Seoul Illustration Fair: Practical Tips IP Holders Must Keep in Mind

As the 2025 Seoul Illustration Fair V.20 (hereinafter SIF) approaches, many IP holders are accelerating their preparations for the exhibition.

As the event grows in scale every year, I naturally feel a growing desire to take this opportunity to gain new fans and let more people know about the characters' charms.

The higher the expectations for an event, the more important it becomes to consider what to focus on during preparation.

So, in this post, I’m going to share basic information about the 2025 Seoul Illustration Fair, along with practical tips that IP holders can actually utilize✨

❓ What kind of event is the 2025 Seoul Illustration Fair?

Seoul Illustration Fair is a large-scale event where character IP holders, agencies, and merchandise manufacturers showcase their works and merchandise in one place.

With the number of participants and visitors steadily increasing every year, it is becoming an important opportunity for IP holders to promote their characters and secure fans.

Since visitors of various tastes gather here, it is also a good opportunity to check the first impression of the characters and identify the strengths and weaknesses of the merchandise composition.

• period: December 25, 2025 (Thu) ~ December 28, 2025 (Sun)

• location: COEX Hall C

• Participation Categories: Character IP, illustrators, toy and stationery creators, brand representatives, etc.

• characteristicSince visitors with diverse tastes gather in one space, you can personally experience the reactions to the characters.

Now that you have a brief overview of the Seoul Illustration Fair, let me share some practical tips that IP holders should keep in mind.

Capture people's attention with on-site events that match the character.

At the Seoul Illustration Fair, numerous character IPs compete in one space, so you must convey the charm of the characters to first-time visitors in a brief moment.

The most effective method in this case is an on-site event.

In fact, at the Seoul Illustration Fair, many IP holders are running on-site events such as Instagram follow events and raffle events.

However, Instagram follow events or raffle events often do not lead to lasting memories of the characters, even if participation occurs.

The reason is that it is not only unrelated to the character, but it is also an event that is frequently held at other character booths.

If you host an event that harmonizes well with the character rather than an ordinary one, you can not only leave a deep impression on the audience but also create new fans.

Furthermore, character experience-centered events have high social media sharing rates and attract the interest of visitors who are not existing fans, which is beneficial for booth operations.

A prime example is Samdaenyangi's on-site event at the Seoul Illustration Fair. Samdaenyangi is ‘We organized the event using the premise that Sana the Cat Grandma reads fortunes on the hands. On the surface, it looked like an Instagram follow event, but visitors experienced the moment of immersing themselves in the worldview by directly touching the character's hands.

In fact, there were many cases where people turned into character fans through this experience.

In this way, if on-site events are designed to harmonize with the characters, they can produce a more powerful effect than any other event.

🎁 Choose main merchandise to firmly establish the character's first impression.

If you have attracted attention with an on-site event, it is important to ensure that this interest naturally leads to the booth next.

Generally, when people become curious about a character, they tend to look around the merchandise inside the booth.

At this time, merchandise becomes the first point of contact that visually displays the character's atmosphere and story.

Then wouldn't it be better to make as much merchandise as possible?

"I don't know what people like, so I'll just make a variety of things!"

Even if there are many goods, in the end, the one thing that holds the visitors' attention the longest is the main merchandise.

Main merchandise most intuitively showcases the character's overall mood and charm, creating a strong first impression and helping to naturally extend interest to other products.

Especially when the booth is small, the main merchandise item is a great help in attracting visitors.

Therefore, when preparing for the Seoul Illustration Fair, rather than preparing a wide variety of merchandise, it is better to first determine 'which product best represents this character' and then organize the booth design and product placement around that product. The clearer the representative merchandise is, the faster visitors will understand the character's vibe and the longer they will stay at the booth.

💬 Social media activity during the exhibition helps maintain the connection with fans.

You shouldn't neglect your social media activities just because you're busy at the Seoul Illustration Fair. On the contrary, it's important to maintain that interest throughout the entire exhibition period.

Looking at the behavioral patterns of visitors, it is common for them to search for character accounts before visiting the exhibition and to look up social media through business cards, merchandise purchases, events, etc., even after browsing the Seoul Illustration Fair booth.

So, it is very important not to take a break from social media activities during the Seoul Illustration Fair.

Even without writing long posts, content that is uploaded without pressure, such as briefly sharing booth updates, merchandise announcements, event time notifications, or fan tag reposts, brings great results.

Such small interactions give the impression that 'this IP is active and alive,' rekindling interest in those who could not visit the booth and leading to fan conversion.

In other words, if the event at the site created the ‘start of interest,’ social media acts as a link that sustains that interest.

📝 During an exhibition, observation becomes a greater asset than emotion.

When an exhibition begins, various emotions naturally arise, but the most common one is ‘worry.’

However, at Seoul Illustration Fair, observation creates greater value than these worries. For example, if you start observing by asking questions like, "Why do people linger at that booth for so long?", "I looked at other booths and saw that this product is getting a good response?", or "How is the flow of visitors being managed even though it is a large booth?", you will naturally begin to see areas for improvement at the Seoul Illustration Fair.

This observation is of great help in clarifying various elements, such as merchandise composition, booth design, and price range determination, when preparing for the next Seoul Illustration Fair.

In fact, many IP holders say that "the lessons learned from past experiences were of great help."

🎨 If you want to make this Seoul Illustration Fair a chance for success, make sure to remember this!

The 2025 Seoul Illustration Fair is an important stage to showcase the character worldview to many people and gain new fans.

It is also a testing ground where you can directly experience how a character is received in the market.

If you are participating in the upcoming Seoul Illustration Fair or preparing for the 2026 Seoul Illustration Fair, why not read this article and plan and prepare strategically?

If you prepare a little more strategically, this fair can become a turning point for IP growth rather than just a simple event participation.

I'm rooting for all IP holders preparing for the 2025 Seoul Illustration Fair to showcase their characters smarter, more joyfully, and more confidently this time💫