How to Make Your Booth Stand Out

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" colspan=2 height=90 BGCOLOR="#006699" TEXT="#080000" background="05bfd5a3.jpg"> <div> <B>How to Make Your Booth Stand Out</B></div> <div> <B>347-LOVE-ART  (347-568-3278)   Toll Free 1-877-512-3333</B><B>   Email: </B><A HREF="mailto:mike@mikealbin.com" TARGET="_top" TITLE="mailto:mike@mikealbin.com"><U><B>mike@mikealbin.com</B></U></A></div> </td> </tr><tr> <td valign="top" width=210 BGCOLOR="#FFCC66" TEXT="#080000" background="05cd2043.jpg"> <bR> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Mike Albin.Com "><U>Mike Albin.Com </U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="wd.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Web design"><U>Web design</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="ma.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Marketing Articles"><U>Marketing Articles</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="sr.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Show Reviews"><U>Show Reviews</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="mt.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Marketing Tools"><U>Marketing Tools</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="l.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Links"><U>Links</U></A></div> </td> <td valign="top" height=390 BGCOLOR="#777777" TEXT="#080000"> <div> How to make your booth and artwork stand out at art shows.</div> <bR> <div> Art shows are getting larger with more artists and fewer patrons to buy our work.  Patrons come to a show with only so much money to spend and there are so many choices to spend it on.  Most of us don't realize when someone comes back to our booth several times in a day, they are also going back to someone else's booth and comparing your artwork to another artist's work.  There are all kinds of factors that influence patrons on which piece they buy.  Some of them are obvious like size, color and price.  Others they may not be aware of at all.  Have you ever walked into a major department store and noticed the lighting, the displays, the background music and how good it smells.  These are all factors that influence what and how much we buy and we're not aware it's affecting us.  Department stores spend millions of dollars on research and consultants to find out what factors influence us most and put us in the buying spirit.  Ever walked by one of those fresh baked pretzel places in the mall?  The aroma will drive you crazy and right in to buy one.  That's no accident!  They are baking constantly, not to keep up with demand, but to create the demand.  You can use these kinds of influences to your advantage too.  </div> <div> All of our work sells to a certain number of people with little or no effort on our part at all.  Someone walks in and says "I love it, I'll take it!"  Unfortunately sales like that are few and far between.  Some patrons need a little coaxing.  This coaxing can be done in a variety of ways, from the very obvious to very subliminal.  The obvious ways are, "How about I take a few dollars off?" or "Would this size work better for you?"  This article is going to teach you a few of the subliminal ways to influence the buying decision.   </div> <div> The first and most obvious is your display.  The more professional and well put together your display is the more your artwork will impress the people that walk by it.  Look around at some of the displays you see on the circuit.  Beautiful wood grain walls that display high end pottery are much more impressive than white painted plywood shelves.  Put two high end pieces of pottery on each type of display, which one would you buy?  The artist with the beautiful wood grain walls can probably charge a lot more for his pieces and people don't think twice about it.  Your eyes focus not only on the artwork but on the surroundings too.  Keep your booth from being cluttered and display your work on professional panels.  </div> <div> The second is lighting.  Lighting conditions vary so much from show to show.  Trees, clouds, shadows from buildings all affect the lighting in your booth and how well the colors in your work show up.  Clouds come and go  all weekend and if your booth is lit up better than your competitors, you'll probably get the sale.  Bring your own lights.  It's easy to do, costs about $300.00 for everything you need and will pay off in the long run.  The best lights I have found are available at Home Depot.  They are 150 watt spiral florescent bulbs that actually use 42 watts of energy and cost about $20.00 each.  They're made by Commercial Electric.  You need a deep cycle marine trolling battery and a small power inverter to run the lights.  There are two types of deep cycle batteries, "starting" and "trolling".  Make sure you get a trolling battery because they are made for to last all day long.  You're also going to need a battery charger for recharging the battery at night.  All three, battery, inverter and charger are available at Walmart for about $250.00.  If you buy an inverter that can handle a little more power you can also run a small fan in your booth when it gets really hot.  A 300 watt inverter should be more than sufficient.  The last item that makes all this come together and work easy is a small wheeled carrier for the battery.  Marine batteries are heavy and carrying them back and forth to the car can be quite a load.  Buy or make a little stand with wheels so you can roll your battery from place to place.  The battery should run the lights all day and will need to be charged each night after use.  </div> <div> I run my lights all day long, even when the sun is out.  If the colors in my work are only 2% brighter because of the lights, they're 2% brighter than the guy next to me that doesn't have them.  </div> <div> The third thing you should have is a professional portfolio for patrons to look at.  This should include pictures of your work along with pictures of your work hanging on impressive looking walls or in impressive looking surroundings.  Sometimes people need a little help visualizing what your work is going to look like in their home.  If it looks impressive in someone else's home it'll look good in theirs.  If you make small items take big photos of your work and hang the photos on the walls of your booth.  You see it with jewelers all the time.  It's what gets people into their booth.   Your portfolio should also include a list of the awards you've won and letters from previous customers expressing how much they love your artwork.  Place the portfolio somewhere in your booth where it will get a lot of attention.  Some people love to read, those people interested in your work will love to read about you.  </div> <div> That brings me to the next item that will set you apart, your bio.  Tell your story, where you were born, raised, educated and live.  Tell about how you make your work, what inspires your work and all the transitions your work has gone through to get where it is today.  Get a little personal, tell about family, your children and anything you can think of that can get a patron to relate to you personally.  They are spending their hard earned money on your work and if you want them to keep coming back for more they're going to want to get to know you.  A bio is a great tool for that.  Run them off 500 at a time and hand them out to everyone that asks for a card.  You can put so much more information on an 8 ½ x 11 piece of paper than a business card.  If a patron goes home for the night and has to decide between two pieces of art from different artists, having a page of information as well as a colorful business card may just be the deciding factor.  </div> <div> Another useful tool that can bring you more sales is a website.  It's been a deciding factor for many of our customers over the past few years.  People go home to look at our website then come back to the show the next day and buy from us.  They were able to sit in their own home and make a no pressure decision on which piece to buy.  <U>If improperly done a website can actually hurt your sales at an art show.</U>   If I don't buy from you this weekend I can go to your website and buy from you later.  The best way around this is to have the prices on your website about 10% higher than the prices in your booth and to charge for shipping.  Hit with the choice of buy now and save verses wait and pay more later, most people will go ahead and buy from you now.   If people want to know why prices on your site are higher tell them the costs involved with keeping the site up and running require you to charge more or tell them this weekend only your prices are marked down for the show.  Sunday night the sale is over!  </div> <div> Carpeting?  Does having a carpet in your booth actually help you make a sale?  Honestly, I don't think so.  It does help keep the dust down in your booth if you're in grass or on dirt.  You really should spend all the time it takes to make sure your pieces of art are as clean and dust free as possible.  Some patrons really look closely at the artwork they're going to buy.  If the corners of the frame or the crevasses in the sculpture are filled with dirt and the guy down the road has clean pieces, I know which one I'd buy.  We don't use carpeting in our booth because it's one more thing to carry around but we do spend lots of time cleaning our pieces to make sure they look their very best.  </div> <div> Background music or earth sounds are a subliminal way to put your customers at ease and help them along in the buying process.  Remember to keep the music very soft, if it's too loud it becomes distracting and will drive people out of your booth.  We use a sound therapy machine that produces the sound of a stream with bird calls and we hang it right next to a picture of a running stream.  The machine is made by Conair and sells for $30.00 at Walmart.  We've also used a CD player with new age flute or piano music.  People won't spend big bucks for a piece of art until they are completely comfortable with their decision.  The music and nature sounds can help them reach that comfort zone.</div> <div> Aromatherapy can also help but it's extremely difficult to obtain just the right amount of scent in an open air environment.  If your scent is too strong it will drive people out of your booth in a hurry.  If it's too weak it's not effective.  Be very careful here, we tried the little oil warming scents and could never get it quite right.  Burning incense is way too strong and offensive to some people.  Air fresheners are very strong when you spray them and fade quickly.  If you find something that works, please let me know.   </div> <div> The last and most important thing that should be in your booth is you.  Spend as much time in your booth talking to people about your work as you can.  I know its long hours at a show and everyone needs a break from time to time but be in there talking, meeting people, shaking hands, passing out cards and signing up people for your newsletter.  How many times have you gone to a store ready to buy something and walked out because you couldn't find a sales person?  It's very frustrating to not have the help when you want it.  I know I'm going to hear a lot of people say, "every time I walk into my booth I scare people away."  Have you ever been scared away by a sales person when you were ready to buy something?  No!  The people you scare away are just lookers and they are blocking the view of the people that want to buy from you.  At shows that are really crowded get them out so the people that do want to buy can get in.  I'll be willing to bet you've been scared away from booths with long lines and decided to go somewhere else when you were ready to buy something.  Don't let that happen in your booth.  </div> <div> At small shows it's good to have a few people in your booth talking about your work, it adds a bit of curiosity. "What are those people talking about? Let's go see."  </div> <div> I have a small stool in my booth, I sit on it as long as I can and talk to people.  Every hour or so I take a little break and will sit outside the booth just to regain my sanity.  Go out and talk with a few other artists and then it's back to talking about what we do.   Talk about your work with a sense of excitement.  If you're not excited about your work no one else will be. </div> <div> I've gotten a lot of positive feedback on these articles and want to thank all of you for that.  If you have any questions, comments or suggestions about this article or a marketing topic you would like to see written about please e-mail me at mike@albinarts.com.  Sell your artwork for what it's worth not what others are charging for theirs. <FONT SIZE="3" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >  </FONT></div> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>