COOL TIP OF THE WEEK

"Cool Tips of the Week" archived from 7/16/2008 email, which is a weekly email sent by Steve Miller to IMTS Exhibitors with quick tips, ideas, examples, advice, and just plain old good information on making the best of your IMTS Experience.

STAFFERS

The E.Q.U.I.P. Formula

The next five Cool Tips are going to talk about a simplified system for your staffers to handle a quality discussion. I've created the acronym E.Q.U.I.P. as an easy way to remember each step.

The first letter, "E," stands for Entice & Establish.

Before anything happens you need to ENTICE an attendee to stop in your booth. Yes, there will be times when attendees voluntarily walk into your booth, but not always. Staffers can't stand back and wait for something to happen. They need to be proactive. Stand out by the aisle, smiling and making eye contact with attendees. Watch for body language that suggest they may be approached. Do they look at your products for more than a few seconds? Do they slow down their pace? Do they take a bit of a double-take, glancing at your booth, looking away and then looking back again? Those are signals to start a conversation. Ask what caught their eye? What made them slow down?

The important thing is to get the conversation started. Once that happens then you quickly move into the ESTABLISH part. Establish rapport with brief small talk. Are you familiar with their company, where they're from? No? Ask about that. The point is to establish a bit of a personal connection with them and then invite them to come into your booth.

The first step is to ENTICE and ESTABLISH. Next week I'll discuss the second step in the formula - Q is for QUALIFY.

E.Q.U.I.P. Tips

E - "E" stands for Entice & Establish
Q - "Q" stands for QUALIFY
U - "U" stands for Uncover & Understand
I - "I" stands for Introduce
P - "P" stands for Post-Show - COMING NEXT WEEK

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