[Manic Monday] Bringing Exhibition Into the 21st Century

In Indonesia, and especially in Jakarta, as the country's trade center, every week various exhibitions are held, from small in the atrium of malls, to large exhibitions which are visited by tens of thousands of people. These exhibitions also cover various industries, from education, housing, electronics, to car show currently being held at JIExpo. This exhibition basically fulfills the needs of each industry to showcase and sell their merchandise or services, but like any event that is open to the public, the exhibition has become a separate entertainment event for the public.

In small and large scale exhibitions, of course this exhibition aims to attract as many people as possible to come, so that the potential for sales is higher. To attract people, these exhibitions usually use methods that are repeatedly effective, namely by holding various entertainment events, and sometimes there is a raffle with prizes for all visitors who come. The entertainment can be anything, from bringing in celebrities, making talk show, music, magic, dance to acrobatics. Prizes are always made that are relevant to the contents of the exhibition. This method may have been running for almost decades in various parts of the world, and booth attractive, beautiful SPG and informative brochures.

During those decades, the exhibition format was almost always the same. Events like Indonesian Computer Festival or Real Estate Expo, or maybe Jakarta Fair, in the end the shape is one large area that is divided into lots for each company that rents the space. Companies that intend to exhibit will build booth according to the concept they need, and will prepare the SPG troops and salespeople already provided with brochures and product information. The rest, booth we will try to keep it busy with various activities and entertainment, especially for exhibition events that last more than one day.

What I feel myself as a visitor, is that I sometimes get confused when I come to these big exhibitions. Information about the full list of exhibitors, their locations and what programs are at the exhibition or booth it is often hard to come by; the information on the website is often incomplete, and the location does not always have a plan and schedule of events.

Although generally the exhibition wants all visitors to go around the entire exhibition area so they can see everything booth, but these irregularly moving groups ended up making the entire exhibition area often crowded and jammed with people. The ideal situation where people can see all booths freely is often not the case. Well, really this problem can not be solved with technology?

With a fairly simple technology and a little discipline regarding the provision of information, coming to the exhibition should be guided by a mobile application, at least a mobile website. Full floor plan - advanced version might work augmented reality mirip Here City Lens - easily accessible.

The list of events and programs for each booth can be presented contextually, until notifications about flash discounts, competitions or sweepstakes can be posted. With easier access to information about the exhibition, visitors can plan their visit well, and even take the time to come more than once, so the exhibition can truly be a complete entertainment event, and not just full of crowds and piles of brochures.

Technological solutions can also provide assistance to exhibitors and organizers. An easy method of acquiring visitor databases can be applied generally at exhibitions or only at events booth exhibition, so that it is easier for exhibitors to get information about potential customers. Booth Even the most popular exhibitions can be measured with real data, based on measurements of visitors who come there.

A more comprehensive dissemination of product information - making it easier for customers to learn and at the same time obtain contact information for the seller - can be done electronically, thereby reducing the need for brochure printing which is likely to be discarded immediately after the exhibition. [Disclosure: I work at Wooz. in, one of the system provider companies that perform the above functions]

Various kinds of technology are often used as part of the entertainment in an exhibition - electronic games, augmented reality, video mapping , instant photo printing and so on; which finally puts these technologies, which are quite sophisticated and not cheap, into complementary entertainment for visitors, without any further impact for the main purpose of the exhibition, namely sales targets. By thinking more carefully about the use of technology in exhibitions, exhibitions can continue to be established as a public entertainment destination, as well as an effective sales medium.

Ario is the co-founder of Ohio, a music streaming service from Indonesia. Ario worked in the Indonesian music industry from 2003 to 2010, before working in the film and TV industry in Vietnam. You can follow his account on Twitter – @barijoe or read his blog at http://barijoe.wordpress.com.