Context
The same review-syndication vendor as the high-volume outbound program, preparing for one of the largest home furnishings trade shows in the industry. At this show the buying conversations happen on the floor rather than over email, so the job was to decide, before arriving, which exhibitors were worth the walk.
The problem
The exhibitor directory runs to well over a thousand companies spread across eleven showroom districts and thirty shuttle stops. Sales time on the floor is fixed and small. Standard data tools cannot tell you the one thing that matters here: which exhibitor is a consumer brand already selling through major retailers but not yet syndicating reviews to them. Without that, the show gets walked by geography or by chance.
What changed
- Scraped the full exhibitor directory, over 1,600 companies, resolving each one to a website, a LinkedIn company profile and an HQ, and capturing showroom district and shuttle stop for every listing.
- Screened each company on what its own site says it sells, rather than inferring from firmographics, and recorded the reasoning per company instead of leaving a bare score.
- Researched which retailer partners each brand already sells through, and how many. That is the signal that separates a prospect from a passer-by here.
- Separated multi-line showrooms and rep groups from single brands. Up to 18 brands can sit behind one booth, which is a different pitch entirely.
- Ranked the survivors into a walking plan keyed to district and shuttle stop, so the priority accounts could be covered in a sensible route.
Outcome
- 939 exhibitors kept as prefit out of the full listing, a shortlist just over half the size of the directory, each carrying its own recorded rationale.
- Close to 550 of those confirmed as selling through retailers. That was the segment the client was told to work first, and it became the spine of the show plan.
- 286 sell through two or more of the retailers the platform integrates with, the tier carrying the highest contract value.
- 227 flagged as multi-brand showrooms and rep groups, routed to a separate conversation.
- Target density mapped across the venue. Two districts alone held over half the qualified exhibitors.
- The client's team worked the show against the ranked list and took meetings on the floor. Outreach ran as a secondary channel rather than the primary motion.
- The method was built to repeat, with the same pipeline set up to run for the following market.
