Get With the Program, Exhibitors

Heidi Genoist -- Tradeshow Week, 3/19/2007

In the stories contained in this issue's focus on corporate exhibiting, we examined how exhibit managers connect with each other beyond the tradeshow floor. While researching these stories, we discovered just how hard it is to connect with exhibitors. One writer called and e-mailed a list of nearly 40 contacts and got no responses.

There are some plausible explanations for this, which we discuss in our stories. Also discussed are some recent and coming efforts that the groups serving the exhibitor community are making to try and change the insularity of this industry segment. Exhibitor Group, in particular, has big plans.

To the 12 percent of our readers who are corporate exhibit managers (according to recent readers' surveys), here's some advice: Take advantage of whatever opportunities are offered you to network online with your counterparts at other companies.

In the past, Editor in Chief Michael Hart and I have joked about online social networking: Who would be interested in the private lives and thoughts of complete strangers, most of them idiots? People are bad enough at engaging meaningfully with their loved ones across the dinner table.

Recently, though, I've changed my mind. I received an invitation to join a listserv for writers, which I eagerly accepted. It's a practical bunch that gives each other inside tips on publishing and selling. During sick leave the week before last, I also set up an account on Yahoo! 360, and played around with creating my site and blog.

Most of the people I spoke to for my focus story in this issue said they didn't have social networking accounts, and I can see why. If I hadn't been sick, I probably wouldn't have had the time for it either.

But professional groups are another thing. They give a concrete return on the time invested. The ability to circumvent hours of research by asking others in my field for help is one of the best benefits I've found on the Internet — not to mention the simple pleasure of connecting quickly and easily with other people who share my vocation.

When I asked my sources whether they thought corporate exhibitors would take advantage of social networking, most said they doubted it. At the same time, most of the exhibitors I meet at the shows I cover have lots to complain about. Nearly all say they wish tradeshow exhibiting weren't so expensive.

What better way could there be for them to change things than to get together and support each other? And what is networking for, if not that?

In other words, exhibitors, stop complaining and sign on.