Promotional Marketing Gifts
Well, we are into the 4th quarter of 2009 already and it’s time to ensure that your business has a strong finish to the year. Promotional marketing gifts are not only great to generate new customers but also to help make lifelong customers of your current clients. You have to make sure your customers know that you appreciate their business or their loyalty may fizzle out. There are many different types of promotional marketing items you can giveaway to your clients. With a virtually unlimited choice of personalized items, you can get creative and give a gift that is both useful and one that compliments your business.
Effective marketing gifts must meet the following criteria in order to be effective:
1. The items must be useful. Ideally give something that can be used daily in order to keep the memory of your company fresh in their head.
2. The products must be of value or have a perceived high value. You don’t have to spend a lot per gift; however, giving away a 30 cent magnet does not portray that you appreciate your clients or potential clients.
3. The item should be age appropriate to your target audience. You don’t want to give out baby bibs if you target audience has an average age of 50.
4. The promotional marketing gifts should be personalized clearly with your corporate logo to remind the recipients of who gave the gift to them.
Make sure and make the last quarter of the year a strong one for your company. Corporate gifts and marketing gifts if planned properly, will be an investment and not an expense.
Corporate Holiday Gifts
Yes, it’s only September, but that means that the Christmas holiday season is only a few months away. So, think about your your corporate gift giveaways for this year. Corporate gifts are great for customer retention as well as employee retention. Any type of personalized gift helps the recipient to have warm feeling towards the giver. The higher end the gift, the better it will be received and appreciated. The idea is to get your customers coming back and spending money with you. There is no better way to promote retention than making them feel appreciated. Choose corporate gifts that are either relative to your industry or at least ones that are useful for your clients. The more useful, the more they will use the item giving your corporate logo lots of exposure. It may be necessary to order two different types of holiday gifts: One for your top customers (more expensive gift) and the ones for the rest of your customers (less expensive). Everyone has a budget, so splitting your gift-giving helps with your budget.
The same goes for employees. Multiple surveys have shown that salary (although important) is NOT the most important factor in terms of employer loyalty. It is the way the are treated. Show them you care and they will work hard for you.
Coupons Can Bring in Sales
Is your business currently using coupons to draw new customers? There are many ways you can use coupons to help your business increase sales. There is always the traditional way of newspaper advertising and include a coupon in your ad. However, paper coupons are easily misplaced and fogotten about. A more effective way of using coupons is to use promotional products and corporate gifts with a coupon or discount code on the product. As long as you use relevant and useful products, the recipients will be sure to keep these promotional items and refer back to the promotion that you have printed on their free gift. Just as you should use a unique promotional code on a paper coupon, you should also use one on promotional products. By doing this, you can track your return on investment (ROI). If you haven’t tried this method of marketing your business, you are missing out on a golden opportunity. Never has coupon marketing been more successful, than in our current down economic times. Everybody is looking for ways to save money, so why not take advantage of that fact and make some more sales. Contact a reputable promotional products distributor to get started with your campaign.
Do You Market Your Business to Your Employees?
Many business get caught up in marketing only to customers or potential customers. But what about marketing to your own employees? Did you know your employees can be your single most valuable marketers for your company? That’s right. If you keep them happy, they will happily promote your business. However, if they are not happy, they will have no problem speaking negatively about your business. So what are some ways to make them happy besides a raise in salary, which is not always feasible? Why not give them premium corporate gifts for their loyal service with your company name printed on the gifts. The more employees that you have, the more important this becomes because they can be walking ads who encounter hundreds or thousands of people daily. Everyone loves free stuff, so give promotional products generously to your employees (just make sure the promotional items are useful and worthy of the service your employees do for you). Don’t underestimate the power of your own employees as a means of advertising.
Corporate Gifts - Are your customers worth $10…or $20…or $30?
Do you have some large clients that bring in thousands of dollars a year for you? If your answer is yes, you should ask yourself the question, “How much is the customer worth to me?” Can you afford $10 or $20 or $30 or $100 to purchase a useful premium corporate gift for these top clients? Premium corporate gifts show your clients that you do appreciate their business and is the best way to thank them. After all, everyone loves free stuff, so take advantage of that notion. There are many great premium gifts to choose from such as electronics, golf items, or office and desktop promotional items. You should tailor your corporate gift purchases for your specific clients and thank them properly because these clients are stolen away from you by your competitors. From experience, I know this can happen. However, by developing a relationship with your clients and letting know you care and appreciate their business, you will help develop loyalty and that client will tell your competitors, “No thank you, I have a supplier.” Don’t wait until it’s too late. In this economy, we all need all the clients we can get, and most importantly, we need to keep the clients we have happy.
Are Your Employees Motivated?
In this so called recession, it is more important than ever to have motivated employees. With unemployment rates as high as they are, most people are thankful to still have a job. However, many employees simply show up, do the bare minimum, and get their paycheck. Just think about the revenues your company could generate if your employees were really motivated and gave their best day after day. Do you have an employee incentives program? Do you reward your employees with corporate gifts or corporate awards? If not, maybe you should consider a corporate awards program. When employees are recognized and awarded for outstanding performance, they will strive to do even better, which means a better bottom line. Attitude within a company is contagious, especially a bad attitude. Therefore, it is imperative that you promote a positive work environment by awarding those exceptional employees. Well performing employees that don’t feel appreciated will eventually leave to work for a company who does appreciate them (which often means your competitor). Corporate awards such as Crystal Desktop Awards are great for recognizing top executives or sales people in your company. These awards will proudly be displayed on their desk and continually remind that employee to strive for excellence. Other rewards in the form of promotional gifts are also a great way to motive your employees. You can set goals for earning these rewards, and you will be amazed at how many strive to meet or exceed those goals. If you set the bar low, you should expect low results. If you set the bar high, you will see the majority of your workforce strive to reach that goal. When you choose a corporate reward gift for your employees, it is important that you choose something of value. Don’t say “Thank you for all of your hard work over the past year; here is a 50 cent pen.” Instead, reward your employees with a valuable item that they can use on a daily basis and be constantly reminded that their hard work is appreciated. There is nothing wrong with giving a corporate gift that they can use at the office. Don’t let another day go by without a corporate awards program in place for your business. If you need help, be sure to consult an experienced promotional products distributor.
The Greenest Promotional Item of Them All
Maybe, just maybe, the greenest promotional item of them all is an item is not made of 100% recycled material, but yet an item that has the power to save hundreds or thousands of trees. The promotional items that I am referring to are custom USB flash drives. It is estimated that a 1GB USB flash drive can hold enough documents that would be equivalent to 50 trees. Each time that memory is reused, the number of trees saved multiplies. You can purchase the USB drives pre-loaded with your custom data and save thousands of dollars in printing and binding costs. Gone are the days of giving out a 100 page printed and bound policy and procedure manual. Here are some great ideas for corporate use of custom USB drives:
- Give out USB Flash Drives to your employees with all required company policy and procedure manuals and any necessary forms your employees may need such as incident report forms, accident report forms, change of address forms,and any other forms that may be needed in the future.
- Give out USB Flash Drives to your clients with your digital version of your product catalog.
- Give out USB Flash Drives to your clients with your PowerPoint presentation to help pitch a product or service.
- Give out USB Flash Drives to your clients with a link to your website that automatically opens when the USB flash drive is inserted into their USB drive.
- Give out USB Flash Drives to your clients or employees with a program that will auto-run when the drive is connected to their computer.
- Give out USB Flash Drives with any other custom data pre-loaded on the drives such as music, pictures, programs, or documents.
Your custom data can be pre-loaded on the USB Flash Drives at a minimal cost. The prices on custom flash drives are much lower than they were just a few years ago. Why spend thousands of dollars printing a catalog when you can Go Green and hand out your catalog on a USB drive. Because a USB flash drive has a high perceived value and is useful, your catalog will be kept by the recipients long after your competitors catalogs will be thrown away.
Corporate Gift Baskets
What better corporate gift is there than a corporate gift basket? These holiday gift baskets are great Christmas gifts or end of the year gifts for employee incentive gifts or for coporate gifts for clients and potential clients. There are hundreds of varieties of gift baskets with gourmet chocolate, nuts, chocolate covered nuts, and many other mouth watering candies and comfort food. These Christmas gift baskets are favorites by anyone who receives them. So don’t forget to let your customers know that you care, and that corporate gift will pay off and keep your clients loyal to your business.
Personalized Christmas Ornaments
Personalized Christmas ornaments make great corporate gifts and corporate giveaways for the Christmas season. Yeah, that’s right, I said “Christmas” and I haven’t forgotten the meaning of it either. A custom Christmas ornament with your business name imprinted on it is a great promotional item that will be used year after year so your customers and employees will always think jolly thoughts about you. You can’t go wrong with the traditional Shatterproof Christmas Ball Ornament. They have been around for ages and are still a favorite. However, if your budget allows a little more, why not go with the Silver Christmas Tree Ornament or the Silver Snowflake Christmas Ornament. For those special clients and executives, you can go with the Crystal Christmas Ornament, which is sure to make a big impression. Whatever type of Christmas promotional item you go with, don’t forget about the ever popular personalized Christmas ornaments. Promotional items are great for any season, especially as a corporate gift to say “Thank You” to your customers, employees, and potential clients.
Radio Coolers - The Ultimate Party Cooler
Pesonalized radio coolers with MP3 player and iPod hookups are great party coolers for tailgaiting at the big game, for boating, or for weekend getaways. These radio coolers have built in speakers and amplifiers so you can blast your tunes on the go. Choose from the 12 Pack Radio Cooler, the Backpack 12 Pack Radio Cooler, the 24 Can Radio Cooler, or the 30 Can Rolling Radio Cooler. These personalized radio coolers have minimums of only 12, so these will make excellent corporate gifts for Christmas. These are also great corporate giveways for that company picnic. A custom cooler is a promotional item that will be kept for years and will make that employee or customer think of you everytime he or she uses the cooler. Of course, if you want to go with the low-tech, old fashioned coolers without the mp3 player hookup and radio, you can standard Custom Coolers too. Either way you go, personalized coolers are useful and appreciated by any recipient.
