Veteran Marketer Proves Booth Babes Don't Work

[Therumancer]

Sounds like this "expert researcher" has no idea what he's doing. If you bring in local experts with their connections and such, of course that is going to increase your effectiveness compared to hiring "booth babes" as generalized sales reps without any real knowledge of the product or subject matter.

The thing is though that most companies don't have any connections with people interested in doing that kind of low-end work for you in every specific area. What's more local experts will oftentimes charge a premium, far more than picking up some talent from a local modeling/talent agency.

What's more the most savvy people from big companies try and capture the best of both worlds by basically contracting company "spokesmodels" at the lower end, basically hot girls whose job it is to travel around with the product, from convention to convention. People who have been trained with that product in particular, and have probably been working out a performance/pitch ahead of time for a while.

Case in point, let's say your smaller-scale tractors and farm machinery and are trying to convince businesses to stock your machines to sell in rural areas. You could take the time to hopefully recruit local farmers from each area that will hopefully get their own connections in to take a look, that would be ideal IF you knew where to find the people and had ones who wanted to sit around on their own time pimping your product, people also probably demanding a premium. You could hire some hot girls and bank on the eye candy, but again your likely to only get a couple hours to brief them on tractors and selling tractors. Or you can hire your own models, paying as much as those local actors, brief them about everything there is to know about the tractors, and then have them take turns basically dry humping the machinery (which they will have rehearsed with dance experience) to get attention, and actually be able to answer the questions. Call it a mini-floor show.

Having sat in and around a LOT of cons for a lot of products as security, I will say that I don't think "Booth Babes" are in any danger largely because most businesses hitting these things aren't going to have the connections to get serious "local talent' to begin with (instead being there to try and break into a given area... or in many cases will be dealing with people from all over who have travelled to the con at whatever location. The idea being the con selling the glamour of a casino ballroom for example, with no guarantee there even are any experts in whatever your selling in the local area of the con, and their advantages being mitigated when they are dealing entirely with people from out of town), or want to invest in their own stable of "spokesmodels" (which is me being fairly diplomatic, at the end of the day though most companies doing the con circuit can't afford that, which is why they are doing cons to build up a clientele and spread news about their product). As a result they wind up with the option of hiring "booth babes" who are likely from a local modeling agency and at least trained to look good, speak well, etc... or just hiring regular booth attendees or using their own people (ie the guy bringing the product also mans the booth... which doesn't happen that often because he probably wants to scope the competition, play around at the con location, and try and broker what deals he can).

 

[Something Amyss]

It's an interesting anecdote, but I think you'd need more than one such instance to do more than imply any meaningful information.

Of course, to a lot of people it's confirming what hey already believe, but....If you're really going to demonstrate it, no need to half-ass it.

Wait people actually or still think this is an effective marketing tactic?

The people who employ it and the people who defend it apparently do, so yeah, I'd say they do.

 

[Elvis Starburst]

Concerning gaming events, I certainly wouldn't go to a booth just cause they had booth babes. Hell, I think it'd detract from the whole thing. It's doubtful those hired women actually play and love the game. If they did, awesome. But it's not like you could go up and ask and get a truthful response. You'd probably get a generic response and a big, fake smile. That's not what I'd wanna see at an event like this. I'd want intelligent conversation with someone who knows their shit. Gimme some flashy combat in a game or something, not flashy sexy women with big fake smiles

 

[soren7550]

The only show I actually see them at is the NY Comic-Con. I don't pay them any attention simply because a hot girl dressed like Wonder Woman doesn't do anything for me. She is, after all, not actually Wonder Woman.

I've been to NYCC three times, and I don't think I ever saw a booth babe there. The closest to a booth babe was these women working at the Wipeout booth, but chances were they were just employees with big-ish boobs.

And chances are, if you're seeing an ample Wonder Woman at Comic Con, they're a cosplayer, not a booth babe.

OT: Hey, that guy in the picture has a X-Play tote bag and an N7 hoodie. Awesome!

 

[Don't taze me bro]

But what about all of the sites that display galleries of said 'booth babes' after these events are over? These girls, provided they have the brand logo either in the shot, or on their clothing continue to advertise the product long after the event is over.

Sure, it's not foot traffic and completed forms, but it shouldn't be entirely discounted.

 

[VoidWanderer]

This doesn't particularly surprise me. A lot of people are likely to avoid them, purely so they don't get thought of as a pervert.

Then there is the possibility that some women might find them awkward, and some heterosexual men might find them insulting, as though they need see a scantily clad woman to be gain interest in something. Which is essentially the purpose of them in the first place.

As somebody who has never attended a place that has had them, I've never been particularly bothered by the idea. But at the same time I have also never really seen the point.

I can understand having people dress up as characters, if it is from a work of fiction. Beyond that it just seems kind of juvenile.

If only E3 would learn from this. The way that businessmen treat 'booth babes' makes me want to take a long shower to make myself feel clean again.

I would much rather talk with someone who actually know about the product, than an attractive young woman who is there to look good.

 

[Yopaz]

Wait people actually or still think this is an effective marketing tactic? I never go to any of these sorts of things but I've always thought of it as more of a traditional role for conventions, sort of like part of the attraction. Like go to any geek convention these days and you'll find plenty of people cosplaying, babes included. I thought they were just supposed to be part of the show, not effective salespeople.

It is still being used to market shampoo, cars, PC hardware, any kind of cosmetic, soda, candy and I'm sure the list goes on so it's still thought to be effective. I've also seen one particular picture on an article about a new laptop (Asus I think) where some of the people commented "How much for the girl" and "I'm more interested in the girl than the laptop" so there's obviously still a draw for the thing. If it's a good sales tactic is subject to debate (especially after this article), but it may be good for marketing online, but I don't know.

OT: I'm not incredibly surprised by this. A pretty face may draw more faces towards a booth, but I wouldn't buy a product unless I was talking to someone who could tell me a bit about it other than what I could read off the product description myself. Also if you're a bit socially awkward (like me) it may be hard to talk to someone you're attracted to and you may lose your nerve before you get there and you just walk away (slowly to hide a boner) in shame (exaggerating here, calm down).

Now speaking from personal experience I did check out a slideshow of booth babes a couple years ago, mainly because they were presenting a variety of new internal components that were up for release. Now for the most part I studied the new hardware more than the girls with the exception when the girls wore interesting clothing that fit with the theme.

I'm not against booth babes, nor do I hate them, I simply don't have a personal need for them to exist and I am sure they would rather be somewhere else with a different model job, sadly those jobs aren't easy to get and I pity those who end up at these kind of events because of the creepers.

 

[cefm]

Having good material and knowledgeable staff who are interested in talking about it is what you want. Anything else is kind of worthless.

In a professional setting booth babes are a toxic poison. I've been to conferences in which a misguided sponsor used booth babes and they might as well have dropped tear-gas in the room. While some folks were OK looking from afar, nobody wanted to be caught anywhere near them. Why? Cause professionals don't want to look like stupid teenagers.