So you’ve got this awesome brand that makes people’s lives better. Like, seriously better. It’s your job to make sure your crowd not only knows about it, but loves it as much as you do. You’re a marketer and you’ve got big ideas.
But you’ve also got a boss who watches every dollar. Probably the nickels, too. How do you convince her to move promotional products from the “nice to have” column to the “must have” column of your brilliant marketing plan?
We’ve got a few ideas for that.
The first known promotional product in the United States was a commemorative brass button handed out when George Washington was unanimously elected as the first president in 1789. That George… always the trendsetter.
It wasn’t until 1886 that someone got serious about swag. A newspaper man from Ohio approached a local shoe store owner with an idea. “Hey, what if, instead of letting my printing press gather cobwebs between newspaper editions, I use it to print your advertising message onto bags that you can give away with every shoe purchase? When people walk around town with your bag, they’re also advertising your store.” And so our love affair with free stuff began.
We’ve come a long way since then. In addition to buttons and bags, there are now over 750,000 promotional products to choose from, (Imagine what George Washington could have done with a really great coffee tumbler!)
Use a slew of statistics to convince your boss that swag is an important part of any marketing plan.
(statistics courtesy of ppai.org)
To figure out the magnitude of brand impressions for a promotional product, multiply how long a person has the product by how many people he comes in contact with while wearing or using it. Say Todd has a favorite t-shirt that he wears once a week. As he walks down the street, 50 cars drive past him. That’s 50 sets of eyeballs checking out his shirt. When he walks into a store to buy a jar of pickles, that’s 50 more sets of eyeballs. In the afternoon he takes a selfie of himself (possibly eating a pickle) and posts it to social media. That’s 398 more impressions. Todd is a walking, talking, pickle-loving billboard.
Television and magazine ads average 1.8 cents per impression. Promotional products average .6 cents per impression. People can fast forward through commercials and skip pages, but they can’t ignore your logo on a mug they use every day.
The power of swag is that when it’s useful and meaningful, it makes its way onto nightstands and desktops and into closets, briefcases and… well… the world. The perfect piece of swag makes your brand unforgettable.
Whether used alone or as an enhancement to your other marketing endeavors (such as print ads and social media), branded merchandise works. When done thoughtfully, it allows you to reach your crowd on a personal level and give them a chance to share in your story.
Your job is to make your marketing matter. Being seen and being remembered? That’s what it’s all about, boss.
Ready to wow your crowd? We’d love to lend some creative muscle to your next promotion. Let’s chat!
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