It’s 14 days before drupa, the largest print fair in the world, opens their doors to welcome all citizens of the Printerverse near, far, and remotely. The information that will flow out from Dusseldorf could easily become the focus of your day unless you start planning your attack, strategically. Based on my experience watching from home in 2012, here are 5 ideas to help you keep your drupa info absorption from overloading May 31 through June 10th… and beyond!
Preview! Just like the Superbowl, you don’t need to wait for the game to see the commercials anymore. Many exhibitors, and certainly drupa, have done an outstanding job providing pre-show info and pre-show videos. Look them up and start making decisions about relevance to follow during the show. Here are a few I have made over the last few weeks at pre-dupa and related events: HP PageWide Press, Pitney Bowes, Ryobi RMGT, Canon Solutions America.
Social Media! If you aren’t sure who is exhibiting and what they are showing, the hashtag #drupa2016 is a great place to start your research. Get a taste of who is out there, and connect with those companies via social or other options available that work best for you. Get the information you seek delivered to your timelines and inbox vs looking for it unfiltered when the social streams explode with all things drupa, and they will. Side note – some companies are using #drupa vs #drupa2016 – but the official hashtag per drupa is #drupa2016!
The Trade Pubs! With the caveat that even the best of the best out there can’t cover ALL things drupa, there is a significant offering of segment focused media coverage that will provide daily highlights on the products and services you are interested in following. Expand your information borders and read what the press in other countries is saying – especially the Europeans since they have the time zone advantage and the news will be new/live in North America when you get up.
drupa! Beyond exhibitor information, drupa shares all things related to the industry and the big picture happenings during the show. Click here, and connect with them to receive the information directly from the source. Read this interview with drupa Director Sabine Geldermann for some inside scoop!
PrintMediaCentr! Thanks to my partners at HP PageWide Press I will be attending my first drupa this year, and thanks to my new friends at Messe Dusseldorf North America, I have a press pass! That means I will be running around and covering as much as I can from inside Hall 17 with HP, and out in the Messe so you can share the experience with me. I’m even taking requests! Do your research and let me know what you want to see. I’ll do my best to find it, gather info and send pics. Connect with me on Twitter, any of the social channels here, or shoot me an email: deborah@printmediacentr.com
I am leaving for Germany May 18th to help HP Page Wide Press with some pre-show #PWPpartners activities I’m covering during the show. In between those tasks I will venture out to get us sneak peek pics of the exhibitor and drupa set-up, and the fairgrounds. It will be cool to see things before masses of print people invade the Messe. I have my cameras, my industrial portable chargers and my shoe strategy in place. Most of all, I do not take this amazing opportunity to attend drupa and share information with you for granted. If you use any of your brain capacity to pay attention to me before and during the show, I promise to make it worthwhile and yeah, a little fun too.
drupa Long and Prosper!
Deborah Corn is the Intergalactic Ambassador to The Printerverse at PrintMediaCentr, a Print Buyerologist™, Integrated Marketer, Industry Speaker and Blogger, Cultivator of the Print Production Professionals Group, the #1 Print Group on LinkedIn, and host of the weekly industry #PrintChat on Twitter. She has more than 25 years experience working in advertising and marketing, and currently works behind the scenes with printers, suppliers and industry organizations helping them to achieve success with their cross media and social media marketing endeavors.
Connect with Deborah through any of the social channels on PMC!
