How To Make Your Booth Stand Out At A College Job Fair

By Francine Fluetsch on March 20, 2015

So, you are about to present a booth at a college career fair, and want to make sure you get a lot of student traffic coming your way. How exactly should you go about this?

Here are a few tips from a student, which should help your table stand out.

image via www.seattleu.edu

Supply some snacks.

College kids love food, especially if it’s free. If you have cookies, candy, drinks, etc. at your booth, I promise you people will migrate over and hear what you have to say. You’d be surprised what people would do for a cookie.

And, they’ll tell their friends that your booth has food, so you’ll be getting more people to come over without even really having to do anything. This may even pull some kids over that wouldn’t have stopped at your booth, but ended up learning a lot from what you had to say.

An incentive to get them to come over to you is all you really need.

Give out free stuff.

Did I mention that college kids like the word free? If you are giving out pens, stickers, lanyards, and other small things to promote your company, you’ll get more traffic coming your way and you’ll have long distance advertising from the students using your products.

We could all use a new pen, so if you had to pick one product to go with, I’d say you’d be pretty set with that. It’s also a great way for the student to remember your company’s name if they are deciding between a few, so you might be able to snag some of the better applicants away from the other booths.

Consider your décor.

Make your booth colorful and stand out! Put a lot of effort into how you are advertising your company. If you want some bullet points, stick it on some colorful paper or use an aesthetically pleasing power point. You want a good balance of professional and creative, serious yet fun, so the students will start getting a vibe of the type of atmosphere they will be working in.

Highlight things that will be appealing to students if they apply at your company: will your job provide them with connections for the future? Can they be set with a job for right after graduation? Will they have benefits and a flexible schedule? You want to highlight the perks and really sell them.

Bring a positive attitude.

You are a big part of your booth, so you play a big role in making it stand out. Some students might be a bit nervous going up to tables and talking to potential companies, so if you tone down the serious atmosphere a bit and have fun with them, you’ll get more people coming up to you with confidence.

Be friendly and inviting, and help sell your company. If there isn’t a long line trying to see you, ask some students around you what their majors are, and tell them how that would be great for your company. If they develop a personal connection to you, they will feel more at ease and gain interest in having a potential connection.

Take a newly hired student with you.

If you have a say in who can come present the booth with you, I’d take someone who students can directly relate to. If you’ve recently hired someone who just graduated, prep them on how to help out at the booth and take them along.

They’ll be able to talk to students about their experiences with getting hired after/during school, and can tell them the experiences of a newly hired member of the company. Hearing it from you is one thing, and then seeing the evidence will boost the likelihood of the students applying to your company.

Say the right amount.

If someone comes over to your booth, they don’t want to feel trapped. You want to be short, sweet, and to the point about the best qualities of your company that you are trying to sell. If they have further questions, make sure to let them know you are happy to answer them, but don’t trap someone into a long spiel. That will make people avoid your booth for sure.

Help them apply.

Why wait for them to apply when you can already start setting up interviews on the spot? Many students will have their resumes in hand, and if after talking to them you like what you see, figure out an interview time then and there.

It will make the student feel better about their chances of getting hired, and will help you ensure that you have some great people lined up for interviews.

If you have people add their emails for more information, make sure not to delay your response time, and email them all ASAP. College students have so much going on, that the faster you get to them, the more likely they will be to respond.

So there you have it, a few ways to help make your booth pop. Happy recruiting!

Follow Uloop

Apply to Write for Uloop News

Join the Uloop News Team

Discuss This Article

Get College Recruiting News Monthly

Back to Top

Log In

Contact Us

Upload An Image

Please select an image to upload
Note: must be in .png, .gif or .jpg format
OR
Provide URL where image can be downloaded
Note: must be in .png, .gif or .jpg format

By clicking this button,
you agree to the terms of use

By clicking "Create Alert" I agree to the Uloop Terms of Use.

Image not available.

Add a Photo

Please select a photo to upload
Note: must be in .png, .gif or .jpg format