The Gift That Keeps Giving

The real value in promotional products isn't just in that first gift giving opportunity. If anything, the value comes in those dozens of impressions your product receives later. The person who receives the gift will usually show it off, or use it in a very public way (like a t-shirt, or using a tote bag at the grocery store). Certainly this doesn't apply to all promotional gifts, as some are only used once, but these gifts can also benefit from word of mouth. If the gift is good enough, the recipient will talk about it, and most of the time they will remember your brand.

But does this influence what promotional products businesses buy? Let's take a look at some statistics and find out:

The top 5 most popular promotional gifts are:

• T-shirts: 31%
• Pens: 10%
• Tote Bags: 7%
• Mugs: 6%
• Keychains: 6%

(statistics from Advertising Speciality Institute Council)

So what do these gifts tell us about how businesses use promotional items? T-shirts, are by far the most popular product, and they're extremely beneficial as the recipient will hopefully wear it many times (and be seen wearing it). Pens and mugs are often shared, or are frequently used at work, again resulting in dozens of impressions. While keychains may not be as popular, the number of impressions is still high (every time you start your car, enter or leave your home etc.), which is how it makes the top five.

So we know what businesses are buying, but how many impressions do these products actually receive? Let's take a look at another chart from the Advertising Speciality Institute Council:

 

Interestingly, tote bags have a significantly higher impressions count than all other form advertising (the chart takes other media such as radio and TV in to account as well), and strangely tote bags only account for 7% of all promotional product sales. Now, this may be because not all business owners feel that tote bags are appropriate for their business, whereas t-shirts are more universal. Both number of impressions and relevance to your brand are factors to be considered while choosing your promotional product.