America is suffering through a terrible addiction epidemic, the smartphone. Everywhere you look, people have their heads down, staring at the small screen or working the keyboard furiously. Couples ignore each other at dinner, people walk straight into fountains and you have an excuse not to make eye contact on elevators. They have become the adult pacifier. Information or interactions that formerly could wait for hours, can’t wait for seconds. Am I part of the epidemic, of course.
What I noticed last week in Orlando was the effect of the smartphone on a tradeshow. It could eventually lead to the demise of the tradeshow. Three reasons:
1) Your potential clients that are walking through the show, with you hoping to catch their eye? Too bad, they just walked right by, with their head down, looking at voicemails or a video of three Norwegian electricians doing cannonballs into a vat of chocolate pudding. I saw this many times, somehow resisting the urge to trip them (attendees, not electricians)
2) Attendance seems light, but registration is strong. People are much more in touch, so they know when they have other obligations to attend to instead of going to the tradeshow. People that were on their way may have gotten e-mails during the previous session. So, instead of waiting, they feel the urgency to work on the issue now.
3) Tradeshow personnel also are not engaging prospective clients as in years past. You would always see rows of people standing on the edge of their booth, waiting for clients, talking to other vendors or passerbys. Now, they are slumped over in chairs, using their phones for business or downloading video of two Norwegian plumbers making a functional vehicle out of sardine cans. Looks terrible and if I am walking the show, I don’t stop, I keep walking, wondering why I bothered.
Those are my thoughts and observations. Its an ugly trend that is hurting the ROI on tradeshows. Would love to hear your views (and e-mail me any interesting video involving Norwegian skilled labor). Cheers, Doug
[...] has their eyes looking at their smartphone. New Lifestyles has a great blog post today about smartphones at Trade Shows and details their observations. Generalmobile, mobile phones, smartphone, smartphones at [...]
Smartphones are incredibly useful devices for people to receive a wealth of information in the palm of their hands. As more people are use smartphones then you need to figure out how to leverage this trend to your advantage. For example, stores are using the technology to offer point-of-sales incentives for people to visit their stores.
People said the same thing when newspapers came out, how people were walking around reading paper and not paying attention to other people. Similar commentary on how the internet is making people less social. In fact, the oppositie is true, people are becoming more social but only specific to their interest groups.
Learn to adopt and leverage technology because hating it will only make you look old and irrelevant.
Oh, I get it….smartphones..bury your head and mind into the allure of marketing by some company that is strictly interested in bottom line statistics and really don’t give a crap about you or your life…ya, i get it…where do I sign up VS? (or is it BS…you must be one of them (data miner/marketer)
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