NCOF 08 - An Exhibitor's Perspective

The 24-7 INtouch team just got back from NCOF 2008 in Orlando last week and overall I think the show was pretty successful. We can never really define success from an ROI perspective until our sales team has the time to follow up on the leads generated from the show. But overall, here is my critique for the main elements we look for in a tradeshow (out of 5 star rating):

1) General Traffic -  2.5/5

The traffic in the exhibit hall was very low this year, which was surprising to us and also many of the other exhibitors. We definitely expected to see more people at the show which was a little disappointing. The attendee to exhibitor ratio seemed very low. There were several reasons that could explain the slow traffic, one being the American Airlines flight cancellations. AA canceled 3,300 flights over 5 days last week effecting travel for over a quarter million people. I guarantee some of those where destined to Orlando for the show. But a few things that could be controlled by the show management was the amount of breaks in the hall. There were very few traffic drivers into the hall (the "Food Factor" discussed in a previous posting) and also they closed the hall for 3 hours in the middle of the day! Last, the Exhibit hall was pretty far (downstairs) from the attendee tracks which made it easy for attendees to miss the hall.

2) Show Location - 4/5

The Gaylord Palms Resort was a very nice venue and since it was a little secluded it ensured many of the attendees would stay at the resort. This allowed for additional meetings with clients and also no one was in a rush to leave.

3) Attendees - 3.5/5

Out of the people we did speak to, many of them were very receptive of our services. They seemed interested and many were decision makers. Again, we have to wait for 6 months to see how interested they really were but, overall we were satisfied with who we were speaking to.

Those are my overall thoughts. I think I would give it a 3/5 using other shows we attend as a benchmark. We are attending next year again, so I still believe in the value of NCOF. If anyone would like to share their experience at the show I would love to hear from you! All comments welcome! Most of our competitors at the show were pretty forthcoming on how they thought the show was going, which is nice to see. There is nothing like a little friendly competition!

- MK