PROGRAM MEASUREMENT
 My company's trade show goals relate to awareness and education rather than sales. So what can I measure to prove the value of my program when we're not gathering leads?
 Whether or not your company has sales-related objectives, education and awareness are viable goals that can be tracked via several measurement strategies. Here are two of the easiest and most economical ways to measure the effectiveness of your program when you're not gathering leads or tracking sales.
1. Unpaid Media Coverage - If your exhibit activities, promotions, and/or products and services are newsworthy, you might score free media coverage, which almost surely satisfies awareness- and education-related goals. Be it print, broadcast, electronic, or some other form of delivery, media coverage can be measured by the number of impressions it generates and then assigned a dollar value.
But before you can measure such coverage, you have to become aware of it. Ask exhibit staffers to track which members of the press stop by the booth or talk to them at the show. Then follow up with each journalist after the show to determine if you received any coverage. Also ask show management for a list of journalists attending the show and monitor their publications during the show and for several months thereafter to see if your exhibit made it into their at- or post-show coverage.
Once you know which media outlets have covered your exhibit, activity, or product, contact the media source to get the price of advertising in that medium as well as the gross impressions likely associated with that exposure. Most media outlets can tell you the gross viewer impressions for selected issues or time slots, and most can even break down the demographics for you. Then, if your product received roughly half a page of coverage in a monthly magazine, for example, determine how much a half-page ad costs in that particular medium. This figure is the dollar equivalent of the free media coverage generated by your exhibit program.
However, the Public Relations Society of America recommends that you multiply that dollar equivalent by 2.5 to address the credibility factor of non-advertisement coverage. In other words, media coverage that is not prompted by a paid advertisement conveys a higher influence on consumers than paid placements - i.e. consumers perceive it to be more credible than paid advertising. Thus, according to the PRSA, nonpaid coverage is 2.5 times more valuable than paid advertising.
2. Presentations, Educational Materials, and Premiums - Another way to measure your exhibit's effectiveness is to track the quantity of educational materials (product literature, CDs, memory sticks, etc.) distributed in your exhibit and the number of branded specialty items handed out. Granted, many of these items will end up in the trash bin either immediately or eventually after the show. But if you distribute these items to qualified booth visitors after you've imparted an education-related message, you're also generating awareness.
Also be sure to count the number of people who witness in-booth presentations, including everything from one-on-one demos to theater-style presentations. Any time you've captured attendees' attention long enough to deliver a presentation or a demo, you're likely generating awareness and providing education. And be sure to count the number of people standing around a presentation, not just those seated in your theater, as standing attendees are usually just as engaged as those that are seated, provided they don't walk off in the middle of the presentation.
Aside from some time and planning, these two simple strategies won't cost you a thing. Used properly, they'll help you validate your program and provide some hard and fast numbers to track your exhibit program's effectiveness.
- E. Jane Lorimer, managing director, Lorimer Consulting Group, Denver
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