By Nancy Drapeau, PRC, Research Director

This past Sunday my family engaged in the annual ritual of watching the Oscars, staying up until midnight EST to find out in real-time which film was awarded Best Picture. I could have gone to bed but I wanted to be there to see the reaction of the winners, hear the speeches and all the rest. The event did not disappoint. I was also fascinated to see the ramifications of Ellen DeGeneres’ use of Twitter. In her nonchalant way, she kept taking silly selfies and posting them via her phone. By her simple actions, she temporarily brought down Twitter and effortlessly broke the most retweet record, with retweets still climbing, now over three million. Here, join in the fun, here’s the link to the famous selfie: https://twitter.com/TheEllenShow/status/440322224407314432/photo/1

 So, what does any of this have to do with exhibitions? Well, everything really. It is a great example of the power of digital media, how it can amplify the impact and connection with a physical event. It personalizes the engagement with those who choose to take that action. Hey, I have a picture, taken by Ellen DeGeneres with a number of actors and actresses I love!

Digital tactics fulfill many more roles than this one example. It is an effective method for communicating, engaging with audiences in a variety of ways and offers methods to propagate a message, as Ellen did with the selfie tactic, which worked amazingly well!

How can this parlay into a digital playbook for exhibitors? Digital tactics are currently being used to fulfill a variety of complementary purposes to maximize the success of exhibit programs. What are exhibitors doing today to integrate digital into their exhibit programs and what examples are out there to help build a digital playbook strategy for their exhibit programs? There are examples from very simple to quite involved approaches, options that can meet the needs of companies with small budgets to the largest.

At a session to be held at EXHIBITOR2014, I look forward to discussing topline trends in use of digital media by brand marketers, sharing examples of how marketers are integrating digital tactics and hearing stories and ideas from the audience.

I am also delighted to be joined by a guest presenter, Adam Polaszewski, Director of Marketing at INXPO, who will share Glassdoor’s use of digital media tactics along with traditional tactics that generated substantial rewards for the company.

If you are planning to attend EXHIBITOR2014, I hope you join us!

FMI :http://www.exhibitoronline.com/exhibitorshow/2014/session.asp?ID=W301#.UxXoaVKPI5s

To pull down the Digital Playbook report at no cost, click here.