Trade shows are expensive. So a lot of people are looking for ways to cut corners, or as we say these days, for hacks. After all, what if you could skip on the cost and still get the benefits? Wouldn't it be nice? It's a trade show hack I've seen many trying to use. It is one of the oldest in the book, and it is so old that it has a name: suitcasing.
In my job as a trade show coach, I've even been asked several times if I could train visitors, usually start ups with no budgets, to hack trade shows this way. But I said no every time. Because it is not a good idea. It is, first, immoral, dishonest, but for those who don't care, it is actually mostly inefficient. Here's why it still doesn't work.
This hack will get you rejected
You might think coming as a visitor instead of an exhibitor is the same thing. It's the same hall, the same people in it, but for fewer zeros on the invoice. So why pay when you can get the same for free, right?
But is it, actually, the same? See access is not what people are paying for here. That will otherwise be called networking. Everyone coming in, everyone trying to sell or buy to everyone else. But trade shows are not simply networking events, there is an underlying, explicit structure. What is it? Both visitors and exhibitors are coming into a pre existing-frame with a game to be played in it.
Here’s how this game looks: standing in the hall as an exhibitor who pays makes visitors take you seriously and consider your offer. Coming as a visitor lets you access multiple choices for your needs.
But when one side tries to hack and reverse that, the game can't be played properly anymore. So what happens?
Exhibitors pay to sell, not to be sold to
Picture this: you get yourself a visitor badge for almost nothing. All your potential clients are in the same hall. In a couple of days you'll be able not only to reach all of them, but to engage with them physically, face to face. Better and faster than LinkedIn, or cold calling, beautiful right? All you need is a stack of business cards, a trade show catalogue and floor plan, and there you go. You tell yourself this is a smart move: open bar, free prospecting. But there's something more important you're missing.
Imagine this now. You're an exhibitor, you paid tens of thousands, sometimes hundreds of thousands, to be here. You selected the show precisely to host a lot of your potential buyers (you can read How to select the right shows for your business to know more about it. Your team is up and ready to engage visitors, they know how to avoid the cognitive biases that cripple trade shows they’ve trained for this moment (you can read Why it’s indispensable to train your trade show team), and they know how to generate profitable conversations. When suddenly someone shows up with a visitor's badge and tries to sell your team something. Like a glitch in the matrix, remember the black cat? How does it feel? Actually, a better question will be what is the price to pay to engage with this person? How much does it cost you? Because on a show, at this price, time is REALLY money (if you want the exhibitor's side of this story, an article will be coming about how to spot a suitcaser).
And exhibitors pay a lot to be here for a reason, they get the audience they are looking for, and not many like to pay to be sold to. This is the unspoken contract: they pay a lot to get direct access to buyers, otherwise this is a rip-off. And so the minute this contract is broken, by a suitcaser, the whole show's social contract is voided.
No booth, no credibility
Trust is the real currency on trade shows, and trust runs on truth. And the first thing suitcasers communicate about themselves is that they have lied about who they are and why they are here.
However good is what suitcasers sell, the fact they’re selling when they’re not supposed to says I'm here to take, not to give. And it goes further. In substance the suitcaser is saying I'm not willing to pay a price myself, but I'm willing to make you pay one. Because taking time away from sellers is like taking money out of their pockets. Cause again, on trade shows, time is REALLY money.
A trade show is definitely not a networking event
A trade show is a different animal than a networking event. On a networking event, everyone can be either a buyer or a seller. So selling to some who came to sell too is not uncommon. But even there people who don't play by the rule of give and take are not appreciated. And at a show the rules and the roles are clear, the sellers have the booths, the buyers the visitors badges. Breaking this convention, stepping on the etiquette, might get you some sales, but not many friends.
So you might make a few contacts. But overall, you won't be appreciated.
The cases when it actually works
Now, you might know some people for whom it has worked, and it might even have worked for you. And I want to address that, because this hack can work, but it depends entirely on what you bring to the table and the posture you come with. The give and take we talked about above. For example, if you're a journalist coming to scout the next exhibitor, what you have to “sell”, can be seen as you buying the exhibitor’s “image”. So you’re not taking, you’re actually giving. So if you're here to offer something, not take, if you present an opportunity, then that can go smoothly. Because you're adding to the value of the show the exhibitors paid to get a share of.
The problem is, when salespeople start coming to shows to sell, to take, they break the game (by the way if you’re exhibiting you can read Why the best trade show staff are not salespeople and who actually is). The minute some players stop to play by the rules of a game, the game changes.
The biggest problem with trade show hacks
The free rider problem
If you're not familiar with the theory of games in economics this is the exact phenomenon of a free rider, or clandestine passenger.
The problem with this behavior is that it encourages others to do the same. After all, if you can get the benefits without the cost, why be the idiot to pay for something others get for free.
But the thing is, it is not free. So suitcasing is, in reality, stealing. And if left unchecked that will eventually damage the show. Much like theft damages a society. If everyone is cheating, the ones who stay honest are the ones being fooled. And soon enough they’ll stop playing a rigged game.
Imagine a game called paying taxes. Everyone plays by the same rules. But once in a while an individual might try to screw the system to get personal gain. But will the collective allow it? Unlikely. Why? Because if not paying taxes goes unchecked (I'm not talking about legally not paying taxes) more and more people will be tempted to do the same. And soon the system will collapse.
That’s why there are tax collectors, and they should be incorruptible. Like a referee in football.
If you’re curious about how this fairness is an unspoken rule at the root of human organizations and societies, you can refer yourself to the monumental work of a social psychologist called Robert Cialdini who spent his career studying persuasion and compliance and a lot of time studying salespeople for that.
That's why organizers screen you
You see now that if and when suitcasers are many they can destroy a show. And so exhibitors and organizers alike try to protect themselves from them.
That’s why visitor terms explicitly ban it, and organizers can pull a badge or escort someone out of a show for it.
Because their show's success depends on it.
That's also why some organizers are actively preventing them from registering. Some shows now screen visitors before they issue them a badge, to make sure they match the profile promised to the exhibitors.
And for the shows who do not take such precautions, it is usually because they are trying to boost their numbers as a marketing argument to attract exhibitors. But for them too, that can backfire. Because if they let in too many of these bad types of visitors, they will dilute the visitors quality, and, in the end, the ROI exhibitors get out of it.
That might go unnoticed if exhibitors don't measure the show potential (it’s one of the ways to be successful at trade shows), but for smart exhibitors not only that won't go unnoticed, but that might not go unpunished. What do I mean by that? They'll eventually stop coming.
So if you are a start up baked into the hacking culture, or a salesperson who's considering this hack or being pushed to use it by a director that ignores the rules of trade shows, my advice is: don't. And if you’re coming anyway, because you’re legitimately here to give, not to take, be mindful of the time you take away from exhibitors. They’re the ones paying for it, so any minute you take away from them costs them.
Now if you want to sell to exhibitors, there is a version of working a trade show floor where the exhibitors' goodwill is on your side. How? It starts with deciding the hall is worth the entry price, with the show selection, and it continues with learning a method for making that investment pay you back. That's a different conversation than the one we're having here though. But if you are ready to have it, I have it all summarized for you in the Exhibitor's Edge masterclass. It is all about how to be successful at shows, instead of how to try to hack them.
The link is below, enjoy it.