Promotional Marketing: A Boon For Consumers
Does anyone else feel guilty when they keep the pen that a charity has posted thru the door, but then you don’t help the charity? I’m sure it’s not just me. It’s just one of those cheap, promotional items that feeds on our guilt. For weeks afterwards, I use the pen, knowing I threw the letter appealing for funds in the bin. What sort of monster am I? The pens are usually of low quality but that’s not the point.
The commercial world use freebies as a marketing tool. I frequently get cheap promotional items such as sachets of washing powder or shampoo thru the door. This is to entice me to buy the product. I normally use the item and then forget all about it, so this strategy is wasted on me.
Companies like insurance and pensions seem obsessed with getting you to sign up with them, with the promise of a carriage clock. They are hideous cheap promotional items but we’re expected to clamor for them. They are often offered by firms that specialize in savings for funeral expenses. That’s really what you want when considering your demise, isn’t it, a clock for the countdown!
Corporations must spend millions on pens, mugs, calendars, lighters etc. as cheap, promotional items. They have the company name and logo in their bid to build up friendly relations with potential customers. You soon end up with a whole cupboard of the things. The only thing I really keep is corkscrews.
Every magazine and newspaper these days seems to want to give away something. The cheap, promotional items in the newspapers are usually DVDs or CDs of something that everyone grew weary of, decades before. Magazines freebies tend to be better, except for the teenage magazines. Their promotions often involve something tacky like a plastic bracelet.
My favorite promotion is food. I like it when I walk into my local supermarket and a nice lady is standing with a tray, waiting to serve me a sample of a new line. These are cheap promotional items for the retailer if they persuade me to buy a big packet of the stuff, which has sometimes happened. I was once given a little scoop of desert and just had to buy a tub of it to take home. Then there are the pastries, little slivers of cake or a new sausage flavor. That’s much better than a pen that doesn’t work properly.
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