Exit surveys provide excellent insights into what attendees thought of their visit to your exhibit. They can give you feedback on staff performance and insights into your success in communicating a key message. Exit surveys even provide an indication of your exhibits' contribution to moving attendees closer to a purchase.

 

The challenge lies in when an exhibit marketer wants to know more. Specifically, when an exhibit marketer wants to know: WHY?

 

The result is high quality information that can be used to shape future marketing efforts.

 

For instance, questions like:

  • Which part of the demo was most helpful in helping you understand the science behind our product?
  • If our message doesn't resonate with you, why?
  • What questions about our product weren't answered? 

 

So what exactly is an exit interview?

In an exit interview:

  • Your exhibit staff uses a pre-determined criteria, established by you, to qualify which customers and prospects are invited to take the survey. This enables you to hone in on key segments of your audience—such as highly qualified prospects that are working with strong competitors or existing customers who you've targeted to cross-sell.
  • The attendees you select are invited to participate in the survey by your staff and introduced to the survey taker.
  • The survey taker/interview is conducted by a marketing strategist skilled at asking insightful questions.
  • The marketing strategist works from a set of two or three pre-determined questions that quantify the attendee's response to some aspect of their visit. For instance, on a scale of 1 to 6, was your visit here today a good use of your time?
  • The interviewer then goes off script, using the attendee's response to segue into an in-depth conversation into why the attendee answered the question the way they did.
  • The results are specific observations that we translate into actionable items.

 

Example

During a recent exit interview for a client, we cultivated the following insights and suggestions:

Finding: Attendees were not aware of a specific initiative before coming to the booth which, after learning about it, they were very excited about.

  • Recommendations: Continue this initiative. Promote it via pre-show marketing to drive more exhibit traffic. Use the initiative as an ice breaker to invite people into the exhibit. Visually promote the initiative in the exhibit.

Finding: Attendees were very impressed with two specific demos.

  • Recommendations: Place these demos where they will be visible from the aisle. Keep them active throughout the show to entice attendees. Use in invitation to see these demos as an ice breaker to draw booth traffic.

Finding: One product was of little interest to attendees.

  • Recommendations: Place these demos where they will be visible from the aisle. Keep them active throughout the show to entice attendees. Use in invitation to see these demos as an ice breaker to draw booth traffic.

 

Do you think an exit interview could help your company elevate its exhibiting success?