You’re undoubtedly aware of the abundance of conferences and exhibitions held throughout the year, across the globe, especially within the mining industry. 

Conferences are an opportune time for professionals in the same industry to interact, share insights, discuss challenges, and learn about new companies. Depending on the desired outcome, exhibiting vendors have the potential to share their investment opportunities to source capital from new and existing investors as well as grow business contacts.

It is important to choose several conferences to attend that best suit your company’s needs and forgo others to focus your time and energy into planning ones you will get the most out of. Some larger conferences have a vast number of booths with limited time for attendees to see them all. The question is then, how do you ensure they will be captivated and choose to visit yours? 

It is found that the average conference attendee spends 8.3 hours viewing booths throughout an event, providing you with enough amount of time to have a productive conversation about your company, give insight into your company’s future and capture the attention of investors. 

After considering which conferences are the most relevant to your company and its commodities, it’s important to make sure you seize the opportunity by ensuring you are well-organised and have an eye-catching booth set up to attract attention and spark curiosity. It is vital your booth stands out and that potential business does not simply walk by without hearing your story. 

Below are a few important tips for ensuring your booth is guaranteed to catch the eye of investors and attendees and encourage them to stay a while to learn about your company. 

1. Ambiance

The colours used throughout the booth and signage as well as the position and brightness of the lighting help to set the ambience and mood. When selecting colours to use, it’s important to stay on brand, so select colours that can make your booth instantly recognisable to visitors. 

Colours can also be used to accentuate certain elements of your booth as well as highlight important text snippets. Choosing an appropriate number of colours is important, as too few can be boring, however too many can be overwhelming.

In terms of lighting, spotlights are effective in highlighting specific elements as well as creating depth. Lamps and projectors are also useful in creating a specific atmosphere to encourage attendees to learn more.

2. Graphics

The human brain processes images faster than text, so displaying striking graphics is vital to grab the attention of visitors. Choose graphics that have simple messaging and that are unique to your company’s brand. 

A simple background with a few prominent graphics can create a clean coherent look and draw more attention to the figures. Too many images can be overwhelming for visitors, create clutter and inevitably distract from the overall messaging of the booth.

Creating a video featuring clips of your company at work can be effective playing on a tv within your booth. TV stands can be decorated with graphics as well to create a cohesive effect within the booth

3. Layout

Booth sizes vary across different conferences, so it is important to make the most of your space and use the layout to your advantage. If the space is smaller than you would have liked, try to avoid covering the entire space with graphics, text and furniture as it can appear cluttered. As a rule, ensure about 40% of your booth is empty space. White space is effective as it draws attendees’ attention to the more distinctive aspects of your booth as well as creates a nice balanced, appealing display.

If possible whilst planning, consider the direction of foot traffic and therefore which displays will be the first thing visitors see. Place your most striking graphics towards the front of your booth to capture the attention of the foot traffic immediately as they walk past.

In terms of furniture, you will find that almost everyone at the conference will have the standard white table and a couple of chairs. Sometimes splurging on something a little more expensive is effective as it can make your company appear more professional and organised as you have put more thought into the display. Consider the placement of the furniture so it doesn’t cover any of your important content and is not blocking the entrance, so it still invites attendees in to learn more.

4. Text/location

Text is effective in giving statistics and brief descriptions of a company and acts as a basic introduction for conference attendees to process. Keep the information clear and concise, just enough to convey your overall message. Make sure the information is accurate, up-to-date and relevant to what potential investors may be looking for.

Ensure the text is at a reasonable height within the booth, close to the average eye level, so visitors do not have to go searching for it.

QR Codes can be placed around the booth. This can help direct visitors to your website or encourage them to sign up to your newsletter.

Finally, a few more basic tips. Make sure you have someone from the company always manning the booth. This is important to create a personal connection with potential investors and for the people asking questions to be helped. This creates a positive correlation between attendees and the company and can leave more of a lasting impression. 

Although it sounds self-explanatory; keep the booth well-organised, uncluttered, and clean to keep a professional atmosphere within the booth and show that you are organised. 

The way your booth looks including, graphics, text, lighting, colours, and layout, can change attendees’ perceptions of your company very drastically, so it is important that you are aware of the impression you are having on your audience. 

Once you have established your graphics for a conference and refined a style that is effective it can make planning for future conferences much easier when the same displays can be adapted. Perfecting your booth is not only important as it captures potential investors’ attention, but it also allows you to create a personal relationship as they learn more about the company’s progress and future plans.