Suzanne Babb a professional office organizer from Phoenix starts her mornings at 7 a.m. She gets her son and daughter ages nine and 14 up and ready for school and then hops into her brand new Dodge Caravan to get the day rolling. She loads her afternoon appointments into the minivan’s navigation system swings by grandma’s for breakfast checks her email drops her son off at school hits a client meeting across town then creates a podcast for her website letstalkorganizing.com from the van in between appointments.

What it is what it ain't who's making it— and how you can get some? The Event Marketer special report on word-of-mouth marketing. It bubbles up around the watercooler. It whips from one end of the playground to the other at lightening speed. It gets dished over coffee gushed about among friends and spread like wildfire over the Internet. It of course is word of mouth—impassioned recommendations about everything from the SNL skit you had to see to the shampoo you have to try. It’s electric baby.

Accuray’s preferred means of approaching its trade show marketing is to bring its CyberKnife Robotic Radiosurgery System to the show floor because the system is quite the draw on its own. The challenge occurs when Accuray doesn’t have enough room or budget in its exhibit to bring the entire system—which requires about 400 square feet for just the product display.

“When we have a 40-foot-by-40-foot exhibit or larger we bring our entire treatment suite. But when we have a smaller space we have to get innovative ” says Patti Cardoza exhibit manager for Accuray.

Whether it’s a new product launch a deep dive into something that can’t be fully explored at a larger event or just a chance to let your customers spend some quality time with your offerings and sales staff nothing beats a road show for taking the client relationship to the next level. No matter how popular a new band becomes through CD sales and radio play they’re never going to reach god status until they get out on the road. It’s that real-life experience seeing the icons you admire live and in person that elevates the excitement and makes a handful of musicians into heroes.