Marketing Managers and Executives are always being advised to spend their marketing budgets wisely when developing plans to promote their brand. Increasingly the marketer has a wide selection of tools to use to help promote their brand to their target audience including; above the line advertising, TV, radio, vehicle livery, website promotional activity, below the line sales promotions, two for one offers ... the list seems endless, but the budget is limited. If the executive spends a small amount across this marketing mix then it may seem that any campaign lacks any kind of punch, so increasingly marketers are looking to promote their brand using fewer techniques to maximise their return on investment.

This article sets out five reasons to use promotional merchandise in your marketing campaign to show how it can help to promote your brand and provide a beneficial return on investment.

1 - Stand out from the crowd & increase sales

How do magazines fight for space on the shelves in your local newsagent? With so many magazines for any one topic, circulation managers have a tough job to make their magazine appealing to the consumer. Putting a covermount gift on the cover of a magazine can create that eye-catching opportunity to make the consumer pick up the magazine and make a purchase. If the covermount gift has been created to link cleverly with the magazines brand, for example a fishing magazine offering a packet of fishing hooks, then the covermount gift can offer the consumer the chance to read the magazine and receive the free useful gift. Increasingly we have found that magazines that use covermount gifts see an increase in sales as these gifts instantly stand out from the crowd on the newsstand.

2 - Long term advertising benefits

When a brand is sold to a consumer along with an item of promotional merchandise what the brand manager is doing is ensuring that the consumer remembers the brand long after the sale has been made. A prime example of this is when a supermarket offers its consumers to spend £x to receive a free 'coin replacement shoppers keyring'. The benefits are two-fold; it encourages the shopper to spend to a certain level to receive the gift, in addition the keyring is generally kept with the consumers household keys or car keys. Each time the consumer goes shopping and does not have a £1 coin for their shopping trolley, the keyring comes to the rescue as it is the same size and shape as a £1 coin and can be used in the lock on the shopping trolley. This can create long-term advertising benefits just by offering the keyring.

3 - Providing additional & useful products/services

The marketer wants to show the consumer that the brand they buy extends into other similar areas of the consumer's life. Using a 'gift with purchase', as a marketing mechanism, can lead to meet this need in so much as the brand offers the consumer more than just the product itself. A classic example of a 'gift with purchase' is in the cosmetics arena. For example, when a consumer is faced with a myriad of lipsticks or make-up brush sets to choose from, a free cosmetic mirror or make-up bag as a 'gift with purchase' will ensure that 1) the brand is purchased by the consumer, initially and 2) the gift, which carries the brand's logo, is useful to the recipient.

4 - Removes price element from purchasing decision for the buyer

If a product sold at retail carries some promotional merchandise it can increase the value of the brand. This is because the consumer considers the promotional merchandise product as in addition to their chosen brand. Therefore, this tactic could lower the reason to reject the brand based upon price alone.

5 - Rewards the consumer for loyalty

How do Marketing Managers lock in customers? Creating loyalty can be difficult to achieve, however, by offering a simple promotional merchandise product can create loyalty in the eyes of the consumer. An example of this could be a subscription gift offered to a consumer for subscribing to a series of twelve magazines. Again if the premium offered is clever and useful, with a high-perceived value, it will provide another reason for the consumer to keep subscribing in order to receive the latest new gift offered.

In conclusion, using promotional merchandise in your marketing plans can lead to an increase in sales of the brand, ensure loyalty, reduce the price element as a buying consideration, provide additional and useful products/services to your consumers and, lastly, ensure that your consumers carry your logo with them as ongoing advertising for you long after the sale has been completed.