Tips for choosing promotional merchandise

By Dean Schwartz (SWAG Master): Adding promotional products to your marketing portfolio can boost your overall marketing efforts. In fact, studies have shown that adding a promotional product to the media mix increases the effectiveness of other media by up to 44%. But how do you go about choosing promotional merchandise? Here are 3 questions to ask yourself when choosing promotional merchandise.

Choosing Promotional Merchandise:

3 Questions To Consider

1. Is the product useful to the end user?

It doesn’t matter how polished your message is or how cool your logo looks. If you choose a product your people don’t want your efforts will be in vain. It is important to know your audience. You may need to do some research to get a handle on life or work styles of your audience. Lifestyle products with functional elements are popular, such as sportswear, chargers, totes, and drinkware. Check out last week’s blog to find out more about what’s trending.

2. Is the product relevant to your brand?

Capitalizing on trends is always a smart move, but just because a product isn’t trending doesn’t mean it won’t be successful. Relevance is more important. Your product should help the end user remember your company. Many products can be branded with a logo but you can create an even stronger link by choosing a product that has an association with your company. For example, custom shape bottle openers would be a perfect choice for a craft beer company.

3. Does the product represent the company well?

If you are offering premium services or products, you want your promotional product to represent that. Even if your competitive edge is offering discounts to your customers, quality still matters. Clients and consumers are sophisticated, and they know a cheap low-quality product when they see one. Don’t let “cheap” and “low-quality” be what they associate with your brand.

Choosing promotional merchandise can be daunting. But keep these questions in mind and you’ll be seeing the ROI in no-time. Browse through our product catalog to check out all our items, or call 888.752.0432 to talk with your very own SWAG specialist. SWAG with style!