Develop
Positioning and strategy.
Exhibitor Success Programme · GITEX Global 2026
Develop Test Sharpen Implement
Made in Germany is the ticket in. Not the answer.
A programme of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy
Made in Germany opens doors internationally like almost no other label, a globally recognised mark of quality and, for years, the signature of the German Pavilion at international trade fairs. But the attention the pavilion creates only becomes valuable for each exhibitor once they are relevant to their own visitors. That is exactly what the Exhibitor Success Programme is for.
The programme gives you clarity on who your appearance should be relevant to, and the strategy to deliver it with the means already at hand.
Register for the kick-off →
10 September 2026 · registration closes 6 September
What you get ↓
Positioning and strategy
A no-obligation first step. After the kick-off you decide whether to join the group sessions.
The programme
Stand space is booked.
Organisation is running. What now?
With the German Pavilion, the organisation is largely taken care of. What remains is the part that decides the impact and that no one can take off your hands: Why should the right visitor stop at your stand, what should they understand in seconds, and what should come of the contact?
The question is not what else you do, but how you fill what is already there with relevance.
This is no side issue. 44% of exhibitors name getting the right visitors to their stand as one of their biggest challenges (AUMA). And you don’t need to produce more activities for it. Much is already there: the communication options of the pavilion and its partners, the touchpoints and formats of GITEX, and your own channels, from website and social media to customer contacts and personal invitations.
This is exactly where the Exhibitor Success Programme comes in. Together we develop a clear positioning and strategy for your GITEX. Without extra media budget and without an extra layer of activity, but by focusing the time and channels that are already part of your participation on one goal: that the right visitors notice you, stop at your stand, and turn contacts into next steps. And the clearer each individual stand is, the stronger the German Pavilion works as a whole.
Before anything is implemented, the right decisions have to be in place. And for the first time, key ones can be checked before the show.
Working model
Don't just implement.
First develop, test and sharpen.
The Exhibitor Success Programme follows a clear working model. Four steps, not marketing, but the underlying logic of the work.
Test
With digital GITEX visitor types.
Sharpen
Refine message and touchpoints.
Implement
With team and operative specialists.
Test and sharpen repeat until the positioning holds.
We don't replace operative specialists. We create the foundation on which they can work better.
The programme replaces neither stand builders nor agencies or internal teams. Positioning and strategy give them a precise brief, so that stand concept, design, communication and activation all pay into the same goal.
What you get
What you end up with.
Step 01 · Develop
At the end of your work, you have two concrete working documents, not a slide deck and not a list of extra measures:
Working basis 01
Your positioning for GITEX
Who your appearance should be relevant to and what should stick with the right visitor.
Working basis 02
Your fair strategy for GITEX
How that becomes a concrete plan for before, during and after the show.
Working basis 01
Sets out who your appearance should be relevant to, why the right visitor stops at your stand, what they should understand in seconds and later tell others about you. From this come your core message, your argument and clear guardrails for everything implemented later.
Working basis 02
Translates your positioning into a concrete plan for GITEX: How do you reach the right visitors? What should happen at the stand? What is the next step, and how do you continue the contact after the show? For this, the strategy aligns your existing channels and means on the same goal and records what is done when and by whom, and how you measure success.
Your strategy doesn’t end at the stand. It connects three phases and gives your existing channels a clear task.
Before the show
Identify the right visitors and guide them to your stand.
At the show
Create relevance, qualify conversations and make the next step firm.
After the show
Continue contacts toward the agreed goal and make impact measurable.
- Website
- Invitations
- Stand
- Team
- Follow-up
Not an extra layer of activity. No ten new measures are invented; the existing channels are aligned to the same decisions.
Test and sharpen
Test before it counts at the show.
Steps 02 and 03 · Test · Sharpen
For the pilot programme, typical GITEX visitor types are built as digital audience models. After the strategic work, pilot cohort companies can use them to check key messages and touchpoints from the perspective of their defined target visitors.
For example
- Positioning
- Invitation
- Landing page
- Stand message
- Offer/CTA
- Presentation
- Follow-up
This replaces neither market research nor a strategic decision. It shows how a deliberately developed positioning might be understood and judged from different visitor perspectives. The results feed back into the work: test, sharpen, check again, before implementing.
Access is reserved for companies that complete the strategic work in the pilot cohort.
The way there
How you get there.
In Stage 1, you use the MesseCode method to develop your own answers. In Stage 2, fairconcept works them out with eight companies into individual positioning and fair strategy, tested with the digital GITEX visitor types. Both are working foundations for implementation with your team and your partners.
This is not a webinar to lean back to, but a working programme. Within the pilot project, the BMWE covers the cost, but expects commitment to taking part and implementing in return.
Stage 01 · Open to all exhibitors
Method and self-application
Kick-off + 2 group sessions + Playbook + Workbook.
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Kick-off event Programme introduction and method overview.
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Two group sessions Guided work on market role, target customers and argument.
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MesseCode Playbook The full method as a structured review framework: seven levels with AI prompts for reflection (PDF, approx. 50 pages).
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MesseCode Workbook The companion workbook to the Playbook. This is where you enter your own answers and develop your strategy concretely.
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Recordings of all sessions Every group session as a replay to revisit.
Structured preparation time
About 4–6 hours in the group sessions. Plus whatever time you choose to invest in working through the Workbook on your own. That’s up to you.
Stage 02 · Pilot cohort · 8 places
Individual depth
Positioning + fair strategy + testing/sharpening + support until after the show.
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Group Session 3 Going deeper within the pilot cohort.
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Two individual strategy sessions One-to-one work with fairconcept on your own positioning and exhibition strategy.
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Your positioning for GITEX The jointly developed and documented foundation for your GITEX appearance.
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Your fair strategy for GITEX The concrete plan for implementation before, during and after GITEX.
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Clarification group call A final round on open questions before delivery.
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Two check-ins before the show Stand-relevant clarifications in the weeks before Dubai.
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Closing workshop after the show Capturing the lessons for future shows.
Structured preparation time
Time required: around 22 to 26 hours across the whole preparation. This time doesn’t come on top, it structures work that happens anyway: positioning, target customers, argument, stand, communication and follow-up.
Applications for the pilot cohort (Stage 2) open after Group Session 1, in September 2026.
The programme is new, the work behind it is not. The MesseCode method grew out of work on hundreds of trade fair projects and is already used in individual consulting. What is new is this scaled, BMWE-funded format for the exhibitors of a German Pavilion.
Method
Seven levels. One sequence.
The programme follows the MesseCode method, seven strategic decisions every trade fair participation should resolve before building anything.
More on the MesseCode method →Schedule
From September to December.
Step by step.
From September to December, you develop your strategy alongside the concrete fair preparation. What you clarify in the sessions feeds directly into stand construction, communication and visitor engagement, and after the show into follow-up and evaluation.
6 September 2026
Registration deadline
10 September 2026
Kick-off
Opening event
22 September 2026
Group Session 1
2 October 2026
Group Session 2
October 2026
Individual sessions
Pilot cohort
October / November 2026
Implementation
Stand, materials, communication
7–11 December 2026
GITEX Global · Dubai
German pavilion
Detailed session dates and working sessions are on the events page.
Backed by
Programme partners.
Backed by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy. Delivered by fairconcept. Supported by the German Emirati Joint Council for Industry & Commerce (AHK) and the organiser GITEX Global.
Register now.
The entry point is the kick-off: get to know it with no obligation, then decide. We show how it all works in the kick-off.
Participation is reserved for exhibitors of the German pavilion at GITEX Global 2026. The in-depth pilot cohort (Stage 2) is aimed at exhibitors with their own stand; exhibitors with an information counter take part at Stage 1. Registrations are reviewed before activation. Questions: messecode@fairconcept.de