Making a show of yourself at Gitex

The Life: Exhibitors need to engage with customers before, during and after major trade shows, says some regulars at major exhibitions in the UAE.

UAE trade fairs such as last October's Gitex in Dubai draw millions of visitors each year. Ravindranath K / The National

For Kenan Abou Lteif, a regional sales manager at Symantec, Gitex Technology Week is the marketing event of the year.

With more than 138,000 professionals and senior executives from 144 countries attending the trade show, it is a crucible for courting clients.

"Gitex is held in October, which is just around the budgeting cycle and is perfect timing," said Mr Lteif who, from his base in Dubai, covers the Arabian Gulf and Pakistan for the US tech security giant.

Trade shows not only generate business, they are in themselves big business.

Last year, Dubai and Abu Dhabi held at least 150 exhibitions in technology, medical care, aviation, manufacturing and even niche sectors such as videogames and tea and coffee.

The trade shows at Dubai World Trade Centre on health care, food, tourism, security, logistics and education attracted 1.6 million visitors and 35,000 businesses last year.

To stand out in the crowd, exhibitors such as Mr Lteif need strategic planning: demonstration of new products; following up with customers; and big advertising campaigns before a show to attract potential customers, retain existing clients and ensure continuity of awareness of their brand names.

"The opportunity to do business for the exhibitors is very big," says Simon Mellor, the senior vice president for DMG Events, which organises the Abu Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference. At that conference, he says, "the business deals signed and discussed run into multibillion-dollars".

Symantec was one of the 3,500 businesses that showcased their products at Gitex last year. This time, it will have a two-storey booth covering 120 square metres when the five-day fair kicks off on October 14.

"There are two objectives [to participation]: to create a platform to host our existing and potential customers to meet our executives and ... use this as a launch [pad] for new products," Mr Lteif says. Symantec has more than 1,000 distributors in the region.

But Gitex is not the only trade show in town and, for exhibitors at the country's many niche shows, it is no less important to connect with customers ahead of time.

La Marquise International, which is owned by Buhaleeba Group based in Dubai and distributes coffee machines among other items, has a client base of about 4,000 in hotels, restaurants and the cafe sector and it sends out invites to all of them ahead of the International Tea and Coffee Festival. Last year, more than 4,600 visitors, including traders, roasters, hoteliers, importers and exporters attended the festival, which featured 47 cafes and brands.

This year, to cater to different market segments, Symantec will have a section especially for small to medium enterprises to showcase their IT solutions packages on information protection and backup recovery and their other latest products.

Since the objective for most of the exhibitors, such as the local pharmaceuticals company Gulf Drug, is to seal contracts, tending to customers is crucial.

"We coordinate [with] them to meet our local representatives, the manufacturers, product managers, specialists and educational experts," says Dr Zeyad Al Moosa, the managing director of Gulf Drug, which exhibits at the annual Arab Health Show.

La Marquise International will co-sponsor a barista competition at the International Tea and Coffee Festival next month in Dubai, in a bid to make it worthwhile for visitors to attend its booth and boost brand recognition.

"We are sponsoring with our coffee machines and grinders and people will get to try the machines as well as the coffee," says Darya Yurkina, the marketing manager for La Marquise in Dubai.

One of their two baristas will participate at the competition and the other will whip up smoothies, milkshakes, cocktails and mocktails for the visitors.

Connecting with customers after the show is equally important.

"We send thank you emails, send information on particular products clients and visitors had shown interest in rather than sending data on all products over phone or emails and set up appointments to close the deals," Ms Yurkina says.

And when the show is done, the last step for an exhibitor is to calculate the return on investment.

Mr Lteif says that is based on "lead generation, opportunity registration and the closure rate of those opportunities".

"When making the decision for participation in such events," he says, "it is important for us to understand the opportunity, the objectives and the expected end result."