Planning for a year’s worth of marketing campaigns is an overwhelming task…even for the most organized marketer. We’ve put together a guide on how to pre-plan your promotional items for the coming year, so you’re not leaving it to the last minute to get organised for this year’s events.

Let’s get straight into it…

Take stock of past successes

What campaigns were successful last year?

List out the projects, campaigns and products that worked best in achieving your objectives over the previous year. This will help your company build on that success this year with similar or repeat orders of branded gear.

It’s also useful to list all those great ideas that you’ve always been wanting to include in your marketing mix.

Events

  • Trade shows/ Field Days
  • Webinars
  • Launch events
  • Formal events

Campaigns

  • Lead generation
  • Website traffic
  • Social media competitions
  • etc

Public Relations Campaigns

  • Sponsorships
  • Supported Causes
  • Donations

Giveaways

  • Purchase incentives
  • Rewards
  • Gifts
  • Thank You’s

Once you’ve got the list of projects that were successful you can plan what products you will carry forward to help you reach those 2020 targets.

Be an early bird

Did you have trouble arranging branded products in time for your project launch date last year?  To overcome this put the projects in your calendar, along with reminders a month or more out so you stay ahead of the schedule. Get your branded gear sorted in advance and avoid the stress of having to rush your decisions. This can also save you money with early bird pricing, and gives you unique options because there’s more time to get custom made products created for you.

This is an illustration to show how much difference contacting us early makes:

Scenario 1: Short lead time

Timeline: 3 weeks until the event.

Project: Need to use local stock and embroidery, limited options for colours, design, sizes and branding areas)

Cost: $10.66 per unit

Scenario 2: Good lead time

Timeline: 12 – 14 weeks before the event.

Project: Contacted us early, allows for custom design, colour and extra detailed accents of company branding to be added.

Cost: $6.75 per unit

In Scenario 2, as you can see you get much more control over the design and make a significant savings. If you need the extra reminder send us your events calendar. We can then get in touch with you a couples of months prior to your event so you can get the design process started, with a good lead time and get more flexibility with your promotional products.

Involve the decision makers from the beginning

Involve the decision makers early. They need to be as engaged and excited about the product options as you are, because those products will be creating brand experiences for your clients.

Stay up to date with new ideas

Get a head start by always keeping up to date with the new products available to promote your campaigns and increase the effectiveness of your marketing incentives. By doing this you will also be able to gain valuable ideas and feedback to use in the future projects. We can send new ideas and visuals to you regularly so you have the most relevant ideas for your brand at your fingertips.

Automate as much as you can

Even branded merchandise ordering can be automated these days, with stock reports and inventory counts being sent straight to your inbox. It means you know exactly when you need to revise the product mix, distribute or re-order products. This allows you more time to spend on other marketing activities in 2020!

Final words

Plan ahead and organise in advance for 2020 to leverage the interest of your target market with branded merchandise and convert more leads into sales. Wishing you every success in achieving your goals and marketing strategy in 2020!