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Lets get back to exhibiting your business!

28 March 2021 Stuart Nimmo Creative Large Format Print Marketing

HAD-Print is all about service and support. With decades of experience and specialist partners, who are like ourselves, experienced and skilled in unique disciplines. We bring together a package approach for small and medium-sized businesses to promote themselves in the best possible light.

So after 12-18 months where you’ve had enough of the Zoom meeting, done endless Teams 1-1’s you’re now longing for something different. Yes! The physical engagement. One of the top experiences or highlights for any business is being seen at the right trade show or event.

Here are our top 10 tips to ensure your presence and stand is a success:

Be clear with your objectives

Before you even book a stand be sure of your business goals, ensure the event has the right profile to tick the boxes on the audience’s demographics.  Are you launching a product, promoting your products or services or seeking new business?  Make sure your targets are SMART with your targets and event budget.

The early bird catches the worm

As the phrase goes, “failing to plan is planning to fail”. Booking early will allow you to get the best location and take advantage of early-bird rates. This will also allow plenty of time for the design, production, delivery and installation of your stand and promotional material.

Brand consistency

Exhibiting will require your brand to be reproduced consistently across all.  We can help you achieve this, with specialist print designers and our associate exhibition stand designer, getting consistency is easy with us. We work with your brand guidelines with brand colours, typography, logo positioning and imagery to maximize the results.

Shout about it and spread the word

An exhibition/event is a great opportunity to get seen and build new business. Consider promoting the event on your company’s website, email signatures, newsletters and social media. It’s a great opportunity to send invitations to prospective customers via post – building this into a VIP package for when they attend your stand.

Stand design

Be seen for the with eye-catching media walls/graphics, lightboxes, a bespoke exhibition displays are all great ways to entice visitors to your stand.  Arrange a meeting with our associate exhibition designer to discuss your ideas and develop your concept.

** Top tip **
Even on the smallest of spaces, adding height can help you be seen more. Most exhibition halls do have height and stand schemes that are 2.5m high. Chat with us for some canny ideas on how to achieve some height, on a sensible budget.

Marketing collateral

Make sure you have plenty of marketing materials to give to visitors.  As well as brochures, leaflets and business cards try some fun promotional items.  Items that have an onward life tend to achieve more brand presence moving forward. So items like re-usable shoppers a good start, as they are environmentally friendly and get more use than just the exhibition. 

Choose your team

Choose who you want to represent your business and brand wisely, after all, “People like people like themselves”.  Apparel can also be a great way of putting people at ease, both your staff and potential customers. Branded t-shirts are a good way of making your team easily identifiable to visitors.

Make it fun

Exhibitions are interactive events, so try and make it fun! Dull and boring doesn’t cut it.  Competitions and challenges with prizes can be great ways of enticing visitors to your stand, starting conversations and collecting data.

During the event

Encourage your team to appear friendly and approachable.  Set up a rota to ensure your stand is always manned and don’t forget to collect contact details for that important follow up.

Follow up and connect further

Make sure your team follows up all leads as soon as possible after the event.  Automated omnichannel marketing campaigns can ensure all leads are promptly contacted across a variety of media, such as email, text message and direct mail thank you cards and opportunities to set up valuable 1-1 refresher opportunities.

HAD-Print produces on-site in Halifax, West Yorkshire all of the above to support you with your physical items for exhibitions and events. We have a specialist Exhibition Stand Designer in Wayne Clarke at Clarke Concepts who can further develop the design of your built exhibition stand. Coupled with our partner installer we can support you from start to completion on your exhibition/event journey.

Proofing perfection – get it right first time.

27 February 2021 Stuart Nimmo Content creation Creative Print based marketing Project Planning

Once upon a time (well that sounds like a children’s story), the process of “proofing” was a critical process of producing an item for print. We are in changing times, and every penny counts in a budget, so a costly mistake can be the last thing you need. In a day and age, where online content is always updated and evolves, sloppiness creeps in. A piece of printed collateral will have a longer life span than a piece of digital content.

It may seem like there is never time to proof something thoroughly the first time, but when it is not done, you may end up making time to do the entire job a second time. Just what are some of the things that should be checked during the proofing process? Here is a list to perfect your proofing strategy:

Proof the textual content.

The first place to start is the text. Review all text for spelling and grammatical correctness, check punctuation, and most importantly, the accuracy of the content. One of my early bosses encouraged us to read the text backwards, so read it properly, then go to the end of the paragraph and check every word. If you have written the text and revised it copiously, get a second pair of eyes to be your critical friend and read it. Good editors/copywriters don’t charge too much for this service.

Check the image quality.

Image quality expectations change vastly with different types, colour is a critical item as well. What might view ok on your computer screen, could reproduce differently in print. An experienced pre-press technician or digital printer will guide you through ensure modest colour management. They will ensure calibration from screen to print and different paper stocks. Worth noting that a screen uses subtractive colour (RGB) and we print using an additive process (CMYK) so colours will vary. For high-level image quality jobs, it may be wise to have physical proof rather than just an on-screen proof, as digital printers, we can proof your job on the paper stock. Or provide benchmarking for colour with standardized materials.

Confirm the overall look and feel.

Pages can look very different on screen to when they are printed. Look over the typography, and the quality of reproduction, ensure you are happy with the detail. Ensure placement of images, illustrations and text. Don’t forget to check hyphenation and line arrangement (as us about Widows and Orphans), page format, and bleeds.

Whilst the print process has dramatically reduced in its timelines, the proofing process is something which you cannot afford to reduce. It is the difference between making a modest impression or an excellent impression with your reader.

Product Review: Stormtech Men’s Patrol Softshell – XB-3

6 February 2021 Stuart Nimmo Product Review

It’s not every day I get the opportunity to try/test out high-end kit. Recently I was lucky enough to win a technical jacket from one of our garment suppliers. Luck was on my side that day/week. 

So let me unpack this…. Stormtech is probably a name most people haven’t heard of. However, the specification and the performance matches some of the high end outdoor technical kit you would send time “browsing” in any of the Ambleside gear shops on a wet afternoon in the Lake District.

So I was lucky enough to get my hands on a Stormtech Patrol XB-3 Softshell Jacket. With a retail price of £170.00 (plain jacket, no personalised branding applied)

It’s highly technical and functional softshell which is specified and designed for the outdoors. Stormtech, which is a Canadian company has seriously designed this for versatility in variable weather (which I am aware they get there!). With fully sealed seams, waterproof zippers and an excellent waterproof resistance – technically it’s excellent. Design-wise, there are some nice trim and features such as dual chest pockets for stowing your valuables, yes it does fit an iPhone XR max in the chest pocket.

I was testing it in a week where the weather in Yorkshire was very wintery. This jacket is comfortable and does a great job of blocking wind and moisture. The water repellence was good, with modest precipitation beading on the surface. Some Softshell jackets whilst light showerproof, don’t bead as this one did. The shell system does need layering for added warmth – however, ask anyone with some background in outdoors, and they’ll recommend layering. The softshell material is heavy-duty enough to be used as a ski jacket, breathable enough to workout in, and comfortable enough for day to day wear – which I have worn it every day in the last week with this review in mind. 

With a background in the Outdoors, thanks to Scouting and also doing a Mountain Leadership course a few decades back, I always look at the technical details. The seams are sealed so the inside of the jacket, equally I have come across some sealed seams which are basic, Stormtech’s are a credit to them. Before I even looked at the technical specification of the jacket, you could tell, it was waterproofed to a good degree. (Water Resistance 10,000mm, Breathability 3,000g/m2)

Point to note, fit, I am a broad-shouldered person with longer than average arms, the large fitted me well for the shoulders and arms, with plenty of movement around the waist. So credit to the sizing of the garment, spot on.

Only only design point I would possibly suggest improvement on; The range provided by the UK distributors is very focussed on black with modest colour trim. Which, when dog walking in the evening in a dark Yorkshire, doesn’t do anything for your visibility. Even if it was flashes of reflective trim, it would add both for urban and outdoor use.

Verdict, if you are outdoors a lot, then yes I can say, specify something like this jacket, as you will reap the benefits from it. If you value your technical specifications and are a gear snob, then give it a try, you will be surprised, there is good gear out there, without the flashy branding. Valid point as per anything, you pay for what you get. Thanks to one of our garment distributors for letting me give it a go!



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