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Stand Out: Creative Exhibitions

For those of you who are unaware, Marketing Week 2013 is just around the corner! Marketing Week offers a fantastic chance for experienced and budding marketers alike to learn from the industry’s best. Should you be attending this marvellous excuse to show off your brand, you will need to know a couple of things first. A market designed for marketing is going to have your senses reeling; think about all those colours and slogans hitting you from every angle, your poor brain won’t know where to turn. As a marketer, this is where you need to know what attracts a customer, and what bores them to tears.

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Know Your Brand

I found this blog post on HubSpot extremely useful for explaining the golden rule of exhibition marketing: understanding why you’re there. You may have what you’re going to say all readied, and you think you sound like the business, but a well-timed ‘what is your role?’ can derail your train in an instant, so don’t just prepare clever answers. People want to poke and probe your brand to test for holes, not listen to your corporate jargon. Be realistic: answer the questions like a human being and put yourself in your customer’s shoes. Remember to sell the value of your product, not just what it does. Function is pivotal to the product’s image, but it’s definitely the image that you’re selling.

The Christmas lights Coca-Cola truck makes for a very shiny marketing ploy.

Walk the Walk

You might be a snappy talker, but how do you dress? Appearance is everything. Let me say that again, appearance is everything. The Marketing Donut outlines these 12 reasons why exhibition stands fail to engage new customers, learn these basics and you can’t go wrong. On that note, if you want your stand to speak for itself, take a look at the services offered by Skyline Whitespace for some truly impressive, dynamic exhibition stand designs. I remember attending their Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 release in London. Admittedly I was more eager for the game than my next breath, but it was well and truly taken away on release day thanks to solid marketing.

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Silver-Tongue

This goes hand in hand with knowing your brand; being able to talk to people. Number 2 in this blog on ‘5 Reasons Customers Don’t Buy’ from About.com I would consider the most crucial point of exhibition marketing. Why would a customer invest their time and money in something they don’t think they need? Who really needs an iPhone 5 when the other 4 function just as well? The key comes from your dialogue. You need to make a big enough impression as a brand, as a product, and as a person for just one customer to be interested, so think about how that translates to a bigger audience.

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 Pack It In

Last but far from least, function as a team, not a rabble of hyenas. If someone inquires, they want a quick answer, not a team song and dance. Passersby aren’t buffalo; you don’t need the whole team to bring them down (so to speak), you should be able handle yourself. Forgive all the animal metaphors here, but this doesn’t mean you have to be a lone wolf; it simply means that being crowded by a host of white shirts and ties all explaining the same thing is unattractive. Simply knowing your team is with you should give you enough confidence to engage new customers: that and a huge customized stand.

Team

I hope you find these tips useful, though I have no doubt you already know what you are going to do. If you only take one thing away, let it be this: be realistic and don’t try to look like a salesman.

Creative Packaging: The Gift of Nothing

I had only begun trying to sell, rather than giving away, my kitsch little pieces of handmade jewellery on the advice of others. But when my list of requests, mostly for relatives and friends, ran thin, I admit it, I was hurt. At craft fairs people commented on how lovely the jewellery was. They picked them up. And then they put them down. And then they walked away. I’d watch far more organised businesses smile as a constant stream of custom came their way. I could never work out what they had that I didn’t. Now I know.

At Christmas I received a ‘joke’ gift from a friend. Meant to make me laugh, the gift actually changed my life. What strikes me even more about the fact a joke has had such a detrimental effect on my life is that the gift I unwrapped was ‘The gift of nothing’.

A  simple, white piece of cardboard displaying the nothingness within its half bubble of transparent plastic. I turned it in my hand; beside a barcode on the back of the packet was a price sticker. It amazed me. The creator, in his / her quest to answer the question, ‘what to buy for someone who has everything?’, had turned the answer into a solution, a gift, a tangible joke…and a source of income.

I won’t go as far as to say packaging has saved my business, but discovering creative packaging  and thinking about packaging for the first time in twenty years, I feel reinvigorated. I am excited again. somehow I had grown up and become one of the people who buy a present and then frown, bewildered, by the child who only wants to play with the box. But now I remember.

When I was a child, there was no purer pleasure than twisting open the hexagonal, interlocked boxes of Turkish delight my grandfather used to buy me. It was the sole reason I liked Turkish delight, if I am honest. The interlocking pieces of lid that needed carefully twisting apart, causing the box to open like a flower.  I can’t tell you about the turkish delight itself, because I don’t remember it, but that box, it was pure magic.

Media Studies: Is It Worth It?

Physics is the study of matter in time and space; mathematics, the study of life’s numerical code, geography, the importance of environmental awareness, and politics the complication of simple matters. Ok the last one was a bit of a dig, but media studies I hear you say? To anyone else, a media student is some sort of desperate attempt at legitimizing watching films and calling it study. It is constantly teased by other academic subjects, right in the bullying corner with philosophy and creative writing, because honestly: what life advantages could one take from the study of film? I would like to share some insight from a long-term film disciple, and hopefully restore some of your faith in the field of media studies.

I began studying film after being on a different course for 6 weeks at college. I switched over and, despite joining so late, found myself creeping to the top of the class. It wasn’t that it was too easy, it was that I had finally found a subject I was both good at and interested in. Movies have been around for over 120 years; it would be foolish to think that the everyday images you see, hear, and buy have no effect on your brain. I have thought hard about the following list, and would like to outline the reasons why studying media is so vastly important to our culture:

Ok, We’re Rolling…

Physics may study the effect of matter in everyday life; but we are surrounded by media in the form of television ads, films, product packaging, radio, etc. The list really does go on, and having an awareness of the effects these things have on society pulls you out of the crowd. Although, having this knowledge means that almost every film/advert I have ever watched since studying at college I have deconstructed and analysed during, a trait my friends often wish I would keep to myself. Despite making some movies completely unbearable, studying film enhances your viewing experience by making you aware of filmic devices such as camera work and sound.

The Reel World

You may think having these skills will simply ruin watching movies, but it’s not just film that you can apply the theories to. Jobs in advertising, marketing, film, tv, radio and theatre production all require an intricate knowledge of filmic devices and design. The practical upshot of studying media at university gives you access to professional broadcast equipment allowing you to make your own movies and gain a great deal of technical experience. You can’t say it doesn’t look like fun!

Developing Talent

I don’t ever like ­summarising people by course, though it does often appear that some people are meant for their subject. Studying something you enjoy, especially if it’s in the creative industry, gives younger members of society the opportunity to make something inspirational. The way the media industry constantly adapts to incorporate new technology and culturally relevant material is an attractive prospect to creative-minded people. Take a look at this project by Creative England as an example.

Media is absolutely everywhere now, and if you’re dead set on making a career from staying on top of it then get to studying, but don’t forget that it’s a creative subject, your viewing experience may turn out something wholly unexpected. Exciting stuff!

I don’t care what it is; The Packaging is Cool, I’m having It.

It’s both a maddening and exciting idea (depending which side of the fence you’re sat on) that a poor product can become successful with the right packaging while a quality product can flop completely if its packaging misses the mark. But, either way, it is a reality…

When I worked in a record store, I would handle thousands of CD and DVD cases every single day. Some stuck in your mind. Most didn’t. The ones which did, I’d later recall, not because of the artist, movie or song usually, but their innovative or attractive packaging and I was surprised at how much I learned about the level of influence packaging had over customers’ choices. Growing up in a generation in which almost every English house had an internet ready computer, I figured people would be conscious of many of the techniques used and attempts commonly made to persuade them to buy a product, and if that they would resist them.

Instead, I discovered a new culture; as people became more aware of marketing techniques, packaging simply became fashionable. Consumers as well as companies began studying-up, turning to books like  Really Good Packages Explained: Top Design Professionals Critique 300 Designs & Explain What Makes Them Work. Packaging, in return, would evolve to exploit their target customer’s awareness, where previously they may have exploited their ignorance. So, the shape of packaging or particular copy used would seem like it was meant as a private joke between itself and the customer. What’s more, customers began buying products to show recognition for particularly clever packaging or to actually own the packaging, not the product, and ‘creative packaging’ began to feature in conversation amongst friends and in ‘top ten’ list on blogs and in newspapers.

Hence, more and more, artists and businesses are wisely enlisting the services of creative packaging companies. Movie makers at every level too are relying on companies such as Key Production, to provide them with bespoke DVD packaging.  And it works.  When the first ‘Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’ movie was released, I had planned to download the soundtrack. Then I saw the three CDs unfold before me, the sleek frosted slip case, artwork  and full colour booklet…and even I had to admit, ‘giving in’, never felt so good.

Why Your Company Branding is Vital to Get Right

When it comes to running a profitable and successful company there a few things that you need to make sure you get right. Company branding is vital to the success of your business. Get that wrong and you are more likely to fail, but get it right and it’s going to be a name that becomes familiar to many people. One of the most important things is your company name (be sure to check it with Companies House first). It needs to be professional sounding and easy to remember to create an impact on people. Any company logos need to be well designed and unique so they will be easily recognised and a company slogan can be effective if it is appropriate to your business.

There are a great many marketing and PR companies out there who will be able to help your business achieve success, but that will come at a cost and is not something everyone can afford right now. Another option would be to approach a printing company. Most will have excellent staff who are able to work with you to design appropriate wording and logos for your promotional material that can often be just as effective. They will be able to design eye catching art work which is specific to your products, and be able to produce a number of different promotional items to help you increase sales. They will be able to advise you on what to include on your business cards and posters to create a professional image and help you come up with a slogan if necessary.

Advertising posters, letter heads and business cards are all items that can usually be produced at a few days notice, and many printers will be able to offer a business package deal to save you money when ordering them together. With a bit of thought, your business will become easily recognisable.