Trade Fairs Effectiveness & Evaluations by Pakistan IT Companies – A Managerial Perception

1. Trade Fairs Effectiveness &
Evaluation By Pakistani IT
Companies – A Managerial
Perception
Danish Ghazanfar
BAC/AIBA/3488/2007
A10731012

2. Introduction
• Trade fairs are an effective marketing tool used by
executives to achieve their sales target.
• Today Trade fairs Industry is multi billion dollar industry in
United States and Europe but unfortunately not much
studies is done on this particular area of marketing.

3. Background
• Trade fairs are market events of a specific duration, held
at intervals, at which a large number of companies
present the main product range of one or more industry
sectors and mainly sell it on the basis of samples.
• Trade Fairs predominantly attract trade and business
visitors.

4. Common reasons for exhibiting include
• Generating sales leads.
• Generating actual sales at the show.
• Enhancing your image and visibility.
• Reaching a specific audience.
• Establishing a presence in the marketplace.
• Improving the effectiveness and efficiency of your
marketing efforts.

5. Common reasons for exhibiting include
• Personally meeting your customers, competitors,
and suppliers.
• Prospecting for new customers.
• Introducing new products and services.
• Demonstrating your product in ways not possible
using other marketing channels.
• Recruiting distributors or dealers.
• Educating your target audience.

6. Trade Fairs in Pakistan
• Trade show phenomenon in Pakistan started in 2000 when
the first international trade fair related to defense industry
was organized in Karachi.
• From there onwards the only venue for trade fairs Karachi
expo center has seen numerous shows including business to
business and consumer ones. On average 35 – 40 fairs are
held in Pakistan including both B2B & consumer shows.

7. Problem Statement & Objectives
• How the Pakistani firms in Information Technology sector of
Pakistan view trade fairs as an important marketing tool.
• And to find out how IT managers evaluate the effectiveness
of their participation in trade shows.

8. Conceptual Framework
• When companies participate in Trade fairs they set
objectives of there participation accordingly. These
objectives could be qualitative or quantitative based or
could be both.
• Previous researches and studies done on this topic have
shown that even qualitative objectives could be quantified
to calculate the ROI on trade fair participation.

9. Conceptual Framework
Quantitative objectives can classified into
• Contact targets.
• Communication/information targets.
• Presentation targets.
• Sales & distribution targets.

10. Conceptual Framework
Qualitative objectives can be classified into
• Presence at industry sector get together.
• Positioning to competition.
• Quality contacts.
• Business networking etc.

11. Data Analysis
• The result shows that out of twenty five companies that took
part in the research nine of them participate in one trade fair
in Pakistan and one in Dubai.

12. Trade fair as an effective marketing Tool

13. Marketing Budget for Trade Shows
• The data analysis shows that more than 50% of the IT
companies in the sample allocate between 5 %- 10% of
their marketing budget for trade shows.

14. Objective of Participation

15. Media Comparison

16. Snapshot Of Findings
• Most of the companies in sample participate in one of the
trade fair in Pakistan and one in Dubai.
• More than 50% of the IT companies in the sample allocate
between 5 %- 10% of their marketing budget for trade
shows.
• All the 25 companies have specific objective of
participation.

17. Snapshot Of Findings
• Sales & distribution & Communication/Information are the
main quantitative objectives set by IT companies for
participation in trade fairs.
• Business Networking & quality contacts are the main
qualitative objectives set by IT Companies for participation
in trade fairs.
• Personal selling & trade fairs are considered as the preferred
medium by majority of IT firms executives to achieve their
objectives.

18. Recommendations & Suggested Areas for
Future Research
Based on this study I would like to recommend the following:
• There must be a universal model for evaluation of
effectiveness of trade shows.
• Further research should be done on companies from other
sectors of economy in relation to their trade fairs
participation.

19. Recommendations & Suggested Areas for
Future Research
• Research on Effect of trade fairs on economy of Pakistan.
• Research on trade fairs could be done from visitors point of
view.