How Cost-Effective Are Tradeshows

Are Trade Shows a Good Investment?

If your company participates in industry trade shows, you’re probably busy getting ready for 2024’s winter trade show season. In fact, you're likely developing your budget for all upcoming trade shows in 2024.

Some good news: Trade shows are back in a big way. Globex’s 2023 study on the exhibition industry shows huge growth. In fact, they project the industry to exceed 2019 levels by 2024 and 2025.

The key takeaway from their data? Trade shows will completely recover to pre-COVID levels in the next two years.

Even so, exhibition booths are expensive, and it can be difficult to calculate tradeshow ROI in 2024. That makes it tricky to determine whether exhibiting at these events is a good financial decision.

But we’re here to help! At Merchology, we’ve spent 10 years helping companies like yours find the best giveaways for their tradeshow booths. Expos are a big part of our business, and we’re passing along what we’ve learned to you.

In this article, we’ll explore an important question: how cost-effective are trade shows? We’ll also share tips for achieving maximum ROI and efficiency in your tradeshow budget plan.

Custom Promotional Items

How to Calculate the ROI of Trade Shows

If you want to decide how much you should spend on future trade shows, then the first step is to figure out your ROI from past events. The basic formula for calculating financial ROI for trade shows is simple:

(Profit - Expenses)/Expenses.

However, trade show ROI is more complex. That’s because your return is more than just the sales you landed at your event.

Here are more considerations for determining your tradeshow ROI in 2024:

Full return takes a while: Even when it comes to hard dollars, you won’t know the complete impact until a full sales cycle is complete. That’s because most potential customers and clients will learn about your product at the tradeshow but won’t purchase until later.
Brand awareness: Depending on your industry, expos may be a critical factor in your brand’s visibility. This may be especially true for B2B (business-to-business) companies or wholesale companies.
Contacts collected through giveaways: If you offer an enticing prize drawing, you can collect contact information for a large number of leads. Then, you can follow up after the trade show. Choose a high-end, logo-branded product—such as electronics—to get attendees excited about your giveaway.

In other words, your expo ROI isn’t just measured in direct revenue. You should also consider the leads you generate, as well as long-term factors such as brand awareness and visibility.

Are Trade Shows Cost Effective?

Of course, your company’s past ROI isn’t the only factor in determining trade show effectiveness for 2024. Thankfully, there is plenty of data out there to show you the current state of the expo industry.

Trade Show Labs has put together an extensive list of statistics that they’ve gathered from a wide variety of studies and sources.

Here are some of the most important insights from their research:

It costs an average of $10,000-$30,000 to exhibit at a trade show (and that’s per show). Because of the high cost, you want to make the most of each event you attend.
The cost of meeting with a potential customer or client at a trade show is $142. That’s 45% less expensive than the cost of meeting them at their office, which averages $259 per meeting.
Companies can get an ROI as high as 4:1 at trade shows. Some Fortune 500 companies even report a 5:1 ROI.
Trade shows and other events account for 31.6% of a company’s marketing budget, on average. However, that number increases to 40% for B2B companies.
Virtual trade shows have become increasingly popular due to the pandemic. They also offer a huge benefit of being much cheaper than in-person events because they don’t require travel or the cost of having a physical booth.
Despite the cost-effectiveness of virtual events, face-to-face interactions are often key to landing sales. In fact, 95% of exhibitors favor in-person events.

What are the key takeaways here? Tradeshows in 2024 will continue to be an essential part of many companies’ marketing plans. For many industries, their high cost is worth the investment because of the substantial ROI.

But if you can’t swing $10,000+ for each in-person event? Virtual trade shows offer great opportunities at a much lower cost.

How to Set Up a Trade Show Booth

If you decide to include trade shows in your 2024 marketing budget, then you’ll want to get started planning and decorating your booth right away.

Here are a few of our top tips:

Expo booth essentials include logo-branded banners, product demos or displays, informational handouts and business cards, and promotional swag. Do price comparisons so you can get the best bang for your buck.
If you’re new to tradeshows or your budget is tight, start small with your booth. You don’t have to pull out all the bells and whistles for your first expo season. It’s okay to leave room to grow.
Know your budget, so you can choose the best booth space size. The standard size is 10 feet by 10 feet, but many events offer larger options. Make sure to choose the right size for everything you need to have at your booth.
Pay attention to the type of booths offered at the trade shows you’re attending. Will you be in a line of booths or in more of a stand-alone location? This will affect how you plan your layout.

Want more information? Check out our General TradeShow Booth Info guide.

What To Do Before Attending a Trade Show

In addition to planning a booth, there are four other things you must do before ahead of your next trade show:

Research your audience. You need to fully understand your potential customers and clients.
Schedule your travel. If your event is in person, you’ll want all your travel details worked out well in advance.
Promote your trade show appearance. Let your existing audiences know that you’ll have a booth where they can connect with you personally.
Order custom merch in advance. Logo-branded swag is a key element in attracting attention to your booth. Make sure you order ahead of time so you don’t have to stress about shipping times.

How to Collect Contacts at Trade Shows

Remember the days when every event booth had a spiral notebook to collect contact info? Thankfully, those days are over! Now, there are multiple apps to handle your email address collection. Here are a few of the best options:

To learn about these apps and more, check out our list of Best Apps for Collecting Contacts at Trade Shows.

Custom Promotional Items for Trade Shows

Trade shows are pricey and time-consuming. So you want to make sure you use every tool to improve your ROI.

Logo-branded promotional items are vital to expo success. Here are a few of the benefits:

They build brand awareness because attendees will advertise your company whenever they use your gift in public.
Swag is one of the most exciting parts of the trade show floor. Offer great swag, and you’ll attract more visitors. That means more people will hear the details of your products and services.
Offering helpful, fun, or exciting merch helps you start building a trusting connection with new leads.

Merch such as custom hats, drinkware, and T-shirts are always popular swag choices. Small electronics such as branded portable device chargers, earbuds, and flash drives are also brilliant options. These items are handy to use during the expo, and they’ll be used again and again after attendees return to the office.

At Merchology, we specialize in adding your corporate logo to these products and more. When you have great merch at your booth, you’ll see better tradeshow effectiveness in 2024!

Contact Us

Now that you understand how to measure the ROI and efficiency of tradeshows in 2024, it’s time to start getting ready for your events! Contact a Merchologist today, and we’ll walk you through the simple process of ordering the perfect customized merch for your booth. We even offer Quick Ship and 3 Day, in case your next expo sneaks up on you. We’ll do everything we can to make sure your trade show exhibit is a hit!