History of Promotional Products
The first known promotional products in the United States are commemorative buttons dating back to the election of George Washington in 1789. During the early 1800s, there were some advertising calendars, rulers, and wooden specialties, but there wasn’t an organized industry for the creation and distribution of promotional items until later in the 19th century.

Jasper Meeks, a printer in Coshocton, Ohio, is considered by many to be the originator of the industry when he convinced a local shoe store to supply book bags imprinted with the store name to local schools. Henry Beach, another Coshochton printer and a competitor of Meeks, picked up on the idea, and soon the two men were selling and printing bags for marbles, buggy whips, card cases, fans, calendars, cloth caps, aprons, and even hats for horses.[1]

In 1904, 12 manufacturers of promotional items got together to found the first trade association for the industry. That organization is now known as the Promotional Products Association International or PPAI, which currently has more than 7,500 global members.[2] PPAI represents the promotional products industry of more than 22,000 distributors and approximately 4,800 manufacturers.

The UK & Ireland promotional merchandise industry formally emerged as corporate marketing became more sophisticated during the late 1950s. Before this companies may have provided occasional gifts, but there was no recognised promotional merchandise industry. The real explosion in the growth of the promotional merchandise industry took place in the 1970s. At this time an ever increasing number of corporate companies recognised the benefits gained from promoting their corporate identity, brand or product, with the use of gifts featuring their own logo. In the early years the range of products available were limited; however, in the early 1980s demand grew from distributors for a generic promotional product catalogue they could brand as their own and then leave with their corporate customers.

In later years these catalogues could be over-branded to reflect a distributor’s corporate image and distributors could then give them to their end user customers as their own. In the early years promotional merchandise catalogues were very much sales tools and customers would buy the products offered on the pages.

In the 1990s new catalogue services emerged for distributors from various sources. In the nineties there was also the creation of ‘Catalogue Groups’ who offered a unique catalogue to a limited geographical group of promotional merchandise distributor companies. Membership of a Catalogue Group could also offer improved buying terms, a network of fellow distributor companies, & provide other support services.

Up until the 1990s the industry had a peak season in which the majority of promotional products were sold. The season featured around Christmas & the giving of gifts. This changed significantly in the early 1990s as Christmas gifts became less appropriate in a multicultural Britain. Corporate companies were also becoming more inventive in their marketing and were now using promotional merchandise throughout the year to support the promotion of brands, products & events. In the early 2000s the role of a promotional merchandise catalogue started to change, as it could no longer fully represent the vast range of products in the market place. By 2007 catalogues were being mailed to targeted customers lists, rather than the blanket postal mailings that had taken place before. The catalogue had now become seen more as a ‘business card’ demonstrating the concept of what a company did, rather than a critical sales tool. In 2009 published results from research involving a representative group of distributor companies, which indicated the usage of hard copy catalogues was expected to fall up to 25% in 2010.

Distributor companies are experts in sourcing creative promotional products. Traditionally, to ensure that they had an effective manufacturer network, they kept themselves aware of the trade product ranges available by attending exhibitions across the world & from mailings received from manufacturers themselves. In 2004 the way the trade sourced promotional products began to change with the launch an online trade sourcing service which united distributors with manufacturers worldwide. This service is purely for vetted trade promotional merchandise distributor companies & is not available to corporate end user companies.

By 2008 almost every distributor had a website demonstrating a range of available promotional products. Very few offer the ability to order products online mainly due to the complexities surrounding the processes to brand the promotional products required.
Source: Wikipedia

Write your goals down!

Writing you goals down help clarify your thinking, keep you on track, and reinforce your commitment.

A famous study from Yale in 1953 reported that 3% of Yale graduates that had written goals had more wealth years later than the other 97% of the class combined.

Another study was done by Harvard Business School on the financial status of its students 10 years after graduation. Check out these results!

• 27% of them needed financial assistance
• 60% were living paycheck to paycheck
• 10% were living comfortably
• 3% were financially independent

Lets look at those numbers in detail:

• Guess who had no goal setting process in their lives? Yep, the 27% who need financial assistance.
• Who had basic goals, taking life day by day? That would be the 60% that are living paycheck by paycheck.
• Some knew where they were going to be in the next five years. They are now living comfortably and make up the 10%.
• For those that had written goals and the steps required to reach them, they make up the 3% that are financially independent.

Break your goals down into 52 weeks or 12 months. Write down step by step on how you are going to achieve them. Find a goal buddy, someone to keep you on track.

Need help with your goals? Triple R Marketing and Sales can help up fall in the 3% bracket with your businesses goals.

Products – Is there a need to improve quality, add new products or upgrades?

Service and Support – Can you improve your warranty?

Pricing – Can you cut cost, reduce prices, offer discounts, better terms or offer a guarantee?

Sales Force – Is there areas you can increase your products with more sales people, distributors, or retailers?

Advertising – Can you improve sales with a web site, brochure, promotional products or catalog?

People - Train your sales force in customer service. Learn ways to motivate your employees and distributors. Do your employees understand that voice mail is to help customers, not frustrate them?

These are just a few things that you can evaluate to increase sales. Make sure your company is communicating out in the market at all times. Here are some options:

Offer a toll-free telephone number

Web site address on all your materials and ads

Radio advertising and other publicity. Media coverage usually generates leads

Coupons - everyone loves a deal

Referral groups – help others and they will help you

Need help increasing sales? A company like Triple R Marketing and Sales can help you connect to your customers with all your products and services.

Ok, why do you need a logo? When you see the two golden arches, what do you think of?  How about that swoosh, or the two red circles that look like a target. When these logo were first designed they were nothing more that lines and colors, but after time they grew with the companies and started representing what they stood for. The products and services that they offered, they branded themselves in the market different that all the others. That is why you need a logo!

Matt Ruedlinger

Here are the results!

• Salespeople who gave promotional gifts to there customers received 22% more referrals than salespeople who did not use promotional products
• 40% of the salespeople commented on how well the gifts were received by their customers.

In another study by the PPAI, a survey of business travelers at Dallas/Fort Worth Airport was conducted. More than 71% of travelers indicated they had received at least one promotional product in the last 12 months. The study also showed that respondents ability to recall the name of an advertiser on a promotional products was 76% compared to the recall of a print publication they had read, which was 53.5%.

Successful promotion campaigns don’t happen by chance! They must be carefully planned, taking into consideration the audience, budget, and the result to be gained.

Key to its success:

• Define a specific objective.
• Determine a workable distribution plan to a targeted audience.
• Create a central theme.
• Develop a message to support the theme.
• Select a promotional product that bears a natural relationship to your profession or communication theme.
• Don’t pick an item based solely on uniqueness, price or perceived value.

If it seems like a lot to consider, well it is! You need a qualified, reliable marketing agency consultant that can help you plan the best promotion for reaching your objective.

Matt Ruedlinger