Go Inside CES

A Q&A about what’s new, trends and more with CEA’s Dan Cole

The 2008 Consumer Electronics Show is just around the corner, and Tech-EM sat down with CEA’s Dan Cole to get a quick snapshot on the event. Here’s the scoop everything from how the show’s changing and how exhibitors are best leveraging their investment to the hot button topic that’s already generating the most buzz for next month’s show. And don't forget to register for your free exhibit portrait at CES right here.

Name: Dan Cole
Title: VP-Business Development and Sales
Organization: Consumer Electronics Association

How has CES changed over the years?
This is our 41st year; we celebrated our 40th anniversary last year. At one time, we were in two locations. We used to have a show in Chicago, and a show in Las Vegas. Due to a change in buying cycles and various developments within the consumer electronics industry, we consolidated into one show that takes place on an annual basis in Las Vegas.

How are the show’s exhibitor and attendee profiles changing?
Historically, the show has been the epicenter of consumer electronics universe. It’s certainly transitioned over the last decade or so into the show that really highlights and is a gathering place for the consumer technology universe.

It’s also transitioned from its main attendance constituency of retail buyers to a very inclusive one of very, very many market sectors. You’ll see people attending from the financial services community, or the transportation industry, or from music and entertainment. The content community is a huge part of our audience now, from the film studios to the record labels to other various, major players in digital content creation.

The point is that we’ve extended to a really broad-based tent that is inclusive of many different product categories serving many, many different market sectors. It’s really become a dominant, huge event—the largest technology trade show event in the world.

How are brands leveraging exhibit space at CES?
One of the primary reasons that exhibitors are there are for the increase in brand equity, including product launches. A lot of the larger companies are launching products there and a lot of the smaller companies are introducing themselves there for branding and brand imaging reasons. We still have a huge number of companies that do the show for a good amount of hot, sizzling leads… so they can make sales either at the show or subsequent to the show. Many of the exhibitors exhibit to be able to position themselves with other exhibitors on the same floor, to develop channel relationships, OEM relationships what have you. They may have no interest in attendees, but want to talk with each other.

What are brands doing off of the show floor?
There are traditional methods, like banner advertising and various sponsorships of different areas of the show floor and different services, in addition to a new technology that we leverage from BDMetrics called SmartBooth technology. This is a service that allows attendees of the show to design their perfect event by searching on various keywords, and it allows them to develop a very, very tailored schedule. Exhibitors can use the SmartBooth product to see who is searching on them so they can prepare accordingly. They can place branding on various elements within this entire process, which is tremendous from an impressions standpoint.

What’s the hot button topic that’s generating a lot of buzz for the 2008 show?
Content is probably the hottest area of the show right now. It’s just a huge, huge theme of the show. The content that goes on your device, whether it be a phone or a computer or through your car audio or video system, the ability to use content anytime or anywhere that we want it is the predominant theme of the show. If you think about it, that cuts across every major product category, whether it’s satellite radio or home theater technology or what have you.