I travel a lot in my line of work and tend to visit at least 3 or 4 trade shows and exhibits a year. The one thing I can tell you from my travel experience is that you rarely follow through with all the business leads you start while attending a trade show. It all looks so great while you are there, but then you get back to your hotel room and start emptying your pockets from the dozens of business cards you accumulated. By the time you get back home or to your office, you forgot who you wanted to contact and why.
But this works both ways too so if you are the one handing out business cards and are expecting a follow up, try and make your cards such that they will speak for themselves and generate a follow up lead even without your well versed presentation. For instance, I deal a lot in affiliate marketing and have a wide network of websites that I offer other site owners to advertise on. When I visit a conference or an exhibit, I make sure that the back of my business cards include a full list of the sites I own. That way when the advertisers get back home and forgot all what I told them about my business and what I can offer, all they have to do is flip over my card and visit any one of the sites listed on the back. Using this tactic has dramatically increased the number of follow ups I received. Next time you print your business cards – why not consider using both sides of the card? You’d be surprised what that can do for you.
