Are you set to launch a brand new product line or reveal a completely new brand name to the world? It is well known that it takes time to build a brand name and associated product lines but there are a number of marketing methods which you can use to speed up the exposure of your brand.

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After the hysteria that was the World Cup, the appetite for football still seems insatiable as the new football season kicks off barely a month after the final whistle in the World Cup Final. This appetite for football is ideal for promotional gifts as it gives a never ending opportunity for marketing.
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The World Cup is rapidly approaching and naturally as a football loving nation the anticipation is becoming very apparent in the UK. The sensationalism surrounding the World Cup is a blessing for advertisers and unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few weeks you’ve probably noticed the huge explosion in the number of football related ads being shown in printed and broadcasted media.

There are numerous special offers, giveaways and other promotional events related to the world cup being used by advertisers who are well aware that this is likely to give their sales a significant boost. Football related promotional gifts are especially popular at the moment and a number of companies are giving away all sorts of promotional gifts with a World Cup or football theme. This is an excellent way to bolster the effectiveness of an already highly valuable form of advertising. Promotional gifts are an exceptionally popular and effective marketing tool that is shown to have a lasting effect on potential customers. Combine this with a little World Cup fever and you’re left with a promotional medium that is likely to grasp the attention of would be customers and clients. Handing out items that fans can use to show their support such as noise makers and whistles that have been embellished with your company’s branding is an excellent way to make the most of this amazing advertising opportunity.

Promotional Pens

So, don’t miss out. Everybody else is shamelessly capitalising on the World Cup, so there’s no reason why you shouldn’t either. A few football themed promotional pens might be all you need to give your business an extra boost during the build up to the World Cup.

 

Promotional Gifts

Launching a new product and ensuring its success is no easy task and many companies who are planning on introducing new products often face difficulties when attempting to get their latest merchandise off the ground. However, there is plenty that can be done to make the public aware of new products as they’re made available.

Promotional events held in city centres are a very popular method of raising awareness amongst the public, particularly if you’re giving away fee samples or gifts related to the product. Most people can’t say no to a freebie, so this method is a guaranteed winner provided you select an appropriate location and time. Handing out free promotional gifts as well as sample of the product is a great way to make sure people remember your company and your merchandise, so having a variety of different promotional gifts such as balloons, t shirts, novelties and similar items made especially for the event is an excellent idea.

If you’re able to create a spectacle then people are likely to become interested and investigate. Eventually you’ll fin that you have a crowd of people gathered around your pitch, which is likely to attract even more. Also, people who see others walking around with your free promotional gifts are likely to be interested in where they can get their own. These are just a few examples of just how successful this kind of promotional event can be for raising the profile of your brand or company. So, don’t waste time, if you’re launching a new product, this is an excellent way to make the fact known to potential customers!

Promotional Pens

New technology often presents new advertising opportunities. This was illustrated especially well by a trial that saw Bluetooth being used as an advertising medium by a branch of the fast food retailer Burger King located in Luton airport. A billboard that was enabled with Bluetooth contacted 20,000 people for the month it was installed and just over 2,000 of those contacted opted to download the vouchers and promotional information sent to their phones.

Unfortunately, the information about the trial does not indicate how many out of that 2,000 actually redeemed their vouchers, so it doesn’t really give a huge insight into how effective the campaign was; all it really tells us is that a percentage of people are willing to pay attention to a Bluetooth advertisement. Burger King was keen to highlight the fact that a customer in one of their Manchester stores attempted to redeem his Bluetooth voucher there. Although the voucher was not valid in that store it shows that offer stuck in that customer’s mind, just as a printed voucher would.

However, it seems that the ad was only really effective for a very small percentage of people and that perhaps it was not as effective as a more traditional campaign that would have made use of printed vouchers or promotional gifts such as promotional pens or printed t-shirts. Nevertheless, the trial does show that perhaps in the future there might be more scope for this type of advertising, but for the mean time it shouldn’t be the cornerstone of a company’s promotional campaign. Most people will remember promotional gifts, but Bluetooth vouchers may only really appeal to the more tech savvy consumer.

Promotional Clothing

You don’t need to tell me about the importance of branding, but it is amazing how there are certain types and methods of branding we are now so used to seeing that removing them would make something appear seriously amiss. A perfect example of this is the practise of having official shirt sponsors for professional football teams. Many people choose to sponsor a player or certain element of his kit as a way of further supporting their favourite team, the details of which can be found in every match day program, but for the last 25 years or so there has also been an official corporate shirt sponsor, who pays a certain amount of money each season for the advertising space on the chest of each player.

Despite many sponsors changing every 3 or 4 years, these sponsors logos become every bit as much of the shirt design as the club’s own logo, and many fans long carry an affinity for brands that have sponsored their club during successful periods. Our sub-conscious acceptance of this kind of promotional clothing is made obvious by how “empty” football shirts from before this period looked, and how strange some team kits have looked in the rare event that sponsorship is not fully agreed before the start of the season.

Of course, football kits make the best kind of promotional gifts to fans of the club or sport, although you will need a fair few million to sponsor a Premier League side. The practise is just as popular at amateur league level though, with many workplaces either sponsoring their own teams or teams of their employees for sometimes little more than the cost of the printed t-shirts themselves. This more local form of shirt sponsorship is fantastic value marketing for local businesses, and can be seen as a philanthropic act as well.

Printed T-Shirts

Last week saw the official request to dissolve parliament and so begin the long process of electing a new (or re-electing an old) government. Since then, local MPs and MPs in waiting have been hitting the streets of their constituencies with real menace, posting flyers, shaking hands and kissing babies. But what happens if someone doesn’t have a baby to kiss, how do you get through to them? Fortunately for all budding politicians, the realm of promotional gifts offers a plethora of different routes with which to connect and convince your electorate.

Elections are about ideas, and nothing cements and idea like a catchy slogan. Get your slogans plastered over a bunch of printed t-shirts and suddenly you have an easy way of your supporters to broadcast your ideas wherever they go. Promotional pens are also an inexpensive item to hand out while canvassing.

Slogan wise, this year seems to be the year of “Change” and “Fairness”, piggybacking on the success of our betters in the world of political-spin; the USA. Barack Obama’s campaign was a master class of marketing imagery which helped drive the slogans home even harder, with the now legendary and much satirised “brown-scale” pictures of Obama’s face becoming one of the great political images of the modern era. However, with one prominent member of the opposition already heavily lampooned over a doctored picture of himself, any ideas over that kind of iconography will probably be quietly dropped for the rest of the campaign.

Printed T-Shirts

Now many businesses attend trade shows, fairs and exhibitions on a regular basis. As you walk round one of these exhibitions you will notice that many of the businesses exhibiting will be giving away some sort of promotional gift, anywhere from a printed carrier bag for their brochures through to promotional pens, key rings, coasters and mugs. So if you are thinking of attending or exhibiting at a trade show or exhibition this year, promotional gifts, corporate gifts and business gifts will be a way to help get your business noticed and remembered.

Everybody appreciates a free gift that will actually be useful to them so why not look at taking along some promotional gifts to the exhibition. Some of the many options available to promote you business are USB memory sticks, desktop items, lanyards, pens, mugs and many other items too numerous to list here all of which can be branded with your company logo and even your business contact details.

Another advantage of free promotional gifts is that every time someone uses it they will be reminded of your business so the next time the product or service your business offers is needed the chances of them contact you is greatly enhanced. Whilst attending the exhibition or trade show, why not also have your staff members that are attending the event in promotional printed t-shirts printed with you company logos, or even embroidered fleeces, sweatshirts or baseball caps?

Promotional USB Drives

Promotional Gifts

Many businesses rely on the loyalty of their existing clients and a great way of rewarding that loyalty is with business gifts or corporate gifts. You may have had these clients for many years or just a few months or maybe it is approaching the time for yearly contract renewals, either way promotional gifts are an ideal way to thank them for their business so far, show them that their business is appreciated and to help that client loyalty to be maintained.

There are many options available to you to do this, you may want to send a branded diary every new year or maybe send a pair of engraved champagne flutes when it is getting close to the time when their contract is due for renewal. Another option is to send something that they will use and see every day such as a promotional flash drives stick with your company logo or one of several desktop items which are available.

Also as most people appreciate the gesture of a free promotional gift it can also help to promote your company as your client may well then be encouraged to tell others about your company and its excellent customer service.

Promotional Fridge Magnets

A television advertisement for an online bingo website has been pulled by the Advertising Standards Agency recently as it was thought to show a negative racial stereotype of a black man. The content of the advert probably wouldn’t strike most people as being offensive; however as the ad prompted complaints it had to be removed. This simply serves to highlight the difficulties that many advertisers face on a daily basis!

There are strict controls over the type of content that can be shown in an advert, and if you want to be slightly shocking or controversial in order to draw attention to your ad then you might find yourself having to skirt around various rules and regulations. However, it’s not just television ads that are governed so strictly, printed ads and radio ads are also subject to these regulations!

So, you need to be well aware of what you can and can’t do when you’re promoting your business. However, if you use promotional gifts to advertise then you won’t have that problem! It’s hard to imagine somebody being offended by a free corporate gift, so if you make use of promotional gifts to advertise your business then you don’t run the risk of offending people’s sensibilities in the same way that you might if you were to run a TV ad! By handing out business gifts such as promotional fridge magnets or novelties you’ll be avoiding any of the hassle of confirming to advertising regulations whilst getting some widespread and effective promotion for your business!