It’s the three days we’ve been waiting for – all the meetings held, catering orders placed and flights booked have brought us to this point. In one week, nearly the entire education industry will flock to San Antonio for ISTE 2017. Almost 15,000 educators will roam the show floor in search of the best product or service. To help you stand out from the crowd, we’ve lined up some last-minute education marketing tactics to maximize your booth visibility.
After all, the measure of your team’s success will likely be based on the number of meaningful conversations you have with educators during the conference.
1. Paid social content
If you are looking to target educators in the week leading up to ISTE, or while they are at the conference, the most practical place is through paid posts on Facebook and Twitter. You can effectively target educators attending ISTE before they head to the show floor, by job title, interests, or even geographic location.
In those paid posts, encourage them to visit your booth, highlight any news announcements, or promote any of your customers presenting a session. Your content should feature eye-catching graphics, with your company logo prominently positioned. This will help with overall brand recognition on the show floor.
2. Giveaways
Everyone likes free swag, especially at a conference. Having free branded promotional items is an easy way to entice educators to stop at your booth.
Don’t panic if you haven’t ordered anything, you can check closets and storage for promotional items left over from previous shows. Pens, stickers or post-it notes – that’s enough to entice a teacher to stop by your booth and afford you the opportunity to strike up an important conversation.
3. Snapchat filter
ISTE is the most tech-savvy event for educators and administrators to attend every year. Cater to these techies by creating and purchasing a Snapchat filter with your booth information on it.
The filters are easy to make and extremely cost-effective. As your competition continues to try more traditional tactics, show educators you think differently than the rest of the vendors by launching a Snapchat filter.
A few final notes
Combine these catchy education marketing tactics with a solid booth presence and you’re set for success. Remember to avoid looking at your devices and greet every passerby with a smile and maybe even a “Howdy!” Have some natural conversation starters at the ready. Also, try to completely hide your luggage under a table or behind a screen after you check out of the hotel – you don’t want booth visitors to think you’re on your way out.
Most importantly, don’t forget your plane ticket, pack some sunscreen and enjoy the conference!