The prospect of being handed a smaller marketing budget but having to achieve more with that spend must be incredibly daunting this year and this is a message we are hearing up and down the country as we speak to current and potential clients. It is proving difficult for everyone involved and we are all being put to the test in various ways on a daily basis, be that on price, on ideas that are different or making sure service levels are maintained to the highest standards.

However, on the promotional products side of marketing there is always an option and it must be remembered that these are some of the best marketing tools to use to promote your company or brand and that something can be purchased to suit pretty much any budget no matter how small.

Businesses often have a standard set of promotional merchandise that they rely on and the weigh up facing most marketing buyers this year is having to look at obtaining products that achieve the same results but reducing the spend.  This can be done in a number of ways.

1. Use the same product, but reduce the quantity. This is a solution many companies are using, allowing them to maintain existing merchandise and maybe target a smaller client base.

2. Using the same product, but reducing the quantity and purchasing a cheaper alternative as a back up. This follows the theme of point 1, but for the same spend, a cheaper alternative product could be used in conjunction with existing giveaways, allowing new client list to be targeted. For example a Prodir pen may be relied upon, but a Super Hit Icy ballpen could be used as an alternative.

3. Move away to an alternative product. This is something we are seeing a great deal of. Marketing departments message is that they are satisfied that promotional gifts do work, but are not loyal to one particular product. Therefore with cost down requests from superiors, time is being taken to find a good alternative that provides the right savings. A company that traditionally buys the Marrow earthenware mug, is more like to consider swapping the order for a Bell earthenware mug in tough times for example.

Steel City Marketing have been established as a promotional gifts distributor for over 28 years and have an experienced sales team who are ready to take on any challenge in terms of reducing your unit costs, coming up with new ideas or discussing ways to promote your brand effectively.  Call now on 0114 275 4150.

This entry was posted on Friday, February 27th, 2009 at 1:16 pm and is filed under General Promotional Gifts, Pens, Promotional Mugs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.