Are you about to go to your company’s next tradeshow, business expo or job fair and want to make sure you catch attendees’ attention? Planning to put some free branded swag out for passersby in the hopes that some of them will either stop for some good old-fashioned networking or at least remember your company’s name later — instead of just scooping up your offered merch and making off without a word?
If we’re right on the money here, you’ve come to the right place. At Integra, we guide roughly 60 businesses per year through selecting the right promotional products based on a number of critical factors like their industry, audience, event type and budget. What we usually start with, especially when our customers are heading to their first event, are the mistakes they should avoid.
In this article, we’ll discuss six major mistakes companies make with their promos and how you can avoid each one of them. Whether you’ve done this 100 times or you’re a startup hitting your first tradeshow to get your name out there, you’ll have a better time knowing you’re armed with the right tactics — and more importantly, the right products — for networking success.
1. Not Matching Attendee Quantity to Your Merchandise Numbers
Unless it’s a ticketed event, you’ll never be able to know exactly how many people will show up to any given expo. But what you can do is get as close as possible in your estimates. Some factors to consider that will help you get a realistic headcount include:
- Social media response
- Attendance numbers for prior events
- Time of day
- Time of week
- Amount of advertising coverage
- Population of the region
- Percentage of population the event caters to
- Other events happening at the same time
You want to try to get your estimate as close as possible, and you’ll likely get better at approximating these numbers the more you attend promotional events. Try to make sure each attendee could take one of each promotional item offered at your table, plus a few extras so there’s no sweat on the big day.
If you undershoot the goal, you could find yourself in the last hour of the event without much, if anything, to offer people who drop by. If you overshoot it, you’ll be stocked up with promo items that have nowhere to call home.
2. Choosing the Same Promo Swag as Last Year
Let’s say you hit it out of the park at a job fair with some fun, timeless promotional products that audiences love. For instance, let’s say you brand a stress ball shaped like a teddy bear to promote your new yarn business. It’s adorable, people love it and you’re hungry for that same response at the event when it comes up a year later.
Here’s the thing: If you show up with the same products, you may find that people come to your stand and comment on the fact that nothing is new. Sure, visitors who didn’t attend the previous year will love the stress teddy. But others may stop by and excitedly check your merch to see what new and fun designs you’ve come up with, only to be disappointed when they find the same product they already have at home.
Avoiding this common mistake doesn’t mean you have to reinvent the wheel. You could do nearly the same thing, but choose different shapes, colors or functions. If you were to stick to stress balls, try a llama or fish next time. You may even find that people get amped up to build their collection!
3. Printing the Year on Your Branded Promos
This kind of makes sense if you’re attending a super special event that emphasizes the year, like a 100th anniversary expo. But even then, you don’t necessarily need to add the date and year.
In the first mistake section in this article, we mentioned that you should avoid overstocking your table because you’ll end up with lots of leftovers and nowhere for them to go. We stand by that advice, but you’re better off having too much than not enough, especially if your goal is reach. At least with extras, you can repurpose your promos in some way. You could have a special giveaway from your store, or mail them out in packages if a customer orders a certain amount of product from you.
As long as you don’t print the date on them.
If you do print the date, you’ll be giving your merch an expiration date. Customers will know you were just clearing out old stock if you mail them a product dated for last year, so why not skip the date altogether? It doesn’t do much for your branding, and it can even reduce the chances of attendees holding onto your branded products once the date has passed.
4. Selecting Promos That Don’t Jive With the Event, Audience and Brand
Okay, this one we get. It’s hard to look at a giant list of potential promos and choose based on the circumstances, especially when something really cool jumps off the page.
But if you’re going to a business expo with hundreds of high-profile professionals in an older demographic, you might not want to show up with a bunch of bags of branded Skittles. If you’re there to promote your dental services, you especially don’t want to show up with a bag of branded Skittles.
And if you’re hitting a family-centered parade with lots of kids, maybe skip the toothbrushes and aim for something a little more fun, like lip balm or, on a hot day, branded mini fans.
It doesn’t mean you have to pigeonhole your own efforts, but it does mean that you should be aware of how your branded merch represents your brand and appeals to the expected audience. The good news is that you can brand almost anything, so even if the options feel limited, you can absolutely find the perfect product for the context if you just do a little digging.
5. Hopping on a Promotional Trend Too Late
While this one may seem obvious, it can be easy to accidentally brand a bunch of items that have gone out of style. Maybe you’ll bring them back from the dead, but more likely, if you choose an item that was trendy last season and isn’t so much now, you’ll have lackluster interest from passersby and find yourself with lots of leftover products and no idea what to do with them.
One example of this phenomenon in the promotional space is fidget spinners. Some people still love them, of course, but for the most part, the hype has died down. Anyone who wanted one probably already has ten, and it seems that the fidget spinner hay day has come and gone.
Trends can change rapidly from year to year, season to season or even month to month. Fortunately, there are three great ways to avoid a miscalculation of what’s hot on the market:
- Avoid planning too far in advance, then do your research. Choose a reasonable time frame that allows you to get your preferred materials on time but doesn’t leave room for trends to creep off the stage. Before ordering your custom promos, dive into online research and maybe even check out a similar event to the one you’re planning, but as an attendee. What are people flocking toward? Which items are flying off the merch table? Those products will be your winners.
- Work with a print management company that has the trends down pat. Any print broker or promotional product provider worth their salt will keep up with the current active trends, and they should be willing to steer you in the right direction. For instance, at Integra, we get a full catalog of trending promotional products once a month from our primary vendor. Along with our online research, we make sure at least one expert on the team reads through it cover to cover to keep best practices and best products top of mind. Whoever your supplier is, make sure they understand the nuances of your event, audience and company, and they should serve you well in the selection process.
- Consider products that don’t go out of style. We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: Certain branded merchandise is simply timeless. Pens, bags and stationary never go out of style, no matter how many cool, techy gadgets enter the scene. If you’re stuck on trying to find the trendiest item, maybe it’s time to go the classic route instead.
The bottom line is that you want people to flock to your table, learn about your business, grab some freebies and have an overall positive experience. Bonus points if they show off their cool new swag or get enjoyment out of it for months or even years to come! But that doesn’t happen with an old, tired trend that the masses have abandoned.
6. Offering Every Visitor a Fancy Promotional Giveaway
The reality of job fairs, expos, tradeshows and similar events is that some people show up just for the free goods. Others will be there for a purpose that doesn’t at all align with what you have on display. Don’t let it get you down — and don’t try to build a budget that covers a fancy mug or branded Bluetooth speaker for every single passerby.
Your budget will stretch a lot further if you stick with low-cost, high-appeal items that you can afford to brand and purchase in bulk for the event. It can be tempting to be the tradeshow equivalent of the neighborhood house giving out full-size candy bars each Halloween, but aiming for that goal is a surefire way to unnecessarily overspend.
So how do you work around this clash of priorities?
Keep a small stock of big-ticket gifts tucked away and out of sight. When you encounter potential clients and customers who seem like a genuine good fit, pull one of those special products out and gift it to them during your conversation as you let them know that you’d love to learn more about them or work with them after the event. It’ll be a huge compliment to the prospect, and the bad-fit attendees will be none the wiser as they leave with your other perfectly good but less expensive branded swag.
Avoid Pitfalls and Gain Maximum Promotional Reach With Your Branded Merchandise
So there you have it — the top six “oops” decisions that many companies make in their promotional efforts. And now that you know about these sometimes small, sometimes large errors in judgment, you can steer clear of them in your own events planning.
We’re hoping you have some good ideas in mind now that you’ve learned some of the best practices in the promo space. Now, you might be thinking about where to get those killer products and who can make your logo look just right on each one. We invite you to learn more about what it’s like with Integra Graphics Synergy so that you can decide if we’d be a good fit as your procurement and print partners in this process.
Ready to start shopping for your own promotional gear and getting it branded just right? If you want to dive right in and think Integra is the right business to carry out your big plans, click below to get started with one of our top promotional experts!
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