I have worked in marketing in some capacity for about 20 years. My specialty has always been the face-to-face marketing channel, e.g., classes, seminars, conferences, events, retail, business-to-business events, facility visits, and – more than all of the above – trade shows. I have been both the staffer in the booth and the planner of the exhibit campaign. I have watched the internet change the purpose and landscape of face-to-face marketing, and the eventual healthy marriage of those two seemingly opposed marketing channels.

The business interruption caused by a worldwide COVID-19 pandemic has placed us all in uncharted territory. While it's true that there will likely be a permanent residual change to the high-contact channel of face-to-face marketing, the history of the channel itself gives us hope. Truth is, people want to do business with people, and face-to-face marketing is the best medium to satisfy that desire. This gives strong indication that we will be back– different maybe, stronger probably, but back most assuredly.

In the meantime, how can we make the most of this interruption to return better than ever? Having been in the business through many ups and downs, I thought it might be a good time to offer some suggestions for optimizing your professional development during this temporary lull.

Conduct a "health check" of the shows on your calendar
When was the last time you validated the health of a show and the place it holds in the industry? The trade show industry is like any other. Some shows grow, innovating and moving with the times to become stronger with each event. Some shows maintain their position, staying relevant while not exactly pushing the envelope. And, sadly, some shows get weaker. This can happen for a multitude of reasons, including a change in the audience they serve, a failure to innovate, or just plain getting beat by newer and better opportunities.

Take a good look at the data for the last two to five iterations of each show in your program and comb through it with surgical precision. Then ask yourself these tough questions:

• Is attendee and exhibitor participation increasing or decreasing?
• Does the primary audience still match whom you're trying to reach?
• At what rate are exhibiting costs increasing?
• Does your company's rate of return on your objectives and goals still justify that investment?
• Are there alternate face-to-face activities that could serve your business better?

Whatever you do, don't be afraid of the answers! Finding out that your traditional methods are no longer the best option is a good thing. Now you can go to work finding better value with new methods. (And if you find out your program and shows are in good shape, all the better!)

Explore new – and different – opportunities
The rush of executing your existing show schedule usually leaves little time to consider how you are participating in exhibitions, which can lead to stagnation. This exercise is about validating your program and, if necessary, making changes for the better. However, it is imperative to let the data speak for itself and remove the emotions that are often attached to longtime strategies.

Take this time to look at your target audience and purpose with fresh eyes. Maybe your company started out with an objective of building brand awareness and relied heavily on show sponsorships to get your name out there. But now that your company is a recognized industry leader, it may be time to dial back on the sponsorships and investigate opportunities to have your internal experts lead educational sessions. By shifting your objectives and strategies to align with how your target audience views your company, you'll find much greater value in appearing at trade shows and exhibitions.

Pick apart your trade show execution
Why not view this interruption as a window of opportunity to do a thorough evaluation of your trade show processes? Determining where you are spending money that could be saved and put back into your program is always a worthy activity, and especially so as we collectively stand somewhat still. Here are a few ways to make sure that you're allocating your budget as efficiently as possible.

1. Refine your schedule to ensure early bird pricing.
All of my project managers have heard my sermon on early bird pricing. These discounts represent virtually free money that can be better spent on the parts of your program that customers actually see. As such, all of our deadlines are set based on those cut-off dates, and I encourage you to take the time to make sure your program is set up to capitalize on these easy savings.

2. Review your shows' exhibitor manuals.
These hefty tomes are hardly anyone's idea of pleasurable reading, but there are many benefits to combing through them. For instance, any variations from standard shows will be found there – and likely only there. Case in point: At one particular show, I got slapped with an eye-popping drayage bill of $27,000. At that show's next occurrence two years later, I was all over drayage planning and came up with a strategy to reduce the number of crates and pallets. Less freight coming in, less drayage being paid, right? Wrong. If I had actually read the line in the exhibitor manual instead of assuming I knew how it worked, I would have realized that this show charged drayage by the square footage of booth space rented, not by piece. It was a big, fat fail on my part.

While this business slowdown is still happening, work forward and study those manuals. You never know what you might find that you may have missed during your busy season. If the manual has not yet been released for a show located in the same venue every time, you can start by reviewing the previous year's manual for general guidelines. When the new manual is released, you can ask what changes have been made.

3. Find new resources
If you don't have a budgeting system that gives you an increasing history of data, it's time to source one. My team uses a subscription software called Smartsheet (www.smartsheet.com), which is basically an Excel spreadsheet on steroids. It is a good fit for our program because it is able to be grown incrementally, it has communication and alert capabilities, and it is very collaborative for project-management teams. That said, the customization we needed was developed through steadily improved iterations of our budget form. After four people and multiple years, we have developed the right system for the complex data that we are now beginning to capture.

I am no math scholar – you can ask my team – but I have an intense desire for good data. Why is this so important to me? Data dispels falsehoods. There is absolutely no doubt that people have differing opinions and reasons for or against certain shows and events. Good data is the truth serum for these discussions. We owe it to our programs to take this time and make sure we are capturing the data that helps us make good, honest decisions that will bolster our exhibiting endeavors.

In the meantime, make the most of this lull. Though it is a difficult time, face-to-face marketing is a crucial business tool. My belief is that if we use this time for improvement, our industry may emerge from this better than we ever could have imagined.

Pursue additional education
When I began in my current position, I felt so inadequate. I forced myself to become educated – despite my extremely limited time. I pursued my industry certification through EXHIBITOR's Certified Trade Show Marketer program with a fervor that bordered on desperation. It was the saving grace I badly needed as I took on a trade show portfolio roughly 10 times the size of my previous program. Despite the fact that fear drove my pursuit, I remember that time of educational focus with incredible fondness. The first time I realized there was a whole group of people facing the same challenges as I was, it blew my mind. (I'm not entirely sure why it had never occurred to me before, but it hadn't!) I worked hard in the program, driven by a near-constant excitement to be finding new resources and answers. Most, if not all, of my exhibit program has been affected by what I discovered, and it has served me well.

I know this downtime seems frightening on the surface, but it could actually be an opportunity to get into a similar educational mindset. When was the last time you were able to read up on the latest industry trends? When were you last able to take an online class about a skill you'd like to learn or improve? Have you ever backed up from your trade show program far enough to research the myriad innovations that are reshaping the exhibiting world? Now would be an ideal time to explore every learning avenue available. All that fresh information and education might very well make our programs stronger when we get back to business – and we will.