How to Refine Your Trade Show Lead Capture Strategy Using HubSpot

Digital communication and AI-driven sales workflows are dominating the modern business landscape. However, technology will never replace the power of a personal connection in nurturing successful business relationships.

Trade shows provide a unique opportunity for sales teams to interact face to face with prospects and existing customers, building and strengthening these relationships.

That’s not to say that technology doesn’t play a valuable role in a comprehensive trade show lead capture strategy; digital tools, including the right lead capture system, are essential for adding qualified leads to your sales pipeline.

HubSpot’s lead capture software collects the important information your sales team needs, then integrates with HubSpot’s customer relationship management (CRM) platform to organize trade show data and provide access to valuable insights, harness data to efficiently manage leads, and automate strategic follow-ups throughout the sales lifecycle.

Curious about what that looks like in action? Let’s take a closer look at how HubSpot can help your sales team dial in its trade show lead capture strategy.

Benefits of Using HubSpot for Trade Show Lead Capture

Trade shows can be a productive resource for capturing high-quality leads, but you still need a strategy to get the maximum value from those leads. 

HubSpot's lead capture solutions offer a broad range of features that streamline and enrich lead management from capture through final conversion, including: 

• HubSpot CRM integration for seamless lead management
• Automated data entry and real-time analytics
• Enhanced tracking and reporting capabilities
• Personalized follow-up communication with qualified leads

Implementing a Three-Phase Lead Capture Strategy

To truly maximize lead capture and conversion, it's essential to strike a balance between leveraging technology and maintaining a personal touch. Here’s how to implement a three-phase strategy for trade show lead capture that allows your sales team to get the best of both worlds. 

Pre-Event Preparation

Trade shows move at a lightning pace, which means your sales team must be ready for action from minute one. Adhering to these pre-show preparation best practices will help establish the foundation for a successful trade show, allowing your sales team to focus on engaging with top-tier targets.  

• Set clear goals for lead capture and ensure those goals are aligned with overall business objectives.
• Train the team to maximize the capabilities of HubSpot’s lead capture tools.
• Design your booth to be both attractive and interactive to draw attention and increase engagement.
• Prior to the show, deploy email, social media, and appointment scheduling campaigns targeting attendees with the potential to convert to high-quality leads.

On-Site Lead Capture 

Once your sales team is on-site, HubSpot’s lead capture software supports a multichannel approach to engage prospects and collect data for the duration of the trade show and beyond. 

For example, HubSpot’s mobile app supports real-time data capture whether you’re at the booth or in line for lunch. 

Customized forms and surveys enable the sales team to collect more granular information that helps assess the quality of a lead and where they are in the sales lifecycle.

Additionally, HubSpot’s real-time lead qualification capabilities provide scoring and segmentation tools so reps can qualify leads on the spot, identify high-quality leads for immediate follow-up, and automate personalized follow-up emails directly from HubSpot to schedule post-show meetings and calls while still on-site.

Incentives and giveaways are effective ways to attract prospects to your booth, but you must do your due diligence to ensure you are encouraging visitors with the potential to convert to qualified leads.

Giving away an iPad or gaming system is sure to bring plenty of traffic to your booth—and some of those visitors might even be solid prospects. However, offering a free software trial or complimentary 30-minute consultation is a relevant, value-add incentive that will appeal to people who are genuinely interested in your product or service.

Real-World Trade Show Success Story: Ashling Partners

When Ashling Partners, a large intelligent automation service provider, experienced disappointing booth visitor rates at the previous year’s FORWARD 5 Conference, they enlisted SmartBug’s help to draw in more leads.

Ashling Partners set an aggressive goal for the conference knowing there would be a large number of high-quality prospects in attendance. SmartBug helped the company take an omnichannel approach to lead capture by creating a unique digital experience at the in-person event that included: 

• A customized landing page and form
• Personalized emails
• An in-person visit to the booth
• An opt-in for a personalized demo after the event  

Ashling Partners’ “Automation Around the World” campaign was a huge success with a 7x increase in booth visitors, 183 new MQLs, and 18 personalized demo requests.

Read the full case study to get the whole story. 

Post-Event: Nurturing Leads to Conversion

Once the trade show is over, the next phase of work begins. It’s time to take those leads and convert them into customers with careful nurturing and strategic follow-up to guide qualified leads through the sales funnel. 

HubSpot supports efforts beyond the trade show floor by giving sales teams access to several instrumental tools and capabilities:

Automate and personalize follow-up sequences with HubSpot workflows.

HubSpot’s customizable workflows enable you to automate personalized follow-up sequences, ensuring timely and consistent communication with your leads and keeping your product or service top of mind.

For example, leads who attend your product demo are entered into a workflow that sends a series of follow-up emails with additional information about the product as well as case studies and special offers. Meanwhile, leads who show interest in industry trends receive a different sequence of emails with relevant articles, white papers, and upcoming webinar invitations.

Leverage HubSpot’s AI-driven insights for targeted marketing.

HubSpot’s AI technology provides valuable data and analytics on leads’ behaviors and preferences. Your sales teams can use this information to connect the dots between the new leads and their existing data. 

AI can identify patterns and correlations between trade show leads and their past interactions, purchase history, and preferences already logged in HubSpot. Springboarding off of these connections, your team can craft personalized follow-up campaigns, sending customized emails that build on products or services these leads have shown interest in before.

Track engagement and refine marketing strategies based on data.

HubSpot’s tracking capabilities allow you to monitor lead engagement, such as email opens, click-through rates, and website visits. Your sales team can use this data to refine your sales and marketing strategies, optimize your content, and ensure you are meeting your leads’ needs.

For example, if you notice a significant drop-off in post-event email click-through rates, HubSpot analytics can help pinpoint where you are losing your audience. 

A/B testing different email formats, subject lines, and call-to-action placements can help you identify which types of content resonate most with a specific trade show audience, so you can launch more targeted campaigns and increase engagement.

Ongoing Trade Show Lead Capture Best Practices

Capturing and converting trade show leads requires more than just the right tools. You also need to maintain the quality and sustainability of your lead capture strategy. Here are a few best practices that will help:

Maintain Data Quality and Integrity

Accurate and consistent data is the foundation of an effective lead management strategy.  Using HubSpot’s lead capture tools will help protect the integrity of your data, reduce errors, and ensure your sales team has access to reliable data for follow-up and analytics.

Update Your Database Regularly

Keeping your HubSpot database up to date is another important factor in maintaining your lead capture success. Regularly review your database and remove outdated or incorrect information. This helps ensure that your sales and marketing teams are working with accurate and consistent data.

Introduce Some Creativity into Your Strategy

Let’s go ahead and admit that vendors who just hand out free pens and water bottles don’t stand out in the expo hall.

Make coming to your booth an engaging and interactive experience by letting visitors get hands-on with your product to win prizes or recording speaker interviews live on the expo floor and then promoting them across your channels.

Maximize Trade Show Success with HubSpot's Lead Capture and Management Solutions 

Balancing the power of personal interactions with the efficiency of digital tools gives your sales team an edge in its trade show lead capture strategy. HubSpot helps teams embrace the best of both worlds to drive meaningful engagement and conversions, turning trade show opportunities into valuable customer relationships. 

Click below to discover how SmartBug can help your team use HubSpot’s tools to maximize qualified trade show lead capture at your next trade show.