It’s the age-old question for CEOs: how can you increase awareness of your company for the best price? This depends a lot on the individual business, but one simple and smart way is to create merchandise with your brand name and logo to give away.
These items create a bond between the company and the person receiving the item because everyone loves a freebie, especially an extremely useful one. This bond is reinforced every time they use the item and it serves as a recommendation of your brand to anyone who sees the person using your item.
Depending on your brand, you may even be able to sell these items to customers, as coffee chains do with travel mugs and retail stores do with tote bags. That’s a win-win situation.
What are the best promotional items?
This also depends on the type of business being advertised. A gym could give away padlocks and a bookstore could give away bookmarks, but not the other way around. It’s hard to read on the treadmill after all.
With that in mind, we’ll go through the branded merchandise most commonly used by people, no matter what company is giving them out.
1. Bags
Everyone needs a spare bag. People can use it when they’re:
- picking up some bread (and save 10p on the plastic bag)
- storing their workout clothes before/after a gym session
- carrying their dog’s toys and treats on a walk
- doing just about anything
The best part is you can go for multiple types of bags to suit more people and purposes.
2. Stationary
Speaking of items that people also always seem to need more of, pens and pencils. Even the most technologically advanced of us have to write things down most days, so writing utensils are practical freebies.
For client and employee presents, you could always go down the route of engraved pen sets or branded laptop bags. The latter is particularly useful for commuters or part-remote workers because they can keep their work laptops safe while waiting for the train to the office.
3. Food and drink items
Drinkware is a popular and smart item to give away.Travel mugs and water bottles are great options because they’re made to be used on the go, which means more potential eyes on your logo. However, traditional mugs will also get noticed a fair amount, whether they’re used for guests or repurposed as a pen holder/plant pot on someone’s desk.
For a unique item in this sphere, opt for cooler bags, which can double up to pack a picnic and as an insulated shopping bag for year-round use.
Items that don’t get a lot of use
There are certain circumstances when clothes and caps make good promotional gifts, but not that many. If you have staff, a uniform can help customers identify them and serve as an advert, but most people aren’t going to wear an advert for your business when they have plenty of clothes already because fashion is such a personal thing.
If you’re lucky, they might wear your t-shirt when they’re out for a run or keep your baseball cap in the car for unexpectedly sunny days, but that’s not a big return on investment, so we’d recommend one of the other products listed above.
