Case Study

Brief

Elster Metering is an industry leader and world-class provider of advanced metering products and intelligent metering solutions. Elster's long lasting success comes from its heritage of innovation and quality.

Elster Metering asked BMB to help ensure they had top billing at IWEX 2009 - the UK’s largest event for water and wastewater professionals. This included design and build of an exhibition stand in addition to driving awareness of Elster’s presence at the show.

Strategy

At a time when many exhibitors are nervous about taking risks, it was important to be brave and take a dynamic approach with this experiential budget. To do this, we took a step back from what was traditionally expected from stands at IWEX which had essentially become a variety of exhibition spaces completely saturated with product examples and brochures.

Instead we advocated a 100 per cent testimonial route – using Elster’s customers as the main focal point and highlighting their positive experiences with the company.

Execution

The testimonial route manifested itself in huge photos of customers across the stand sat alongside details of how they had enjoyed working with Elster and what the results of their collaboration had been.

In what was even more of a coup for Elster, the customers who had given written testimonials agreed to physically man the exhibition stand and meet visitors on the day, ready to be grilled with questions about what Elster were really like to work with and explain how their metering solutions really could make a difference.

The next challenge was to ensure a flow of visitors to the stand and translate the exhibition creative into a form of direct marketing. We advised that an email campaign would be the most suitable medium – and created four separate campaigns to be issued in the weeks leading up to the show.

Mirroring the creative execution of the stand, the first email introduced the Elster team, highlighting their presence – and that of their customers – at IWEX 2009. A telephone number and email address were provided for any visitors to book meetings before the show and all stand location details were clearly highlighted.

A ‘Tell me more’ button linked directly to a dedicated landing page on the Elster website which also carried details of the individual testimonials and imagery from the stand.

Each subsequent email - there were four in total - focused on a particular customer and their specific experiences of working with Elster.

Results

By the end of the email campaign, there could be no mistaking what – or who – would be the subject of the Elster live experience.

This is a fine example that if an exhibitor is willing to take risks, moving away from the accepted norm, they can really maximise the potential of the face to face environment and build on the live experience with strategically co-ordinated and effective marketing tools – in this case, a wholly integrated email campaign.