Independent Business Group's headquarters are located in the San Francisco Bay area. I mention that because I'm about to confess that business hasn't been exactly booming during the last 20 months. Economic doldrums have hit Northern California hard, and IBG is no exception. Our offices are a stone's throw from Silicon Valley, and we had a fair share of customers with names ending in "dot com." Note the emphasis on the word had.
The point of this column, however, isn't to blame IBG's woes on outside forces. Nor is it to seek out fellow members who are in the same boat so we can commiserate. Rather, I wanted to share details about a very successful event we recently organized. We're confident the results of this event will add considerable momentum to the recovery we've been making during the last few months.
IBG is 20 years old. As we've evolved, we've diversified our product lines to include office supplies (40 percent of our business) and promotional products (10 percent) to supplement print sales. IBG always has strived to make customers aware of all the things that we can do for them. Of course, you can say it, and say it, and say it again--but seeing is believing. Our marketing department and management staff had an excellent thought: To truly educate IBG customers, we needed to hold an open house that included a tabletop show.
We had a dilemma. Refer back to paragraph one. On one hand, we were convinced that a show would be a great way to show customers we weren't one-dimensional. On the other hand, we didn't have the budget to pull off a first-class event.
To solve this dilemma, IBG turned to the people who (aside from ourselves) would benefit most from an increased IBG top line--our valued manufacturers and suppliers. I have to confess: I was shocked at the enthusiasm shown by our supply-chain partners when we asked for assistance. The support from our print industry manufacturers was terrific. We immediately had offers that included no-cost printing of marketing materials to promote the show, donations of door prizes, funds to offset the cost of signage and table rentals, and participation in the show itself. We arranged to feature two booths dedicated to a pressure-seal system and comprehensive document security. Employees of our manufacturers agreed to staff them. All of our supply-chain participants wore name badges that included the title "IBG Resource Partner."
Our promotional product suppliers, who have plenty of trade show experience, also provided door-prize donations and table fees to offset the show's cost. One of our shirt suppliers provided embroidered IBG dress shirts for our 37 employees. We quickly had 10 companies that wanted booth space. The wholesaler IBG uses for office products was so excited about the concept that it agreed to pay half the catering bill. It also helped to coordinate booths for six large office product suppliers, including Avery Dennison and 3M, who were willing to pay table fees.
With this promise of support, IBG concentrated on making the show an event worth attending. To promote it, we sent teaser fliers that included unusual facts about IBG personnel. (OK, not that unusual.) We asked our customers if they knew that one of our customer service representatives is a former professional roller skater, or that our top sales rep was a high-school teacher before joining the business forms industry, or that our graphic designer had been an Idaho pig farmer. The flier's tagline was "After 20 years there is still so much that you don't know about us." The promotion was effective: Numerous customers called to say, "I didn't know that about Bev/Pat/Christian/Rae/Salvador...."
IBG identified and concentrated on two main goals for the event. The first was to teach customers about all the valuable things our company could provide. The second was to learn more about our customers. At each product area, we had drawings for free products. The entry form included questions pertaining to customers' needs for office supplies, printing, graphic design and promotional products. The leads we gained just from the drawing cards were enough to call the show a success. It was a first-class event, thanks to a little (actually a lot of) help from our friends. The phrase of the day was, "I didn't know you did that!" This was music to our ears. Every customer left the building with more knowledge about IBG.
Since the event last month, we've added 40 accounts to our online ordering system for office supplies (a 10 percent increase), and we have so many promotional product projects going that we hardly have the time to process them. That's a dilemma I like having! Also, we have four customers who want a pressure-seal system. Our December sales were up more than 35 percent over November. And the increased business has been placed with resource partners who had faith that IBG could put on a worthwhile show.
It's too early to gauge the long-term impact this collaborative effort will have on our sales, but we're convinced it should be an annual event. Our marketing team already is hard at work on plans to make next year's show even better.
Gail O'Roke, CDC, is CEO of distributorship Independent Business Group, based in Hayward, Calif., and president of DMIA.
