How to Turn Your Promotional Products Expense Into a Profit Center
If you use promotional products you probably already know the power of giving away freebies. You may use them to thank current customers, or to give incentives to potential customers.
When most people think about promotional products, they tend to think pens, keychains, t-shirts, mugs, caps, etc.
Did you know there are products that put pens, mugs and keychains to shame? They can cost less and bring measurable profits. Sometimes, these profit-producing promotional items may even be free.
How can this be?
Instead of ordinary promotional products, think “infopromotional products”. An infopromotional product is an information product that you use as a promotional item.
What can you use as a infopromotional item? You can give away
-tips sheets
-articles
-special reports
-audios
-videos
-books
-ebooks
-teleseminars
Now you could spend time creating your own information product - but I’m not suggesting that. That takes time and money.
Consider joint venturing with an expert whose advice your customers would find valuable. The expert can give you a special educational item that you give to your customers. Let’s say it’s a tips sheet. At the end of the tips sheet, there’s an offer for the expert’s books, tape set or seminars. The customer can only get the special offer by mentioning your name or special code.
Where can you find experts? You can find them in your city or search for them online. Think about what your customers might appreciate and look for experts in those fields.
Are your customers business owners? Search for marketing gurus, cost-cutting consulants, automation experts.
Are your customers homeowners? Search for home improvement experts and real estate experts.
Are your customers concerned about health? Look for fitness and self-improvement experts.
How much will your infopromtional product cost? If it is a physical product, your joint venture partner may pay for some or all of the cost. Why? Because it’s a marketing expense for him. The expert’s company is reaching a highly targetted market - your customers. That can be a good thing for your joint venture partner, you and your customers. You’ll see why in a moment.
If your giveaway is delivered online, such as an online video, you may be able to get it for free. So now, you have a high-perceived value item to give to your customers at low or no cost to you.
Let’s not stop there. This article is about turning an EXPENSE into a PROFIT CENTER. Here’s how:
The key is that your joint venture partner has an offer and a tracking mechanism so you get paid for your referrals. If your customers are online, tracking is as easy as using a affiliate code. Now your customer gets to sample your joint venture partner’s expertise in the infopromotional product and get a special deal, your partner may get new customers and you get a fee for each of your referrals, all because you gave a gift to your customers.
Try infopromotional products and you may never give away another pen again.
Resource: Internet Marketer Raynay Valles specializes in joint venture marketing strategies. Find out more about using joint venture infopromotional products, visit http://www.raynayvalles.com/jointventures or email her at rvalles at raynayvalles.com
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Promotional Products are Sticky - That’s a Good Thing
The targeted use of promotional products has been proven over time as an essential and cost-effective marketing technique. From sole proprietor to international conglomerate, whether solely present as an e-retailer or established as a brick-and-mortar chain, any business can benefit from this physical gift-in-hand approach.
Everyone knows to make their web sites sticky. Fresh and useful content keeps users coming back for more, with the result that they get to know and trust you and ultimately become a repeat and loyal customer. Promotional products similarly keep your company name (imprinted on a coffee mug or mouse pad) literally in front of potential customerswhether at home or in the office.
In fact, the money spent on promotional products is often a better use of advertising dollars in terms of ROI (return on investment). According to a 2004 study by LJ Market Research, 75% of respondents asked could recall the name of an advertiser on a promotional product they had received, while only 53.5% could remember the name of an advertiser they’d read about in a print publication in the past week.
By giving gifts at trade shows, in direct business-to-business sales meetings, or straight to the customer at cash point or in direct mail campaigns, your company begins to get attention and build name recognition, attract new and reward repeat customers while at the same time further inspiring loyalty.
Intangibles such as word-of-mouth and goodwill are also bumped up when you give people something useful for free. It doesn’t have to be a pricey item - if the recipient feels that a special effort was made to give something that targets his or her specific area of interest. Bookmarks are a good example of an inexpensive - although useful - promotional product. Because they are not perceived as gifts of intrinsic value, care must be taken to match the content of the bookmark to the subject matter of the individual customer’s purchase, in which case a strongly personal and highly positive impact can be made.
It’s the thought that counts.
Farfromboring.com has over 70 years experience in the promotional products market. With millions of different promotional products on the market making the right decision on the right promotional products for your business would be overwhelming. With our dedicated sales and support team FarFromboring.com will help you choose the right promotional product for building your business. Visit Farfromboring Promotional Products for more information or visit our Promotional Products Blog for unique promotional products, promotional products specials, and for articles on promotional products for your industry.