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For low cost, high impact marketing, promotional products can’t be beat. Are you looking for a novel way to prove this?
Here’s a question I received from a promotional products distributor and a fun, creative way to answer it.
“I belong to a networking group that meets weekly and has about 20 people in attendance at this particular chapter. I am scheduled to speak for 20 minutes about my promotional products business. I would like to be able to share material that will be of interest to the group and allow each one to walk away with something beneficial. Do you have any suggestions that might be of help to me?”
I want to share with you a unique idea that I learned several years ago through another distributor and then I’ll share some of my own ideas below as well:
Explain what promotional products are. You could say: “Promotional products are useful or fun items imprinted with a company name or logo that are used to promote a business, product or service while creating good will and brand recognition.”
Then have all the members of the group reach into their pockets, purses and briefcases to look for promotional products. The group member that finds the most promotional products in 5 minutes wins a prize! (Make the prize a fun promotional product with your company logo.) This will get the group engaged, show how pervasive and useful promotional products are, and make your talk memorable and fun!
Use this as a springboard to talk about the value of promotional products. Ask members of the group how long they’ve had the products they found and how often they use them. Let the group know that promotional products are generally much less expensive and are kept and remembered long after traditional forms of advertising (internet, newspaper, TV and magazine ads) are forgotten. Both ASI and PPAI have studies that prove this point, which you may want to share.
More ideas from Rosalie:
- Present a few case histories of how promotional products have been used successfully in a variety of industries. Use examples from your own clients or get case histories from your favorite suppliers. You may want to bring a “storyboard.” Visuals always help!
- Engage the group by asking what their current business challenges are and give them suggestions to overcome those challenges by using a targeted promotional products marketing campaign.
- Wrap up the presentation by handing out a promotional product imprinted with your company logo and contact information. Include a special offer to encourage them to take action. A presentation that is fun and gets the group engaged is sure to be valuable and be remembered.
What’s your opinion? What have you done when presenting to a group or individual client? How do you explain the value of promotional products?
Do you have a question you would like to have me answer? Send an email to Rosalie@promobizcoach.com and you may see it answered in a future post.
Please leave your comment below!
© 2013 Rosalie Marcus
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Rosalie Marcus, The Promo Biz Coach ™ is a promotional products business expert, coach and speaker. Combining her skills and years of experience in promotional sales, she helps her clients sell more at higher profit margins and dramatically increase their incomes! Get a FREE special report: 10 Big Mistakes Promotional Professionals Make and How to Avoid Them and a FREE Skyrocket Your Sales audio download at http://www.promobizcoach.
Reach her at Rosalie@promobizcoach.com or 215-572-6766.
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What a great way to do a presentation. I belowng to several groups and this is a good way to engage teh groups..
Great ideas!
Thank you Rosalie! This is great as I have two presentations coming up. One for my virtual assistant group and the other for my author group. I appreciate your good advice!
Rosalie & Rachel can you tell me more about Rachel’s Virtual Assistant Group? What platform do you use to conduct this group?
Hi Rosalie – I have a presentation at my networking group this thur – so this came in handy. I am doing my presentation on the process of choosing a promotional product that fits your needs and Vector art – what it is and why we need it for imprinting on promos.. Thanks Again!
Great ideas! I will be adopting some of these. As creative professionals we must come up with memorable ways to make our presentations. To close my presentations I pass a tray around containing a few defective items, either the item itself or the imprint, and talk about the importance of quality and how working with an expert will avoid this kind of trouble.
When I have to do a presentation about my business in front of my business group, I sometimes do a quiz. Questions range from how long have we been in business to various other related business queries. Whoever answers a question correctly will get a self-promo from me. They love it!! It really generates a lot of interest, and it shows me that they really are interested in what I do, etc.
My father taught me this idea about 25 years ago and I have used it many times to break the ice when I speak to groups about our profession. Once the winner has been awarded the prize, I relate the all the items that have been found to computers. I tell the audience that the products they have found are the “hardware” and how the product is used and distributed is the “software”. This analogy is a great segway into case studies and a discussion about HOW a product is used and not the product itself.
After the case histories are presented, I give the audience a “test” to drive home the point that it is not what is used, but how a product is used is most important. I take a pen and ask the audience what it is. 99% of the time the response is a pen. I tell them it is not a pen but a “Coupon” because the copy on the pen says, “Bring this pen to XYZ Fitness Center and receive a 10% discount when you sign up”. I will give them another chance and ask the question again. This time when they fail the test, I tell them it is a” Fund Raiser “. The copy says,”Please use this pen to write a check to support XXX Charity. If time allows I give the audience one last try and tell them the pen is a map and use a banner pen with a pullout map of a college campus that is given to students at freshman orientation.
I have found these examples to be an easy and fun way to engage the audience.