ASD/AMD is over, now what?
Wednesday, March 12th, 2008You flew to Las Vegas to find a few new trade suppliers. You ended up with 300 business cards and 25 pages of scribbled notes in the notepad you carried. Now what?
1) Organize - You should start by organizing your notes. Re-write your notes in a more intelligent and organized manner. Try to categorize suppliers by industry (Jewelry, General Merchandise, Etc..) and make additional notes that you didn’t make at the show. As each day passes, your memories from the show will fade, so be sure to write down as much as possible.
2) Prioritize - Now that your notes are organized, put them in the order in which you plan to contact them. Lets face it, you’ll probably never call that “plastic forks” distributor, even if his sales pitch was great! You may not call some of these suppliers for years, if everything is in order it will help you recall and order new product lines faster.
3) Act - You spent the money to travel there, now you actually need to order the products you fell in love with. Many small retailers can be overwhelmed by the sheer size of the show and the information they collect. Continually adding new products to your business is important, so pick up the phone and start ordering!