How well could you function without your dose of speed networking at a business event, or without a cup of coffee in the morning or your mid-afternoon tea break? If you’re anything like us, or the millions of other avid hot drink consumers, speed networking, tea and coffee are a staple of your day…
Imagine a future where you can be immersed in a room from the comfort of your own home. Imagine a future where you can visit an exhibition again to remind yourself of the name of a distinct stand. Imagine if this technology wasn’t far off in the future as you thought, but at your fingertips right now…
Are you a budding entrepreneur? Are you bursting with ideas? Brimming with passion? But are perhaps lacking investment and funding? What if we told you we could help?
Encouraging the entrepreneurial spark in all of us, Network Xpress recognises the growing number of entrepreneurs – 400 million worldwide – and are committed to supporting the individuals embarking on their ventures.
You probably think you know what to expect when you’re attending a business tradeshow - a mix of exhibitors and visitors milling around with a positive business buzz in the air. But what if, on top of the standard networking hustle and bustle everyone is accustomed to, you could be transported – at least for a few minutes - to a luxury car showroom, or a rocket ship hurtling through space? Enlisting Virtual Reality (VR) at an Exhibition allows just that!
Chamber Partners
We pride ourselves on our ability to connect businesses with each other, if we didn’t then we wouldn’t be able to call ourselves ‘Network’ Xpress! We’ve spent a number of years now building up a reputation as a pro-active networking events company and much of our wider branch of support comes from belonging to a range of Chambers within the local area.
As someone who understands the power of exhibiting at tradeshows, I am keen to help others make the most of these opportunities. Innovation is always well-received at exhibitions, and the last thing that anybody wants when they’re showcasing their business is to blend in, or worse: be singled out as having a lack-lustre stand. But there are a number of creative touches you can make to ensure that you stand out for the right reasons, without breaking the bank.
Networking is undoubtedly one of the most divisive activities in business. Some people relish the opportunity to jump into a busy room and engage with others, while some find networking daunting and difficult. Whatever your position is, networking is without question one of the most successful ways to grow your business and serves as an opportunity to market your company, with you as its public face. Therefore, how you interact with others will affect how they view your business as a whole.
Running any event involves a lot of prior planning to ensure you get it right on the day. This is no truer than with exhibitions. There’s a whole host of factors to cover, including (but not limited to): keynote speakers, choice of venue, catering provisions, event dates & exhibition literature. And what’s more is the organisers also have to put the time in to source the right kind of quality exhibitors for the events, as well as then promote it to potential visitors, all months in advance.
Gamification is a rapidly growing method of adding value to a business and its services. It’s functional, fresh and fun. However it’s not – as some people believe – simply adding games to business, it’s much more than that. It is, in fact, the process of using game-style mechanics to improve and enhance a current business experience. By applying game mechanics to ‘nongame’ company processes, you are adding a whole extra layer to your business and making it stand out from the competition. This is precisely what we’ve done at Net XP.
My last piece focused on the Power of Face-to-Face events, and as you’ll know from having read it, I’m a big believer in networking and creating real-life business relationships. However, this doesn’t mean I think technology has no place in business tradeshows; far from it. There are a number of impressive technological tricks both exhibitors and event organisers can use to create an innovative tradeshow experience, so in this piece, I’m going to name just a few examples that add wow factor to events.
Today’s advances in technology are incredible, aren’t they? It’s never been easier to get in touch with someone across the globe, and the internet means that we can now achieve many of our daily tasks from the comfort of our armchairs and offices. To put it into perspective, we send around 200 billion emails per day, a statistic some might consider daunting, but most would say is an incredible feat of modern tech. And whilst we can converse so freely through emails and phone calls, many would in fact argue that we’re becoming out of touch with one another.
For small business owners, preparing for a trade show or exhibition can be a very daunting experience. Here are a few ideas and concepts to employ at your next exhibition for the smoothest expo possible…
