looking for your category. By the show the ads and social media together reach about a million people; that is our working benchmark.
In the same weeks our manager calls and writes to the companies on the list in your name, in Russian: who you are, what you bring, which stand to find you at. The ads run at the same companies, so the name the distributor hears on the phone he may already have seen in his feed. Some companies see the ads and get in touch first; they join the same list.
We book meetings for specific days and hours of the show. Before the meeting the distributor receives your terms: distributor price, minimum batch, lead times, rights to the country. We collect his questions in advance and pass them to you, so the answers arrive at the show with you.
At the show the stand has a schedule. Our manager stands next to you, interprets and makes sure meetings do not overlap. Walk-in visitors come too, and those conversations run as usual.
After the show negotiations pick up where they stopped at the stand. Every month you get a report with numbers: how many meetings took place, who sent a request, what stage each conversation is at.
What gets discussed at the stand
With an unfamiliar brand the first minutes go on introductions: who you are, where from, why you can be trusted. A distributor who has seen you in his feed for three months and already has your terms skips those minutes. He goes straight to the price per batch, payment deferral, who else brings your product into the country, and whether you would give him the rights to Uzbekistan.
The further people travel to a show, the more often they travel to negotiate. In the same AUMA survey, contract and purchase negotiations were among the priorities of 12.4% of visitors from Germany itself and 27.3% of visitors from Asia. I think a distributor coming to Almaty from Tashkent or Bishkek weighs his time the same way.
Put the preparation into the trade show budget
You pay for the stand, flights, hotel and team in any case. The three months of preparation decide who you will talk to at that stand, so they belong in the same budget as the show itself.
Month one of preparation is $5,000; every later month starts at $10,000. The ad budget, $1,000-1,500 a month, starts in month two, once every platform is ready. It is paid to the platforms for impressions and sits outside our fee. If fewer than three months are left before the show, we launch the platforms and the ads at the same time, and the calls and meetings still fit in before the doors open.
After the show, compare it with last year on three numbers: how many meetings were in the schedule before opening, how many conversations at the stand got to terms, and how many negotiations continued afterwards.
A week before your next show the distributor will open the exhibitor list again. Your name will be one of hundreds of lines, and this line he already knows: a meeting with you is in his calendar, and your terms are in his inbox. For that, start three months before the doors open.
In short
- 01Visitors choose stands before the show: 64% decide in advance where to go, and they have about thirteen business conversations a day.
- 02From a long exhibitor list, people pick the names they have seen before.
- 03Over three months we make your name familiar: a site in Russian, social media, content that answers his questions, ads and social media reaching about a million, calls in your name.
- 04A month before the show the meetings are in the stand schedule, the distributor has your terms, and the conversation opens with price, batch and country rights.
- 05Put the preparation into the trade show budget: the first month is $5,000, each month after from $10,000, ads $1,000-1,500 a month from month two, separately. After the show, compare the result with last year.
That is the way Artifact prepares foreign manufacturers for trade shows in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. Once you have chosen your show, write to us and we will start the countdown from its date.
Galina Sorokina