If you’re looking for a new marketing strategy, look no further.
Perhaps you’ve tried building your brand’s image through traditional channels: sending out endless heaps of junk mail, filming an expensive, over-the-top commercial that didn’t seem to draw any attention your way, or paying for an ad in the paper nobody reads.
Perhaps you’ve tried your hand at digital marketing, and you’re having difficulty navigating the different social media platforms and knowing how to use the features of each one for their maximum marketing potential. Perhaps you’re looking for something fresh, something cheap, something customizable to your customers’ needs.
Let me introduce you to promotional product marketing, one of the most successful and popular ways to build brand awareness and improve public perception of your brand.
Serving the function of demonstrating the benefits of shopping with your brand immediately, a calculated promotional product marketing campaign centered around distributing the right kinds of products will help you make a strong impression on would-be customers. Here are three things you need to know about this low-cost, high-impact complement to any successful marketing strategy.
1. Anything is Customizable
Nowadays, several available websites offer a wide range of customizable products, from towels to lunch boxes, making it more than possible for you to create branded versions of products relevant to your industry. Most of the options available at such sites are cheap, though certain sites provide a better quality product than others. For your promotional product marketing campaign, it’s crucial to choose a product relevant to your industry: you want it to be useful for your customer base.
2. Consider Your Demographic
When choosing an item to brand and distribute, there are a variety of factors you’ll likely want to consider. Is this product being given to employees to boost morale? Is it being distributed at a career fair to enterprising students or at a corporate event to associates you’re aiming to network with?
It also helps to consider elements like the season it will be distributed in, the state/region, and above all else, your budget. You don’t want to be caught distributing branded sweatshirts in Florida in the middle of summer. Chances are, that won’t fare too well.
3. The Impact on Consumers
Keep in mind that your promotional product will likely be around for a long time, especially if you’ve chosen a manufacturer that crafts quality merchandise (as you should, if you truly aim to impress those receiving these gifts). Unlike even the best digital marketing campaign, promotional product marketing puts the benefits of working with your brand directly into the customer’s hands, often for no cost at all. This can leave a positive impact on the consumer’s idea of your brand, making it significantly more likely for them to buy from you in the future.
It also has the added benefit of turning the recipients of these gifts into continuous sources of low-cost advertising. In addition to using the product with your brand name on it, they will likely share where they got it from and what you do with friends, family members, and anyone else who asks them about your product.
Even if they don’t, using a product with your brand name on it will likely be seen as an endorsement of your brand: even better, the products will likely last and be used for years, leaving an impact on everyone they come into contact with.
An Enduring Impact For a Low, Low Cost
Very few people say no to receiving free gifts, no matter the setting or the brand. Depending on what you choose to customize (like, say, coffee mugs or clothing items), your brand’s name will spread far and wide on the backs of the hundreds of people receiving and using your promotional products.
For one of the lowest overall costs of any current marketing strategy, you may find that distributing promotional products has a tremendous impact, swaying potentially hundreds of formerly oblivious customers to your brand.