Creating a promotional products campaign

Creating a promotional products campaign

Before developing a promotional products campaign from scratch, there are many different factors to take into account. The ongoing should provide all the tips and advice necessary to ensure that you devise a successful operation.

The Starting Point
The starting point is the business, take into account the services and products you have to offer. Look for ways they stand out from your competitors, which will prove good selling points. Is the style of your logo attractive enough to interest buyers? If not, maybe now is the time to consider change. The simpler the better.

Evaluate your competitors
Look into the products and services your competitors are offering and how they vary from your own. Find out what they are perhaps doing better than you and look for areas where you strengths will give you the ‘edge’ over them. A little espionage can be employed into finding out what sort of service they offer, what sort of packaging they use, delivery times and methods and so on, how many items they actually stock at any given time. All this information will help to form a picture and aid your campaign.

Decide your aim and stick to it
Do you want to form a long-term plan, or maybe just a one off promotion to move stock? Is the objective to attract new long-term customers, or is it to enhance your business image and cement your place in the community. You may want to rebrand your products, with a new colour scheme and image, or maybe your intention is to launch a new product or service. Know your aim and stick to it!

Outline your campaign
To begin with, it is important to make a list of your requirements. This should include your specific objectives, whether you want to change your current image, to launch a new product and so on. What can you say that is distinctive about your product or service, what benefits will your customer receive by using your products or services? Offering a series of related branded products will emphasise your theme or message far more effectively than if you concentrate on one product or service.

The Perception
Having outlined your campaign, it is now necessary to think of a concept, a unifying idea through which your message can be expressed. A focus for your campaign. For example, you could be the supplier of golfing equipment and, for the duration of your campaign, you are offering a free, imprinted golfing umbrella to all customers. So although your campaign will promote various different golfing products, the umbrella will unify the promotion, as it will benefit all customers.

How to approach
There are various different approaches that can be employed to reach your customer, so take some time to think about how you want them to react to your promotion. Do you want to inspire them to leap up and call you, maybe you wish to conduct a humorous campaign to get them in a happy frame of mind, or do you want to get across to them a new product that you feel they are bound to be interested in. So decide whether you want to be ‘entertaining’, ‘informative’ or perhaps ‘persuasive’ - this will set the style of your campaign.

An ‘entertaining’ approach can use a humorous tone. It is more often employed to produce interest in a business rather than to offer specific information.

An ‘informative’ approach requires a factual manner, whereby you simply state the facts honestly and in a simple fashion. This approach is often best used for offers of obvious consumer benefit, such as a BOGOF campaign.

A 'persuasive' approach often has an emotional tone. If your business is allied to a charity for instance, and you state your intention to donate a percentage of profit to that charity, then some customers will be swayed by this information and may well choose your product or service over that of a competitor for no other reason.

The gimmick or ‘attention grabber!’
You can grab attention to your product or service by use of a gimmick. A gimmick is used to gain attention rather than to give information about your product, although sometimes they can do both. Promotional balloons, for instance, can be imprinted with some or all of your company information, but can also be viewed as a fun item and can always be taken home for the children.

Logo Size and Design
You logo should be printed as large as possible with this type of ‘gimmick’ item. The design should be simple, bold and, of course, tasteful.

Choosing a product
Ensure that the product you pick is as useful as possible for your campaign; it should relate to your product or service and serve as a constant reminder to the recipient, saying ‘Remember Us.’

So by now you have a good idea of how you want to promote your product or services and it is time to reassess the situation. Put all your thoughts and ideas into writing and then take a good long look at it. There is no particular order that the sequence of products you give out has to take. For example, if you were in the business of manufacturing sports equipment, you could offer miniature chocolate golf balls, footballs etc., to the various sports shops stocking your products, with increased inducements for the shop managers.

Headlines
It is important that your products or services, for the purposes of your campaign, are encompassed in an eye-catching headline. It can, at the same time, offer a benefit to your target audience which is an added bonus. But it is more important to keep it snappy and recognisable so that, in time, it becomes a household name.

Graphics
Using an illustration as part of the imprinted design can often be extremely successful. It needs to be immediately recognizable and will surpass the impact of the headline title or logo, when appropriately employed.

Slogans
Television adverts are renowned for using short, punchy advertising slogans, particularly the car, drinks and detergent industries, all very successfully. Indeed, in some adverts the product is not even mentioned, the slogan does all the work! Slogans for old-established products are so entrenched in the public's mind; they will know the product simply by hearing the slogan.

If you can work out a short and simple slogan, then this could be very good for business and stand you in good stead for the future, affording automatic recognition by the general public. Catchy slogans are difficult to develop and take time. Be prepared to go over your initial ideas again, and again, maybe completely changing your original idea altogether. You must give it time, a bad slogan is worse than no slogan at all! Try it out on your employees, friends and relatives. Be prepared for criticism and keep on trying. Check your punctuation and spelling carefully, it is easy to miss glaringly obvious mistakes!

Typeface
As with any print job, standard design rules apply. Choose appropriate styles according to the image you wish to portray. Choose either one type, or complementary typefaces (in both size and design) and keep the number to a minimum for best effect. Importantly, it must be easy to read. Sans serif typefaces in small sizes are more difficult to read than serif faces of the same, so they are more suited to headlines rathan the the main body of text. You may prefer to ask your promotional products distributor, or an advertising design studio, to assist you in the final preparation of your imprint.

Colour
It has been proved that using two colours adds a great deal of recognition to the user. If your logo has two colours it is well worthwhile to spend a little extra to produce it that way. But if this proves too expensive for your budget, perhaps using a method such as engraving or debossing would prove almost as eye-catching.

Promotional products to avoid
Don't choose promotional products that require either assembly or instructions on how to use. It is also important not to give products that are powered by battery unless the battery is supplied with the item.

Keep it simple!
Keep all emphasis on your company name and logo and keep it straightforward. In other words, don't clutter your message!

What epitomises a successful promotion?
You may just be setting out in business or already be well established; in either event, you won't get new sales unless people are aware of you. There are various ways of getting your message across and without some form of advertising you won't succeed. Once your business profile is out there and known to people, the next two most important matters to address are 'target audience' and 'need.' To know your target audience, and to establish whether your product or service is essential to their business, should be established long before you make any significant financial investment.

You should have a good idea of your competitors’ products and services, you should be able to establish their weaknesses and any openings in the market where you can improve upon them. You must then establish whether these openings will prove sufficient for you to exploit and promote your own product or service. So to advertise successfully, once your ‘target audience’ and ‘need’ are established, it is important to decide on an angle. Study your ‘target audience’ again and you may realise they are too diverse to use once approach; so separate them into groups and tailor your approach accordingly.

Visibility
One of the most valuable mechanisms of promotional products is their continual usage and high level of numerous exposures. Albeit in a small way, such as with a promotional pen or promotional key ring, or with more expensive items that are used extensively for years to come. Sometimes choosing a more expensive items actually pays off, as the gift creates more customer satisfaction, loyalty and general well being.

Demographics
Know your ‘target audience’ and choose your promotional products wisely; ensure that they will servie to both fit their needs and enhance their lifestyle.

Business location
If your business has several different branches, throughout the country, it is important to get this message across so your would-be clients know that your operation is nearby and easy to get to. If you have room, maybe this information can be imprinted on your promotional product.

Consistency
When structuring an advertising campaign, consistency is of vital importance. Once you have hit on a slogan that fits your product or service, that you feel fits the image and is the best slogan for your business, stick to it. If it is catchy enough it should stick in an audience’s awareness, each time they hear it they will remember the product and, very often, if the slogan is at all humorous it will make them smile! Thus, continuity should run throughout the campaign. Your stationery should also be consistent, choose a colour and style and stick to it. This all helps create brand awareness and sets you apart from your competitors.
Your aim is to project your product or service with a sense of excitement, to seduce your target audience into wanting it above all else. Your advertisement should create an interesting visual effect, be it romantic, funny or whatever, so your audience feel some sort of pleasurable emotion and, in turn, equate this with your product or service.

Once you have established your marketing strategy and have a well-known advertising policy, you are well on the way to success and you will be able to carry the theme forward into the future. The most successful companies offer consistent advertising over a number of years, a little along the lines of a soap opera. The characters may change but the product remains the same. Think of the Bisto gravy television advertisements!

Be very clear about the type of business you are and clientele you wish to target and attract. Don't be scared of missing out on certain customers by concentrating on your own preferred audience. You can't please all of the people all of the time and it is necessary to nail down who you are aiming to target.

Don’t be boring when devising your campaign, creativity is the key. Try to look at your ideas from the other side of the coin, would they excite you as a customer, would they please you and would you remember them? If you can answer yes to all three, then you are well on the way to a successful campaign. If not, then it’s back to the drawing board!


We at YesGifts.co.uk are happy to help you with your promotional products requirements. Our Promotional Team is extremely qualified and can provide you with the committed expert service you would look forward to from a major company. Call us on 0870 933 0085.