Packing for your next conference...
Sorry, but you know you can’t bring those shoes because they’ll take up too much space in your carry-on and you’ve already committed your checked bag to conference swag bags and company mugs.
Dinner is also a no-go because the conference starts bright and early tomorrow and you still need to set up your table.
If only you’d listened to Mark from Finance and taken an earlier flight.
On the plane, you meet another conference go-er but don’t notice them at baggage claim. They must have another teammate here who brought the swag ahead of time. Lucky!...
You long for the days when you’ll have enough budget to bring two people to the conference because it would make it a lot easier to have one person hold down the fort at your table, while the other person goes to mingle and collect business cards to add to your CRM.
It’s all right, someday you’ll have the staff, and your hustle is going to pay off!
What if we told you that there was an easier way?
That you don’t need more staff or to bring all of that swag with you?
✅Bring the shoes
✅Mingle
✅Add contacts to your CRM without the hassle of manual labor
No, you don’t need to clone yourself or drink some potion to make you superhuman for the next 48 hours.
With HubSpot Business card scanner and Postal.io’s magic links - you can become a superhuman sales and business development rockstar at your next conference!
Let’s start with swag.
We know that gifting to prospective clients and new connections is extremely effective in your offline marketing efforts. According to Knack Shops, corporate gifting report 83% of revenue teams believe that business gifts generate measurable, positive ROI.
They also found that 45% of millennials like to share their gift on social media (twice as many as boomers). Can you say free advertising?
So in a sense, not offering swag at your conference almost seems like a loss in revenue.
Once the conference is over and everyone returns to the office, will your new connections remember you?
Will they be telling their teams about you?
If you didn’t have a chance to meet with someone, but they grabbed a Yeti water bottle with your logo on it, you’re bound to make an impression on them!
With all of this in mind, you can’t very well eliminate corporate swag even if Mark from Finance would love the added budget back into his spreadsheet.
So, how do you do this and still have room in your checked bag?
Before we tell you the secret to this magic trick, you might need a little background on Postal.io.
Postal.io is a direct mail platform that not only offers an array of gifts and packages, but can integrate with platforms such as HubSpot to leverage workflows, automation, and optimization for building relationships in your sales pipeline.
It’s reported that on average, close rates have increased by 30% when using offline marketing through the Postal.io platform. Gifts can range in price to fit your budget and there are a variety of items from baked goods, or AirPods, to catered lunches.
The ability to send a collection instead of one specific gift also means that your prospect on the receiving end can choose what they want the most out of the items you’ve selected.
This gives them the ability to engage with you and truly find value in what they’re receiving. It also means less opportunity to fail. Not sure what we mean? We may or may not have sent a meat and cheese basket to someone not realizing they’re vegan.
What if you’re working with a company that cannot accept gifts?
Sometimes company swag is not included in those restrictions, or you could donate in their honor to their favorite charity. The possibilities are endless.
At Digital Reach Online Solutions we use Postal.io for not just our client-relationship building, but also for onboarding our employees!
(source Postal.io)
Okay, so now that you know what Postal.io is, what is a magic link?
Instead of lugging around a checked-bag worth of company swag, your networking efforts can go even further all without the backache. Not only can those people you interact with receive a gift from you, but they also don’t need to lug it home themselves either!
Honestly, you may get more people who oblige because they won’t need to figure out how they’re getting it home. Instead, you can focus on relationship building in the moment and they’ll get a reminder that they met with you when their items arrive at their doorstep.
Even better?
You can include a meeting setup when they redeem their gift. So now you’ve
✅Avoided heavy lifting
✅Had a more meaningful conversation with your prospect
✅Given them a friendly reminder of your interaction with offline marketing
✅Solidified your second meeting all-in-one.
Magic links also have parameters that you can set.
Why? You have a budget, so you don’t really want Joe from the conference going online and getting gifts for all of his family and friends now do you? You can set a limited number of gifts in your link, a limited number of days the gifts are available to be accepted, and even filter out domains or require approval so you know exactly who is getting your goods.
Picture this: you go to the conference with a handful of business cards and on those cards is a QR code for your magic link. Your prospects choose a gift that they enjoy and you stay top of mind when their item arrives and your meeting is booked.
❌ No heavy lifting.
❌ No storage issues.
✅ Just networking.
Remember at the beginning of this article we mentioned that not only could you pack your favorite shoes, but you could mingle, and add your contacts to your CRM without a magic potion?
Don’t think we forgot about that last part! With the HubSpot mobile app and business card scanner, you can wave goodbye to manually entering contact information from everyone you interacted with at the conference!
Now you may not be new to a business card scanner, but this might be the only one that doesn’t come with additional fees. There is no fee for scanning beyond your first few cards, it’s free forever.
Not to mention, it’s so much more than a simple scanner.
Have a bad memory? Once you’ve scanned the information, you have all of the power of HubSpot in the palm of your hand.
Upload a snapped photo or make notes to help you remember important information. You’ll also have access to emails, meeting links, and so much more to start building your relationship faster than you can unload leftover swag from your suitcase. Oh wait, you don’t need to do that anymore!
These are just some ways to get started with services like Postal.io and HubSpot. Postal.io and HubSpot integrate so well together that you can use automation and workflows to nurture your business relationships with a “set it and forget it” type of ease.
Never miss another anniversary or celebration of a closed deal by following a few simple steps to set up your process.
Whether you’re starting small and need platforms that scale with you, or you’re a seasoned professional with vast amounts of data and complex problems to solve, HubSpot has a solution for you.
You can even try Postal.io for free and get a feel for what possibilities are available for your relationship-building future.
Don’t have the time or the staff to do it on your own?
Enter Digital Reach Online Solutions. We can be an ongoing partner with you in optimizing your CRM needs or we can provide a simple one-and-done solution.
Not ready to go steady just yet?
We have a lot of free (un-gated) resources that include tutorials, handouts, and on-the-go information in our blogs and newsletters. No strings attached.
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