40 Strange People You Meet at Trade Fairs
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Did you know about the Curious Customer, The Copycat Ninja, The Mass Fabricator? |
| There are many type of people that attend trade shows, and here are some of these people, will you realize them? Disclaimer: The article is just for fun with a sad reality embedded in it, so please pass this one if you cannot handle it, and please do not be offended if you think the article mentions you; instead just laugh at it with your hearts content. In the end we are all alike. These my personal observations and hope yours are as interesting! |
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| The Booby Trap; The enigmatic pretty photogenic booth girl or boy, attracting prospective perverts to your trade show booth which you hope to turn into prospective perverted clients; unfortunately most of those people does not know or care about the product. Called from model agency or someone's pretty friend. Subject to nasty looks, dirty hands and rude remarks. They have a hard life. |
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| The So Called Editor; Asks all the right questions, and then the wrong ones, this person is at your booth to find a story, but a terrible story; a master of tragedy, a servant of omitted truth. This is the devil in disguise, a Trojan horse; gets invited to your exclusive events and product demos just to talk bad about you, your work and your company. You did not see that coming. |
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| The Omniscient Expert; Does not know anything in reality, points to non existing problems about your product, complains about missing features (that are actually there), these people are illustrious negative word of mouth experts, they says to others that your product is not original, defected, low quality or worse. In reality mostly an unsatisfied user that is not able to afford your product as well as very jealous, egoistic and sad person, that actually wishes to be in your place is taking revenge. |
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| The Gala Escapee; Look at that tuxedo, look at that nice evening gown, in the middle of the day, these people for sure know how to wear and impress, but the looks are deceiving, these are the wildest most aggressive and most ruthless merchants you can ever meet, they overdress to ensure their target feels inferior, to start the game a step ahead. The good? They look great when you take booth photos! |
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| The Mass Fabricator; These people build but never design. They seek one of three things; free designs to copy, designs to lease or designs to buy. They give small orders and reverse engineer your products and sell it within their own countries as premium design products. Unfortunately a very big percentage of trade fair visitors fit to this category, especially many of them being the type that just steal designs and concepts. |
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| The Copycat Ninja; Sneaks to your booth with a very secret mission; corporate espionage and intelligence, to collect as many information as possible, takes thousands of photos and asks for the big catalogues, acts as a buyer. Never works alone. The team infiltrates your booth, while one asks details regarding production and trade secrets to your naive staff, the others have already reverse engineered your newest product and getting quotes from suppliers to release your product under their name in their native countries. These people are economic assassins. You can hear them but you will not be able to decipher their secretive language. |
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| The Non Important; An elegant and important looking person that is absolutely useless; looks nice, talks nicer but after a while you realize that this person is a big balloon; merely a shell of a formerly important person, thinks she or he still deserves special attention, asks VIP passes or privileges, there at your booth to spend some quality time and to have fun, seeking a moment of glory, to recall his or her past, visits your booth solely to enjoy amenities and to steal your precious time without even intending to do so. You excuse them and move on. |
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| The Real Deal; He or she could be anybody. This person never shows up but you always wait. Usually comes to your booth only when you are not present. Only a relatively small percentage of trade show visitors are actual qualified leads; you need to build policies, and structure processes to ensure that you do not miss them when they come to your booth. The Real Deal is a deal maker. |
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| The Thief; Nocturnal ones lurks at around the closing time of the last day of the trade show to collect whatever is left unattended, will grab goods, flowers, food, furniture and whatever is left but the Day-Thieves, which are the worst as they steal the prototype products you bring from your international factories on day one or precious samples that you cannot obtain next day, they truly ruin any trade show, and they feed on your trust; if you let people touch and approach your products, prototypes and samples, and you have to trust and let people to do so, you are under risk. |
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| The Meta Hunter; Usually an above average looking women or man that flirts with high level company representatives in order to make them sign the ultimate agreement; that of marriage, to be able to get 50% of whatever you have earned in 20 years of hard work while she or he was attending glamorous parties, dating hot people or spending even hotter time in international travels. Well versed with the art of seduction but only holds back when it comes to you. |
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| The Crazy Designer; Flamboyant colours, weird looks, strange clothing, a hair style or accessories that is more extravagant then most nefarious pop singers. She or he wants to differentiate with looks to be remembered, to be recognized and to bait inexperienced company representatives get talking about whatever terrible design ideas they have to drain your budget and bankrupt your company. Looks busy and acts busy with a full schedule of so called clients trapped under design agreements, but if so busy why attend the fair? For hunting new pray only. |
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| The Lost One, no one knows who this person is, but here there at your booth, touching products and discussing with people, perhaps waiting for some sort of transportation, sometimes a resident of the area, sometimes a friend of a friend of a friend that attends the event, should not be there absolutely as this one consumes air, space, food, precious time as well as your limited attention span with that out of concept look that does not fit anywhere. |
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| The Pro-Visitor, comes with cards, leaves them, makes deals, attends event openings, eats free food, collects air-plane miles and part of hotel clubs, this one actually there for pure business done effectively. Systematic and pragmatic, knows how it all works, hard to bargain, but a good client in most cases, this is indeed an endangered species. |
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| The Aggressive Client; This one is hungry and therefore angry, gives into instincts and abandons logic all together, takes everything personal including your smile or tired face. Ready to fight, ready to argue as armed with the mind-set of a savage animal, you need to be extra careful, this one can bite and unfortunately one in hundred visitors will be like this, guaranteed. |
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| The Other's Journalist; Travel fees sponsored by the inviting company these greedy journalists are disgrace to the press, but unfortunately times are though and they too must earn the bread, they cover only the inviting big company plus occasionally a non-competing smaller company, trade shows include their numbers when they disclose the number of press attendance but they are virtually not there. |
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| The Unhappy Journalist; Invited by the organizer or assigned by the press office, they are unmotivated press members who are not interested whatever subject the fair is about, these terrible press members feature the wrong companies and wrong products at their esteemed publications, they clearly have no clue on which company is the innovator which is the follower, they do not know which products are original which are copy, they just leave a sour after-taste. |
| The Gadget Collector; Pens, Pins, Notepads, Bags, Toys, T-Shirts, Digital Gadgets, and all the most valuable Corporate Gifts that you prepared for your valuable prospective clients ends in their useless but fast hands. Was it a bird? Was it the wind? Your gadgets are gone. They are so shameless that if they cannot grab a gadget they will either come and ask for one, or worst make a gadget out of your booth parts and exhibited products. |
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| The Catalogue Maniac; This one brings a big luggage to the fair, the luggage is empty; and when fair ends, that baggage is really full, full of catalogues that half of them are thrown in hotel and other half thrown in the airport to reduce wait. They never check your catalogue during fair; they simply do not have the time; but they are obsessive collectors of any print material they can grab their hands on; did you lost your corporate materials or secret pricing guide or wholesale pricing not sheet during the show; they have them. |
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| Did you like these crazy trade show visitor stereotypes? Well good news, we got more covered for you. Checkout the next article to see even stronger, faster, wilder and maniac characters that visit trade shows every year. These people are to stay but regardless they do not make any event bad; they add salt and pepper and make your day interesting, they are the soul of trade shows. |
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This article was added on Friday, 17th of June, 2016 at 09.58 am by author 
