In order to make any trade show a success, it's vital that your company construct a comprehensive social media marketing strategy to implement before, during, and after a show.

Social media has become the primary way that people and businesses communicate with each other, because it's easy, convenient, and immediate.

Not only that, social media has also become one of the most economical and successful means of marketing that businesses can leverage, if executed properly.

As it turns out, there's a bit of method to the madness when it comes to constructing a social media marketing strategy for trade shows, but, if done effectively, the return on investment can be tenfold.

Don't fool yourself by thinking that you can call it a day after posting a tweet or two, because that's definitely not going to cut it.

If you're looking for guidance on building a beginning-to-end trade show marketing strategy, then check out "The Ultimate Checklist of Trade Show and Exhibit Marketing Tactics" post, and be absolutely sure to steer clear of these seven social media DON'TS when marketing your company online for your next trade show. 

Trade shows are gold mines when it comes to lead retrieval.

Not only are you able to build brand awareness, but, more importantly, you're able to shake hands with key decision makers and influencers in your industry - which is definitely worth its weight in gold.

Surveys conducted by the Center for Exhibition Industry Research (CEIR) show the following* to be true of trade show attendees:

• 92% of trade show attendees say they are looking for new products (Source: CEIR: The Role and Value of Face to Face).
• 81% percent of trade show attendees have buying authority (Source: CEIR: The Spend Decision: Analyzing How Exhibits Fit Into The Overall Marketing Budget)
• 46% of tradeshow attendees are in executive or upper management roles (Source: CEIR: The Role and Value of Face to Face).

*Extracted directly from the Trade Show News Network.

With that said, it's easy to see why mastering the art of trade show lead retrieval is vital to building your business. In order to ensure that you get your money's worth at any trade show, here are three strategic methods for collecting leads. 

There's a bit more involved in exhibiting at a trade show than the concept of "build it and they will come."

You can build it, alright, but we can't promise the right people will come.

For this reason, we've compiled the ultimate list of trade show and exhibit marketing tactics to help your company trump the competition and stand out from the rest.

This is a massive list of marketing tactics and strategies that start from before the your trade show even starts to activities you can do after the trade show ends. 

We recommend you bookmark or favorite this page for future reference.