Last month, QuickTapSurvey and Infusionsoft announced a partnership that is aimed to help small businesses increase sales via their participation at exhibitions and events.

While custom lead capture and marketing automation tools are plentiful, many are priced out of the reach of the smaller exhibitors. Yet, small exhibitors make up a large percentage of exhibits at trade shows.

According to a 2012 Center for Exhibition Industry Research (CEIR) report, 61 percent of companies surveyed are considered small businesses, with fewer than 100 employees.

CEIR also reports that the typical booth size used by most exhibitors, 76 percent, is less than 400 square feet. On average, it is 271 square feet, and the median is 100 square feet.

“I’ve been working with small businesses every day for the last 11 years and I love empowering them with the latest marketing automation technology. These hard working business owners can be as professional as the big guys, spend less time worrying about the details and make more sales. It’s a win all around,” said Cody Jones, senior manager of enterprise partnerships at Infusionsoft.

Infusionsoft is a marketing automation platform that kicks in when a new contact, or sales lead, is entered into the system.

The actual lead is where QuickTapSurvey fits in. “We’ve said goodbye to business cards, handwritten notes, paper ballots, and trying to remember who’s who at the end of an event. With QuickTapSurvey, businesses can use iPads, iPhones and Android devices to capture contact details from potential customers in an easy, fast and engaging way,” said Ravin Shah, co-CEO and founder at QuickTapSurvey.

Nick Longo, small business advisor at Training Business Pros, is looking forward to taking advantage of this new partnership. Longo, currently a customer of Infusionsoft, will be incorporating QuickTapSurvey at their next show.

Longo said that what interests him most in using QuickTapSurvey, aside from the ease in which it ties into Infusionsoft, is the double opt-in permission aspect.

Given the fact that violators of Canada’s Anti-Spam Law can face hefty fines (the first enforcement action earlier this year had an $880,000 price tag), Longo has every reason to look for a solution that complies with that law.

“We see this as an investment that’s going to be huge in our ability to upsell,” said Longo. “One of our favorite sayings is, the money is in the list. If QuickTapSurvey lets me build that list, then it’s worth the investment.”

The contact details captured by QuickTapSurvey are automatically sent to Infusionsoft with pre-assigned tags that specify which processes to kick off. This is a big help for small businesses with few resources to dedicate to post-show lead follow-up.

The exhibitor can focus on top-priority sales leads while letting the marketing automation platform take care of nurturing marketing leads, and following up with information requests automatically.

Longo plans to use the combination of QuickTapSurvey and Infusionsoft in other day-to-day interactions with clients, but the primary benefit is at the trade show.

Longo said, “On a week that I’m doing a trade show it will easily save me two days work.”