In our humble opinion, promotional products sometimes get a bad rap.
Like used car salesmen or tax collectors, promotional products are often misunderstood and unfairly given a negative reputation. In reality, all of these roles are extremely important— in the case of promotional products especially, there is tremendous value to be gained from properly understanding how they can be used to benefit your organization.
Let’s start with the basics!
What are promotional products?
Promotional products, also known as swag, are small items that are branded with an organization’s logo or artwork and given away to a designated audience with the intention of increasing brand awareness and eventually increasing business.
Promotional products take many forms. Most people associate the term with items found at a tradeshow— things like pens, notebooks, lanyards and water bottles. However, promotional products are really more about the intention behind them than the items themselves. For example, fancy headphones, branded with a logo, can function as promotional products just as well as any sticker or button.
How do you use promotional products?
Promotional products are used to boost brand awareness, entice leads to become customers, encourage existing customers to remain customers in the future, and more generally leave a good impression of your organization with whatever audience you choose.
The possibilities are endless when it comes to the power of branded items to help achieve your goals.
What are the most effective promotional products?
Here are some of the most effective promotional products when it comes to building your brand and getting your name out in the world.
Drinkware
Custom drinkware makes fantastic promotional products for several reasons. To begin, it follows one of the most important maxims of good swag: it’s useful. Custom water bottles, mugs, glassware and other fun drinkware are great because people will use them time and time again. Water bottle are especially popular because they get used outside of the home. That’s basically free marketing!
Apparel
Branded clothes are another great choice for promotional products. Things like t-shirts, hats, scarves and socks are the most popular, and for good reason. The trick with these items is to choose something that’s not too overbearing. You might not have luck getting people to wear an ostentatious jacket branded with your logo, but a fun pair of socks? Who could say no!
Custom tech gadgets
The promotional product might conjure up images of pens and stickers, but ignoring the power of customized tech gifts as swag is a huge mistake. Useful swag is always a big hit, and choosing smart tech gifts like chargers, phone accessories, power banks and more can be tremendously popular with your audience. Everyone always needs another charger, trust us.
Homewares
With the rise of WFH, brands looking to leave an impression are turning more and more to items that work in the home, and especially the home office. Promotional products for home use are increasingly popular, especially items like blankets, kitchen utensils, and games. Again— anything useful is sure to be appreciated more than simply decorative items.
Office gifts
If we haven’t made it clear yet that useful swag is good swag we’ll say it one more time. Office gifts that make life easier, or make the day-to-day routine of working a bit more enjoyable are sure to endear your brand to folks using your promotional products. Nice pens, notebooks, desk organizers and the like are all good bets in this category.
Surprising and unique gifts
Ok— now we’ll break our own rule. Sometimes promotional products don’t have to be explicitly useful. Sometimes, swag that is fun, unique or surprising can delight your audience into loving your brand just as much as a tool they will use. For a full list of our favorite swag that’s unusual or unexpected, check out our in-depth article on the topic here.
Promotional products can be a game changer for your brand, provided you put the time and effort in to make sure the items you are creating reflect positively on your organization. Luckily, our site is full of thousands of incredible products, all of them hand picked to be outstanding pieces of swag ready to carry your branding.
If you have any questions about how you can build your swag vision with us, please feel free to get in touch using the form below! One of our expert swag curators will be in touch as soon as possible with a follow up.
