3 Easy Tips to Gain Better ROI from Promotional Products

Marketing budgets are always tight and it is difficult to get funds released when necessary. In such a scenario, how do you ensure that you get significant ROI for the promotional products you invest in? In short, how can you make sure that your products will become a marketing success?

Featured below are 3 simple tips to ensure better ROI on the items you give away:

1. Choose a product that is handy and built to last

Don't just go for any product to highlight your brand. Instead, opt for something your recipients can use for years. A quality mug, for example, will not be discarded. If the mug is appealing, there is every chance your recipients will get attached to them. They will use them to drink their favorite beverages, remembering your brand each time. After a couple of years, your recipients may move on to another mug. But your old imprinted mug may still find use on a desk to store handy stationery such as pens or rubber bands.

Speaking of pens, they are pretty resourceful as well. And so are shirts, jackets and USB drives. You won't find it difficult to get a quality product that matches your branding needs.

2. Finalize a target set of recipients

After you are ready with the promotional products, who do you give them to? Obviously, you would want to distribute them among people who will help promote your brand better. Do you wish to give them away to employees or prospective customers?

A business I am familiar with in Albuquerque handed out their giveaways to employees and their families. In two days, all the merchandise was exhausted and the marketing campaign was an economical failure. Since the items were taken by employees and their families, it didn’t get the exposure it deserved. Most of these giveaways were locked up in their homes with no exposure to the outside world. Don't make the same mistake.

Plan well in advance for your marketing campaign. Think wisely about what you want to distribute among employees and customers. For example, you could hand out imprinted shirts among your employees. They will serve as quality uniforms as well and customers will feel better while interacting with them.

3. Specify a call-to-action

If there is a reason why you are giving away promotional items, then do convey it to your recipients. Tell them you want to do business with them and they will probably agree, especially if they like your giveaways. By specifying in advance what you hope to achieve from these giveaways, you are paving the path for a long-term business relationship. Everybody loves receiving freebies - your recipients will value your services even more.

When you know what you wish to achieve from promotional items, you will find your marketing campaigns performing much better.

Promo Direct is a promotional products company that has been around for more than 20 years. Founded by Internet entrepreneur Dave Sarro, Promo Direct provides advertising and marketing solutions to a hundreds of business owners and institutions in the United States. With an inventory of more than five thousand products, the company has an answer for every marketing requirement under the sun.

If you are looking for some promotional ideas and/or products, do visit the ODM Group’s website and Marketing Gifts Blog for more related information. 

Check out some cool ideas and ways to generate more sales through giving away promotional products:

• Branding your Promotional Products
• Giving out Practical Promotional Items
• Giving out Unique Promotional Items

A Compact Yet Practical Direct Mail Gift- Pillbox

Children’s Hope Fund Hong Kong Ltd is offering a direct mail gift together with their newsletters. This gift is one that is practical and unique. The organization is offering a pillbox that is able to hold your weekly medication. On one side it is divided into 4 sides that reads: Morning, Afternoon, Evening and Bedtime. On the other side it spreads out from Day 2 to 6. This makes taking your daily dosage of medication much more convenient.

Take a look at how the pillbox looks like!

A Compact Yet Practical Direct Mail Gift- Pillbox
(Closed)

A Compact Yet Practical Direct Mail Gift- Pillbox
(Opened)

 This direct mail gift is certainly something that stands out as compared to the rest of the normal promotional gifts offered along with your mail. This makes people more interested to know about the organization and will also make them read the newsletter as compared to the normal reactions to such items, which is to throw away the letters.

Intriguing Direct Mail Gift

This direct mail gift is something that’s completely different. This would make consumers to feel more intrigued about the product and that way they would like to read and know more about it. This would increase brand awareness and recall. Should they use the product, they would be reminded of the organization every day. That would lead to a drastic increase in brand recall and awareness and with that being a constant reminder to the users of the product, they would want to give back to the organization.

Boosting Corporate Social Responsibility

This gift with subscription could also be made of recyclable materials in order to help boost your company’s corporate social responsibility. With your company being involved in the preservation of the earth, more consumers that are concerned about the green movement would be highly receptive to your company.

Check out what other guest bloggers have to say with relation to promotional gift items:

• Triple0 Jandals Giveaway by Bright Sparks
• The 5 Best Promotional Products and Why They Work
• Promotional Gift Ireland- Kellogg's GAA Cúl Camp Kit and Kit Bag

How Business Promotional Products Work in the Real World

Business promotional products are defined as any physical item that is branded, or in some way used to directly promote or correlate a brand communication or message with that brand’s target audience. The products in question can be anything, as long as they are clearly owned by the campaigning brand; and so long as they have a conceptual connection with the thrust and purpose of the campaign.

It is important to note those business promotional products that have little to do with what the promoting brand actually makes, or the services it provides, may still be perfectly valid for use in its campaigns. This is because the primary function of the object is to engender a reaction – an emotional response, or recognition – within members of an already defined target audience. The item is there to make a target audience member feel a specific way, and, by its branding, to associate that feeling with the company that owns the promotion.

In many cases, then, business promotional products are appropriate to the target audience without having specific pertinence to the position of the brand within a certain marketplace. It is best to think of them as physical emblems of concepts: a stress ball, for example, embodies ideas like health care, or relaxation – and so a branded stress ball may engender the thought that the owning company actually sells relaxation, which in fact it simply sells caffeine free tea.

This is the purpose of much advertising, of course. The idea behind most product awareness campaigns is to make a physical thing emblematic of a metaphysical thing, normally a positive emotion or a perception of status. Relaxation, comfort, happiness and sexiness are all common metaphysical ideals expressed by this kind of advertising: and so the business promotional products used to do the advertising may be much more associated with the ideal than the normal product or service of the business in question.

The environment in which the target audience is found plays a big role in the selection or commission of business promotional products. Our hypothetical stress ball is an excellent example. Stress balls are often used in offices, which can be very stressful environments. So the company who has a young professional target audience (which usually works in an office), and which has defined that audience as a prime match for its brand personality, may promote the idea of relaxation no matter what their product really is: even to the point where a product that is not inherently relaxing is seen so to be.

Tea is a clear instance of this. Tea, which contains a lot of caffeine, is medically proven not to be relaxing. It stimulates blood flow, makes the brain go faster and may even cause heart palpitations with excessive use. Yet such is the success of its advertising that it is inextricably linked with the idea of taking time out, having a break and putting your feet up.

The selection of item is the key to building the right message; the placement of that item is vital for ensuring it gets to the proper audience.

Author Bio:- Steve carry is a freelance writer who writes articles related to advertising gifts , promotional products, business promotional products and many more.

Do check out ODM Group for more promotional ideas. Some related promotional products below

1. Stressballs 
   -       Aromatherapy Stress Balls
   -       Stress Ball Keychains
   
   
   
2. Tea-related Products
   -       Tea Tool
   -       Tea Infusers