Trade shows will be back and will be more important than everr

Diversified UK is the UK division of the family owned Diversified Business Communications， based in the USA. The UK division has expanded gradually over the past 10 years， to include around 20 successful， market leading niche events， including Natural & Organic Products Europe， EuroBus， British Travel and Tourism Fair， London Design Fair， Ocean Business， Digital Construction Week and AquaCulture UK.

This year， the trade show sector has been hit very hard by the pandemic. Since the lock-down was announced in March， the company has had no trade shows and as of mid-July， it still doesnt have any idea of when the exhibitions will be allowed to resume. Carsten Holm， Managing Director of Diversified Communications UK， tells the reporter， like many other organisers， Diversified UK moved several of the spring shows to the autumn， and later took the early decision in June to cancel all the shows this year.

“It was an incredibly difficult thing to do， and means that we will turn over less than 5% of last years revenue， but we felt that running half shows， with half the number of visitors， all with smaller budgets than normal， would ultimately damage our business more， than cancelling everything， and regrouping for next year.” Carsten Holm considers. Now， all the teams efforts are being put into transferring bookings to next year and making sure that it can return with full shows.

On the topic of O2O2O， Carsten Holm personally believes that it is difficult to transfer the power of face to face trade shows to online， as its not just impossible to replicate the physical environment， but also to get critical community engagement. In the current context， the exception is conference， learning and seminar content， which can work well online， so for some of the products， Diversified UK has developed virtual events， to help stay in touch with relative communities . One example was the Accountex Virtual Summit which achieved nearly 16，000 registrations. Thats a big result considering the physical trade show attracts only half that audience. The problem， however， is to make the virtual platform a financial success in the same way as the physical trade show， but it helps to keep the audiences engaged， and it generates great data for potential new visitors to the shows. “I expect that once we are back to new-normal， that we will continue to run many of these virtual events， but as a support to， rather than instead of， our established trade events.” Carsten Holm has a clear mindset about this.

Looking ahead， Carsten Holm says that it is so incredibly difficult to forecast what the future will look like. Trade shows have until now been by far the most powerful platform for companies to connect， network and do business. He thinks that rather than the current crisis proving to companies that they can prosper without tradeshows， the opposite is actually the case， with companies realizing how important trade shows are to the success of their businesses. So， although it will take some time for confidence to fully recover， “trade shows will be back and will be more important than ever." He is fully convinced.