Struggling to prove your event’s impact?
You’re drowning in spreadsheets and scattered data, trying to piece together lead tracking and justify the budget for your next trade show.
The worst part is presenting lackluster ROI reports to executives, making it much harder to secure the resources you need for future events.
The challenge is real. For instance, 37% lower attendance at CES post-pandemic highlights the deep need for better engagement and operational efficiency. You must make every single interaction count.
But the right software fixes this, giving you tools to streamline operations and prove value and finally ending the manual chaos for good.
Speaking of scaling your operations, you might find my guide on best data management software helpful.
In this article, I’m breaking down the best trade show software to help you manage logistics, capture quality leads, and demonstrate clear pipeline impact.
You’ll discover solutions with the robust analytics, CRM integrations, and automation features needed to justify your investment and drive business growth.
Let’s find your perfect fit.
Quick Summary:
| # | Software | Rating | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | FieldDrive → | Event marketing managers | |
| 2 | Whova → | Hybrid event organizers | |
| 3 | Accelevents → | Busy event organizers | |
| 4 | ExhibitDay → | Small event teams | |
| 5 | vFairs → | Virtual event professionals |
1. FieldDrive
Are manual trade show processes overwhelming your team?
FieldDrive offers an integrated suite of products designed to streamline your event operations, from check-in to lead retrieval. This means you can say goodbye to scattered data and insufficient analytics, gaining full control over your event ROI. Their solutions are built to enhance visitor experiences and maximize exhibitor ROI. You can finally simplify your event operations.
FieldDrive solves common event pain points, allowing for seamless visitor experiences with touchless check-in kiosks. You can offer attendees a smooth entry with multiple check-in methods, including optional facial recognition and QR code scanning. This eliminates long queues, making a strong first impression and boosting attendee satisfaction.
Additionally, their lightning-fast badge printing solution produces high-quality, fully-colored, two-sided paper badges on demand in an average of six seconds per badge. These highly brandable and customizable badges reflect your event’s messaging. Plus, FieldDrive Leads, their onsite lead retrieval app, empowers exhibitors to gather high-value leads with real-time reports, on-the-fly digital content sharing, and custom lead qualifiers. This integrated approach ensures efficient lead generation and high-velocity sales follow-ups, directly impacting your pipeline.
The result is quantifiable business impact.
Speaking of optimizing user satisfaction, you might also be interested in my guide on best patient engagement software.
Key features:
- Touchless Check-in Kiosks: Provide seamless, secure, and fast attendee entry with multiple methods, including facial recognition and QR codes, ensuring a great first impression.
- Lightning-Fast Badge Printing: Print high-quality, customizable, two-sided paper badges in just six seconds, with eco-friendly options available for sustainable events.
- Enhanced Lead Retrieval: Boost exhibitor ROI with FieldDrive Leads, offering real-time data, instant content sharing, and custom lead qualifiers for high-quality lead capture.
FieldDrive features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: FieldDrive offers a robust solution for event marketing managers, demand generation specialists, and heads of growth. Its integrated approach, from 50% faster check-ins to enhanced lead retrieval, makes it a top contender for best trade show software, directly addressing challenges like scattered data and manual processes while demonstrating clear ROI.
2. Whova
Are manual event processes causing you headaches?
Whova offers an all-in-one event management platform designed to simplify your trade show operations. This means you can save significant time.
You’ll complete tedious tasks with just a few clicks, allowing your team to focus on more important strategic initiatives. This boosts efficiency.
Here’s how to simplify your event logistics.
Whova’s platform streamlines everything from registration and ticketing to exhibitor management. You can provide the best experience to your attendees with the award-winning event app.
This app empowers attendees to participate and interact more actively, helping them build twice as many connections. It equips your exhibitors with powerful lead generation tools like business card and QR code scanning. Additionally, you can showcase sponsors effectively with embedded opportunities and live slideshows. The result is a smooth, engaging experience for everyone.
Whova helps you save 60% more time managing event logistics with features like an agenda center, speaker hub, name badge generation, and check-in, ensuring your events run without a hitch. This complete suite also offers powerful event marketing tools and support for in-person, hybrid, and virtual events.
You will delight both attendees and exhibitors.
If you’re also looking into broader event solutions, my article on event rental software covers essential tools for your inventory.
Key features:
- All-in-one Event Management Platform: Handles in-person, hybrid, and virtual events, centralizing registration, ticketing, and overall event logistics in one powerful solution.
- Award-Winning Event App: Enhances attendee engagement with personalized agendas, live polls, messaging, and photo sharing, helping them build more valuable connections.
- Exhibitor Management & Lead Generation: Equips sponsors and exhibitors with powerful tools like business card scanning and promotional opportunities to maximize their ROI and lead capture.
Whova features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Whova stands out as a best trade show software option, delivering an all-in-one platform that tackles common challenges like scattered data and manual processes. Its comprehensive features, from the award-winning event app to robust exhibitor management and lead retrieval, streamline operations and help you prove pipeline impact. The positive customer stories highlight its effectiveness in boosting attendee satisfaction and saving event management time.
3. Accelevents
Struggling with complex event management for your trade shows?
Accelevents offers an all-in-one platform built for busy organizers, simplifying registration and event management for any format. This means you can streamline operations, whether you’re hosting in-person, virtual, or hybrid events.
You’ll find it an intuitive solution, designed to make your life easier and eliminate the headache of fighting event tech.
Let’s simplify your trade show planning.
Accelevents solves your challenges by providing comprehensive tools for every stage of your event. The platform features personalized registration journeys, allowing you to capture precise attendee data effortlessly.
You can also build complex agendas and manage speakers at scale, ensuring every session runs smoothly. Accelevents excels in managing exhibitors and sponsors with self-service tools and a resource center, saving you valuable time.
Additionally, you can customize event pages, badges, and emails to promote your trade show effectively, boosting attendance. Plus, the mobile event app helps attendees manage their schedule, network, and engage, enhancing their overall experience.
Deliver quantifiable business results.
Before diving deeper, you might find my analysis of complex pricing structures helpful for your software needs.
Key features:
- Comprehensive Event Management: Manage every aspect of your trade show, from personalized registration and ticketing to agenda building and speaker management.
- Enhanced Attendee Experience: Engage attendees with a mobile event app, gamification, networking tools, and live or on-demand content via a virtual event hub.
- Robust Exhibitor & Insights: Streamline exhibitor management with self-service tools and leverage in-depth reporting and analytics for measurable event impact and ROI.
Accelevents features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Accelevents stands out as a strong contender for the best trade show software, especially with its reported 422% increase in event attendance for Zapier via HubSpot integration. Its all-in-one, customizable platform, combined with strong customer support and security, makes it ideal for event marketing managers seeking measurable ROI and streamlined operations for in-person, hybrid, or virtual events.
4. ExhibitDay
Are your trade shows a chaotic mess?
ExhibitDay offers a simple, free planning and project management platform to simplify your event operations.
This eliminates the pain of dealing with scattered emails, spreadsheets, and pen-and-paper notes.
It’s your ultimate event planning playbook.
ExhibitDay solves your challenges by centralizing all your conference, trade show, travel, shipment, sponsorship, and budget management in one intuitive place.
You can also plan both in-person trade shows and virtual events, ensuring your team collaborates effectively. It’s like a checklist, but far more powerful.
You’ll be able to assign tasks, track overall progress, and receive notifications when tasks are completed. Plus, with robust budgeting and ROI features, you can set event budgets, track leads, brand impressions, meetings, and revenue, and accurately measure engagement and ROI.
Effortlessly prove your event impact.
While discussing your event operations, you might also find my guide on creative management platforms helpful for centralizing marketing assets.
Key features:
- Centralized Event Planning: Manage all aspects of your in-person trade shows and virtual events, including travel, shipments, and sponsorships, from a single, intuitive platform.
- Team Collaboration & Task Management: Assign tasks, monitor progress, and receive completion notifications, ensuring your event team stays organized and on schedule for seamless execution.
- Budgeting, Analytics & ROI: Track event budgets, leads, brand impressions, and revenue, allowing you to measure engagement and calculate ROI efficiently, proving your impact.
ExhibitDay features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: ExhibitDay is a strong contender for the best trade show software, especially if you’re battling manual processes and scattered data. Its focus on centralized planning, team collaboration, and robust ROI tracking empowers you to streamline operations and deliver quantifiable business results.
5. vFairs
Is managing your trade show a manual headache?
vFairs offers a comprehensive event management platform to simplify your event operations. You can set up custom event websites and registration, capturing payments and offering ticket tiers.
This means you can streamline your entire event lifecycle from a single tech platform, taking your events to the next level by automating registrations and lead capture.
Here’s how to simplify your event planning.
vFairs helps you plan, manage, and host any event with ease, whether it’s in-person, virtual or hybrid. You can create custom-branded landing pages for registrations and payments, ensuring a professional and consistent brand experience.
Additionally, the platform includes a mobile event app builder, allowing you to create a fully functional app to enhance attendee experience with networking and custom agendas. Plus, exhibitors can easily capture leads onsite by scanning QR codes.
The solution also provides robust event reporting and analytics, giving you critical insights into event performance and helping you measure ROI. This allows you to track real-time analytics and make data-driven decisions.
Quantify your event’s impact.
While we’re discussing virtual experiences, understanding best virtual classroom software is equally important for diverse online learning needs.
Key features:
- Comprehensive Event Management: Plan, manage, and host diverse events—in-person, virtual, or hybrid—from a single platform, including registration, ticketing, and custom landing pages.
- Enhanced Attendee & Exhibitor Engagement: Elevate attendee experience with branded mobile apps featuring networking, agendas, and lead capture, including QR code scanning for exhibitors.
- Robust Reporting & Analytics: Gain critical insights into event performance with real-time reporting and dashboards, allowing you to measure ROI and optimize future events.
vFairs features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: vFairs stands out as the best trade show software for event professionals seeking to overcome scattered data and manual processes. With features like comprehensive registration, lead capture apps, and strong analytics, it helps you streamline operations, boost attendee engagement, and deliver measurable pipeline impact, ultimately justifying your investment.
6. Brella
Struggling with event ROI and scattered data?
Brella offers an intuitive event app and management platform, designed to simplify your operations and prove impact. This means you can finally overcome manual processes and gain robust analytics.
You’ll find Brella connects effortlessly with your existing tech stack. This will help you streamline workflows and ensure your critical event data flows smoothly.
Ready for quantifiable results?
Brella helps you achieve measurable ROI through its best-in-class AI-networking and matchmaking features. This unique AI approach drives high meeting acceptance rates, boosting lead generation.
You can customize the entire attendee experience, from onboarding to event engagement, creating a sleek, user-centric interface aligned with your brand. Plus, built-in lead and contact scanning helps you manage event activity and increase ROI. The platform provides granular data on meeting quality, attendee intents, and market trends, giving you full visibility into your event’s performance and impact.
This is true strategic partnership.
Key features:
- AI-powered Matchmaking: Drives high meeting acceptance rates and targeted lead generation, ensuring valuable connections and measurable pipeline growth for your attendees and sponsors.
- Customizable Brand Extension: Allows for white-labeled event apps with personalized branding and content, enhancing engagement and boosting your brand’s visibility and image at events.
- Robust Integrations & Data: Effortlessly connects with 500+ third-party tools, offers real-time data flow, and provides deep behavioral analytics for comprehensive event insights and optimized ROI.
Brella features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Brella stands out as the best trade show software for event professionals seeking to overcome manual processes and prove ROI. Its AI-powered matchmaking and comprehensive data analytics provide the tools you need to deliver quantifiable business results and justify your investment.
7. 6Connex
Are your trade show efforts truly paying off?
6Connex offers comprehensive event management tools for in-person, hybrid, and virtual events, centralizing your operations. This means you can effortlessly plan, manage, and deliver impactful experiences from promotion to post-event follow-up. It addresses the pain point of scattered data and manual processes by providing a single platform for all your event needs.
You’ll find everything from hosting your event website to deploying marketing campaigns in one spot.
Here’s how 6Connex simplifies your event strategy.
It allows you to centralize event management, handling everything from your event website and marketing campaigns to notifications and calendars. Additionally, it offers built-in ticketing and registration, with integrated coupon and discount features that work with your payment provider.
Plus, 6Connex helps you welcome attendees with ease using QR code technology for physical check-ins and provides mobile event apps for managing, check-in, attending, and tracking real-time data. You can also build brand equity and attract new leads through 2D or immersive spaces, animating prospects with networking and games, and using event data to understand visitor behavior.
The result is a streamlined process that drives leads and proves impact.
Key features:
- Comprehensive Event Management: Plan, manage, and deliver in-person, hybrid, and virtual events from a single platform, handling promotions to post-event reporting.
- Integrated Ticketing & Registration: Streamline attendee management with built-in ticketing, coupons, discounts, and QR code check-in, all integrated with your payment provider.
- Robust Engagement & Analytics: Enhance brand experience with immersive digital spaces, provide networking and games, and track visitor behavior to optimize conversions and lead generation.
6Connex features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: 6Connex provides an all-in-one solution for event marketers seeking the best trade show software, offering comprehensive tools for in-person, hybrid, and virtual events. Its focus on centralized management, integrated registration, and robust engagement features, combined with over 15 years of event experience, makes it ideal for driving leads and proving quantifiable ROI.
8. Map Your Show
Are manual event processes causing you headaches?
Map Your Show offers solutions like Floor Builder and Exhibitor Resource Center to streamline your operations.
This means you can create, manage, and optimize your trade show floor plans with ease, making your event planning far less stressful.
Streamline your event operations today.
Map Your Show simplifies managing your entire conference, from start to finish. You can easily manage floor plans, exhibitor resources, and conference schedules.
The Exhibitor Resource Center helps exhibitors manage listings, deadlines, and promotions easily. Additionally, the Mobile App keeps attendees connected and engaged with your event through session scheduling and navigation.
Plus, MYS Insights provides AI-driven analytics to predict event sales, identify at-risk exhibitors, and optimize revenue, giving you the measurable ROI you need for your leadership. The Sales Accelerator helps exhibitors identify top leads and create personalized follow-up messages.
The result is quantifiable business results.
Key features:
- Floor Builder allows you to create, manage, and optimize trade show floor plans, simplifying a critical aspect of event logistics and ensuring efficient space utilization.
- MYS Insights leverages AI-driven data analytics to predict event sales and identify potential risks, helping you make strategic decisions and optimize your event revenue.
- Sales Accelerator is an AI-powered tool that helps exhibitors identify top leads and create personalized outreach, boosting lead generation and exhibitor ROI.
Map Your Show features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Map Your Show stands out as a powerful candidate for best trade show software by providing comprehensive tools like Floor Builder, MYS Insights, and Sales Accelerator. This suite of features addresses pain points like scattered data and insufficient analytics, delivering quantifiable business results and helping you prove impact to executives.
9. HexaFair
Struggling with scattered event data and unclear ROI?
HexaFair provides an all-in-one platform to host virtual and hybrid events, directly addressing your challenges in managing complex trade shows.
This means you can say goodbye to manual processes and insufficient analytics, as it helps you simplify your event operations and prove impact.
Here’s a streamlined solution for you.
HexaFair helps you deliver immersive and engaging experiences for your audience, whether it’s a small workshop or a large-scale expo for 50,000 attendees.
You can easily manage everything from virtual trade shows focused on lead generation and B2B online meetings to hybrid events where on-site and virtual audiences interact. This is done through interactive venue maps and a dedicated event mobile app for seamless connections.
Additionally, with features like an agenda builder, interactive 3D virtual booths, gamification, and robust reporting tools, you can ensure authentic engagement throughout your event and gain detailed insights to justify your investment. The platform is accessible across all devices too.
The result is truly quantifiable business results.
Key features:
- Comprehensive Event Management: Host and manage virtual or hybrid trade shows, conferences, and expos, from small workshops to large-scale events with up to 50,000 attendees and 1,000 exhibitors.
- Immersive Engagement Tools: Utilize interactive 3D virtual booths, auto-matchmaking, live chat, spatial audio, and gamification to create unique and engaging experiences for your audience.
- Robust Analytics & Reporting: Gain detailed insights into every aspect of your event through comprehensive reporting tools and an analytics dashboard, helping you track performance and prove ROI.
HexaFair features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: HexaFair positions itself as a robust solution for event marketers seeking to simplify their operations and prove event impact. Its comprehensive features for virtual and hybrid events, combined with strong engagement and reporting tools, make it a strong contender for the best trade show software, delivering scalable, measurable results for your marketing efforts.
10. ClearEvent
Are you juggling scattered data and manual processes?
ClearEvent offers an all-in-one platform with robust ticketing, payments, and sponsorship tools. This means you can streamline your sales workflows and generate event revenue more efficiently.
This comprehensive solution eliminates the chaos of disconnected tools, making it ideal for event marketing managers needing to centralize event planning and operations.
You’ll gain crucial insights.
This platform allows you to plan smarter, saving time and reducing stress by bringing everything—registration, scheduling, budgeting, and communications—under one roof. You can deliver a seamless, mobile-friendly event experience with features like a mobile event app and check-in app, keeping attendees informed and engaged. Additionally, you can secure and track payments for registrations and booth sales, while managing sponsors and showcasing their profiles to boost visibility. You’ll also benefit from real-time dashboards and job assignment tools for smooth event execution, ensuring your team is organized. Plus, automated communications save you time by sending personalized updates directly within the platform. The result is better lead tracking and measurable ROI.
Key features:
- All-in-one platform: Manages registrations, ticketing, payments, and sponsorships, bringing all your event operations into one centralized hub for efficiency.
- Attendee & onsite engagement: Provides a mobile event app, check-in, and self-service options to keep attendees informed, engaged, and streamline their event experience.
- Operational insights & automation: Offers real-time dashboards, job assignments, and automated communications to ensure smooth event execution and clear ROI tracking.
ClearEvent features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: ClearEvent’s focus on streamlining operations, boosting revenue, and enhancing attendee engagement makes it a strong contender for the best trade show software. It’s designed to help you overcome manual processes, track lead generation effectively, and prove event impact without the usual stress, as evidenced by its use in major events like the Bravo talk show with 36+ live audience members.
Conclusion
Done with proving your event’s impact?
Choosing the right tool is tough. You need a solution that ends the manual chaos and demonstrates clear, quantifiable business results for your organization.
The pressure is on because events are critical. A report from Eventgroove found 78% of organizers identify in-person conferences as their most impactful marketing channel. This shows how crucial getting your event management right is.
Here’s the tool I recommend.
I found FieldDrive is the top solution for streamlining event ops and finally proving that impact you’ve been struggling to show your executives.
For additional insights, my analysis of best WhatsApp marketing software provides valuable perspectives.
Its integrated approach, from lightning-fast badge printing to seamless lead retrieval, makes it the best trade show software for ending scattered data and manual headaches.
I recommend you book a free demo of FieldDrive to see how it can transform your events and simplify your entire process.
You’ll finally get quantifiable results.
