Exhibiting in a trade show can be a consuming project that requires months of planning. Your organization's resources, both time and money, will be spent in excess and at the end of it all, your superiors will want to know, “Was it worth it?”
So, how do you quantify the value of your project for them? Where should you start? We understand that it's challenging to calculate the success of your marketing efforts after a trade show. Not to worry! Today, we’ll address exactly how to do that and also how to make it as easy as possible for you to do this in the future.
Let’s begin.
Your Metrics: ROI and ROO
First, we need to make a clear distinction.
Upon completion of your trade show event, you will have two areas to measure. The first is ROI, which compares the costs of the trade show exhibition against how much revenue is generated in sales.
The second is ROO (Return on Objectives) which is a more empirical valuation that shows how well your marketing strategy is working against your trade show objectives.
Both are important metrics, and we can help measure both for you - but we’ll get to that in more detail later. First, let’s discuss how to calculate ROI.
How to Calculate ROI for a Trade Show Booth
There is a very simple formula for calculating your ROI. Let’s review that now.
ROI = REVENUE - INVESTMENT
INVESTMENT
So, if you know that you’ve generated $60,000 in sales from the leads collected at the trade show, and you invested $30,000 in exhibiting at the event, then your ROI would be 100%.
Your next question might be, “Well, how do I know how much revenue I’ll generate from the trade show?” Measuring ROI can be a lengthy process depending on your particular sales cycle. However, at FastSensor, we offer two metrics specific to trade shows that give valuable insight into your ROI.
They are “Outreach Funnel” and “Time-in-View.”
Outreach Funnel analyzes critical KPIs such as walk-by traffic, visitors, browsers, and engagers to calculate how many people had eyes on your brand and how many visited and engaged with your booth.
Time-in-View tracks the total amount of time visitors spent looking at your exhibit assets and the average duration of view time per impression. This is similar to online impressions and CPM metrics in digital marketing, but for physical engagement that is often more valuable.
Equipped with this powerful insight, you can make adjustments to your exhibit that will increase engagement and conversion.
How to Determine ROO for a Trade Show Booth
There is no mathematical formula for ROO because it’s not a sales measurement. Instead, it’s based on alternative goals set for the trade show, such as increasing brand awareness, demand generation for a new product launch, press coverage, etc. It can even include generating qualified leads that will later be used to calculate ROI.
Regardless of your goals, it’s important to get clear on them and set up a method for tracking them so you can improve your ROO and increase your ROI at every opportunity.
Now that you understand the basics of calculating ROI and some examples of how you might set goals for your ROO, the last step is to secure an expert method to track your objectives.
FastSensor: The Expert Method for Measuring ROI and ROO
FastSensor is the first AI-powered, people tracking solution for indoor venues. Our platform tracks and analyzes customer behavior in indoor spaces and reports back key metrics like engagement, loyalty, traffic heatmaps, dwell time, and conversions. It delivers real-time customer behavior insights that drive more on-site engagement and sales.
FastSensor will monitor your trade show exhibit and floor plan so you can see what elements are performing well and which are not. We do this by exploring how visitors navigate your booth so you can optimize your floor plan to boost ROI.
In addition, with FastSensor’s robust reporting methods, you can ditch the clunky, time consuming spreadsheet work and access your metrics anytime via our software or reporting.
Don’t waste anymore of your precious resources trying to calculate and quantify ROI and ROO without the right data. Let FastSensor do it for you and help you improve your exhibit along the way. Contact us today to schedule a demo!