Conventions, Trade Shows Create A Network To Cultivate Relationships

IFA:

20 years ago, when franchise lead generation was much simpler, trade shows were the lifeline of franchise development teams. As the primary, and often only, source of prospects, franchise companies flocked to franchise trade shows and expos across the country in droves—daring not skip a single one, or they might miss out on their only opportunity to meet prospects and make that critical franchise sale.

When the Internet entered the picture and became mainstream in the 1990s, trade shows and expos experienced a steady decline. Leads from the Internet poured in from all directions, and franchise systems opted to invest resources in both building their own Web sites and optimizing their Web site’s performance, as well as paying for stand-alone presence on franchising portals, rather than traditional expos and trade shows. They felt their development teams’ time and funds were better spent on the telephone following up with all the Internet leads. Likewise, prospects spent most of their time surfing the Internet for franchise concepts, rather than spending time and money to travel to expos around the country.

Over the past several years, trade shows and expos have experienced a gradual comeback. Numbers show that attendance continues to climb, on both sides of the fence. Prospects are realizing the value of attending expos to ’shop’ around for potential franchises and actually talk in person to the human beings behind the Web sites, and therefore more franchise systems, particularly the emerging franchises, are re-allocating funds to exhibit.

Why the resurgence?