Use of advanced technology has now become ubiquitous. From trade exhibitions to education- technology has become an essential tool for excellence. In the recent past, trade shows across the globe have displayed excellent digital implementations simultaneously with conventional practices. The organizers are leveraging high-end technologies to increase their appeal to both the exhibitors and the attendees.
The recent tech trends of the trade shows focus on engaging attendees with familiar and new technological implementations and generating traffic. Let us look at Top 5 current tech trends of trade shows:
- Trend 1: Deploying Event Apps: Almost every trade show organizer deploys a mobile application for their events. These event apps allow exhibitors to communicate with their attendees in real-time with the help of push notifications. These apps are also wonderful platforms for easy communication between a participator and an attendee. Through these applications, any notification, any alert or any change in schedule can be easily communicated to everyone at the same time. Moreover, event apps also give an option to organizers and sponsors to advertise their brands on an affordable digital platform.
- Trend 2: Use of Beacons: Beacons are small digital objects which can communicate with any bluetooth enabled device (like mobile phone) via bluetooth signals. These Beacons can be stuck on the walls of the venue of a trade show in order to communicate with the attendees’ mobile devices by exchanging bluetooth signals. It is amazing how implementation of Beacons can make the trade show experience smooth and informative for the attendees. For example, whenever an attendee approaches any particular exhibitor who is using Beacons technology, the bluetooth signals can be exchanged between the Beacons and the attendee’s mobile phone. Thus, the attendees can promptly receive push notifications with information about that particular exhibitor.
- Trend 3: Social wall: Every event tries to extend their reach to as many people as possible and social media is a helpful tool for that. A big event like a trade show must have multiple social media accounts which receive hundreds of posts and comments at the same time. A social wall is a wall-like platform where regular updates from all the social media pages of a particular event are displayed together. This is helpful for the attendees as they can keep track of all the social media updates of their favorite event without having to switch tabs.
- Trend 4: Live Digital QA & Polls: Often, the trade show organizers hold contests to drive attendee engagement. By conducting a live question and answer contest or live poll with the help of an event app, the organizers try to take the excitement up a notch. While attendees enjoy taking part in these contests and winning attractive awards, the organizers also enjoy all the attention that help them generate traffic for their trade shows.
- Trend 5: A Chatbot for the Trade Show: An interactive bot can perfectly fit the role of a trade show concierge for attendees. Chatbots help attendees to ask simple questions and get answers for them. For instance, information about a particular event, any particular speaker of an event, date and venue of an event etc. A chatbot can even guide attendees to the venue with the help of a digitally implemented map.
Digital technologies have helped the trade shows function smoothly. The trade show organizers can communicate, arrange and operate their events better with the help of all the above technologies. As we approach the end of the year, we are getting nearer to discovering what new tech trends will be introduced in trade shows in the coming year.
Summary
In this digital age, it is easy to attract people by spicing up any business with the implementation of digital technology. Trade shows, in the recent past, have shown some awesome tech introductions along with conventional practices. Let us look at the top 5 current tech trends of trade shows.
Author Bio: Kevin Maddox has been working for the event industry for several years now. Being an expert, he likes to talk about current trends in the event industry and how the collaboration of technologies likes even app are working wonders for this industry.