Matt’s Creative Advertising Blog

For how gimmick-laden promotional products can be, if the right ones are chosen for the right things, they can be extraordinarily effective. Yet, today’s typical advertiser forgoes them all together, either out of fear that they’ll end up with several storage units full of t-shirts and mugs or that they’ll squander precious online marketing funds on archaic methods of persuasion. While the majority of a company’s advertising budget should be aimed at improving web presence, promotional products still have their place.

They just have to be useful. Promotional products work when your company’s name and information are made visible by the use of the product. This is why things like pens, coffee mugs, lighters, and so on have been so appealing to promotional products users. These types of products are sure to be used, and therefore, the company is likely to get exposed.

But this means things like shirts, buttons, and hats should be avoided. Let’s be honest, your company has no business being part of a fashion statement and chances are nobody wants your business logo to be part of their wardrobe anyway. You have to consider products people won’t mind having a company’s name cover. That’s the difference between promotional products that get buried and ones that do some serious advertising for you.

Generally speaking, there are two kinds of promotional products: ones meant to be kept and ones meant to be discarded. Some are pricier, more useful items like headphones, planners, or even luxury items like towels and toiletries that are meant to be kept by the person the gift was given to. Others are small, easily misplaced, and not typically expensive like lighters, pens, and even low-storage flash drives. These are meant to pass through many hands. It’s important to know which kind of promotional product advertising your company needs to specialize in before picking which products you want to be associated with.

You have to make sure you’re buying up useful items though. Otherwise, you’re just wasting money so long as marketing is the ultimate end to these means. Useful items will be seen, will be used by many people, and all the while your company is associated with it. Useless items sit in storage and are eventually donated to charity. Promotional gifts are as effective as they’ve ever been, so long as they remain as functional as they should be to work.