This is it. Time to order your trade show exhibit’s cornerstone: the background display.

Are you skeptical about the benefits of exhibiting at trade shows? Think the whole trade show thing is a bunch of hooey? You may want to reconsider.

Whether you're planning your first trade show or knocking out your umpteenth, working with a small booth is always tough. Usually the small space is accompanied by a small budget, which makes your task even more challenging. Sound familiar?

Disappointing trade show results are most often rooted in the lack of strategic pre-show planning, goal setting and/or effective post-show follow up. Meaningful and measurable goals are the most important step for improving your trade show results and your goals should guide your decisions at every step.

The degree to which trade show participation is mismanaged and misunderstood boggles the mind. But, in all fairness, tracking opportunities from leads to customers was very difficult without modern day technology. We knew trade shows were important (they are), but relied heavily on gut feelings, what we did in the past, what our competitors were doing and input from the sales team to determine what was effective and what wasn't.

Trade shows are gold mines when it comes to lead retrieval.

Creating an accurate trade show budget that allows you to achieve forecasted ROI takes a bit of practice and experience. It's easy to overlook small expenditures that can quickly erode your budget forecast. In addition, unexpected costs often surface on-site due to shipping damages or a forgotten item (our Checklist for a Successful Trade Show is a helpful reminder resource). This is part of the trade show package. You have to anticipate it. Further complicating the process is the time-consuming and number-crunching that is predicting lead levels and conversions via historical data. Very tricky.

Not so long ago, huge custom booths were the sign of corporate success. A 60 X 60 space complete with trendy furniture, a café and an entertainment act on the hour told everyone that your company was an important leader in the market - a force to be reckoned with. Although somewhere inside, many of us have a love for the dramatic, the need to demonstrate favorable ROI and to spread marketing budgets in many new directions has led some of the smartest companies to downsize booths at least at some shows.

If your company is taking the time, money and energy to invest in exhibiting at a trade show, then you're going to want to make sure that you're getting your money's worth.

What was once the new kid on the social media block, Instagram has moved its way up the ranks to become one of the most popular and widely used social networks around.

In fact, it's estimated that Instagram has 300 million active users per month and a whopping 75 million users each day. In case you're wondering, that's a heck-of-a-lot of people.

With stats like that, it's a no-brainer that you should be incorporating Instagram into your trade show marketing tactics immediately.

Here are five easy, fun, and effective ways to capitalize on Instagram for your next trade show.