1. What are Corporate Gifts?

Corporate gifts is a communication medium that uses a useful article to put your name and sales message in your prospect's office or home, car or truck, pocket or purse, to help you increase sales of your product or service. It could be a pen, mug, calendar, umbrella or one of over a thousand others that are available to you from us to help meet specific marketing objectives. Corporate gifts is synergistic with other media (the total effect is greater than the sum of its parts) because corporate gifts adds the benefits of a long life and multiple exposure to the marketing program. It repeats the advertising message each time the product is used, without extra cost per exposure.

The results achieved by corporate gifts defend the theory of "give and you shall receive".

BenzGifts would love the opportunity to work with you and assist you in the 'giving' part, so that your organization can reap the 'receiving' benefits.

The power of "free" is undeniable. Whether it's a giveaway at a tradeshow, an in-store freebie, or a fun gift for your employees, giving out something for nothing is a proven way for your business to get people's attention.

Corporate gifts are almost always emblazoned with your company's logo and/or message for maximum effect. They can be great tools to generate name recognition and create customer or employee goodwill, often at very little cost. They're popular in all types of industries, from construction and service trades to academic and government.

Almost any business can benefit from the right corporate gift, but you need to get the right item for the right price. This FAQ will introduce you to the process of selecting and buying corporate gifts for your business.

2. How are corporate gifts used?

Since corporate gifts can be used alone, or integrated with other media, there are virtually limitless ways to use them. They are popularly used as business gifts; employee relations; orientation programs; corporate communications; and at trade shows to generate booth traffic.

They are also effective for dealer/distribution programs; generating new customers or new accounts; nonprofit fundraising; public awareness campaigns; and for promotion of brand awareness and brand loyalty. Other uses include employee incentive & motivation programs; occupational safety programs; new product or service introduction; and marketing research for survey and focus group participants.

3. Corporate gifts pros and cons

When used correctly, corporate gifts can have a positive impact for almost any company. Here are some of the benefits, as well as a couple of potential pitfalls to avoid.

Benefits of corporate gifts

Because people love freebies, corporate gifts have a value far beyond their cost. This is particularly true when they become something the recipient uses on an ongoing basis: a RM5 coffee mug can provide constant reinforcement of your brand if a customer uses it every morning, and corporate clothing turns your recipients into walking advertisers for your business!

Flexibility is one of the key features of corporate gifts. They can work within different budgets and as part of many types of programs, and can be given to any audience: customers, prospects, dealers, employees, and suppliers. You can also easily tie them to other marketing efforts, either as incentives for desired actions or as branding tools . And the actual product itself can be almost anything.

The benefits of corporate gifts as marketing tools are well established. Studies have proven time and time again that corporate gifts increase response rates, encourage repeat/return business, improve direct mail/advertising responses, boost brand recognition, and create more favorable impressions of your company.

Drawbacks of corporate gifts

To achieve the best results, a corporate gifts campaign must be carefully planned . No matter how "cool" or compelling the giveaway item is, you have to have a plan in place to publicize the promotion, distribute the product, and measure the results of your campaign. Starting with a small, focused campaign can help you get a handle on how to be successful with corporate gifts.

In addition, the gift you choose may carry restrictions as to the size and colors of the logo and other printing you can apply, which can put a damper on your plans. However, these types of restrictions are usually fairly easy to work around – simply switch to a gift that allows more imprinting or scale back the amount of printing you want to do on each item.

Getting your customized items produced also takes some time . Depending on the items you choose and the manufacturer's workload, you might get your products in a few days, or it might take eight weeks. If you're planning on using your items at a specific event, make sure you leave enough time to get them produced. Be especially careful in the last two months of the year: many businesses order holiday gifts for customers and employees, making the end-of-year rush a big one for the corporate gifts industry.

4. Choosing the right corporate gifts

Anything a logo can fit on can be a suitable corporate gift. The challenge can be narrowing down your choices to just a few, when there are so many different types of gifts that you could use. Here are some of the major categories and their relative advantages and disadvantages.

Clothing – the most popular category for corporate gifts. Corporate T-shirts are the most common, and other popular items include caps, sports jackets, tracksuits, and more.

•  Pro: free advertising, popularity, great for employee items.

•  Con: styles change, ordering multiple sizes can be hard, sometimes costly, items are seasonal.

Office gifts – paper weights, name card holders, pen holders, stress balls, photo holders, sticky notes, even USB flash drives, anything designed to be used at the office.

•  Pro: many items are very cheap, used in the office environment where you want your message

•  Con: popularity may make it hard to stand out; high-end items expensive

Useful items – diaries, coffee mugs, pens, calendars, bags – can be for the office or the home

•  Pro: everyone uses them, good branding opportunities

•  Con: can get used at home or by kids, outside your target audience

Food – includes chocolate, fruit baskets, candy, gums, coffee, and more.

•  Pro: wide range of costs, appreciated by most people.

•  Con: limited duration, allergen problems

These are just a few examples -- the variety is nearly endless, including calculators, crystal, pewter, wristbands, umbrellas, watches and perfume. You can find anything ranging from serious and useful to amusing and silly. With all the options, it's worth spending some time to make the right choice. The best corporate gifts effectively associate your company's name with an item related to your industry.

For example, a financial services company that wants to build customer loyalty might have success with pocket-sized solar calculators. A car repair shop may want to give away tire pressure gauges with a logo and phone number. And a popular choice for technology-driven businesses is mouse pads with colorful logos.

People are known to shop on impulse- buying an item just because it is on sale, or purchasing something because it looks great in the store. When shopping for corporate gifts, you really can't succumb to impulses. Instead, you must carefully decide on an item that will help meet your objectives.

A college admissions representative who worked with the secondary school market once wanted to buy magnets to give to prospects. Although magnets were in the budget, they would not really do the job of spreading the word among other secondary school students, as the magnets would be at home on the fridge where maybe a handful of other students would see. A better idea was to give out day planners or diaries (only to enrolled students) that they could carry to school everyday where hundreds of classmates could see. "Oh- that's where I'm going to study after SPM/STPM" they would say when asked about the college's name on the planner. Jona, the rep, was hurt that the magnets she liked did not get ordered. But, Jona does not have a marketing background and she didn't understand that these items served another purpose.

So, when ordering your items before you even browse the pages of catalogs or websites, you want to have some objectives in mind. You would not want to invest money in an item that doesn't match the tactic. Think about these:

-Do you want to stimulate trade show traffic?

-Do you want to use these as sales aids?

-Are these going to be premiums?

-Are you introducing a new product/service?

-Do you want to thank current customers?

-Are these for an event giveaway / door gifts?

-Are these to motivate employees?

-Are you trying to gain back lost business?

-Are you trying to improve customer service?

-Are you using them to supplement a direct mail campaign?

These are just a few questions you will want to ask yourself. If you are looking to supplement a general direct mail campaign, you will want to keep postage costs in mind. Perhaps mailing a magnet, sticker, pocket calendar, pen or pencil would be something good to use. You would not want to mail a t-shirt or mug- that would be very pricey for the response rate of direct mail! If you are doing a campaign to target past customers or are just doing a smaller-gauge mailing, perhaps something a little bigger would work.

On the flipside, if you are looking at motivating employees or thanking customers, chances are you will want to budget more money per item. However, there is likely to be fewer items ordered. A pen would not be ample to thank someone for years of service or business! Items for these categories would fall under desktop accessories, plaques, acrylic awards, clocks, engraved items and more.

If you are using these items for sales purposes, perhaps if you have traveling sales people, you will want something that will be left behind to keep your name on top of the mind. Things like a note cube or coffee mug are things that can sit on a decision-makers desk for a long time.

If you are looking to promote your business at an event, such as a concert or festival, passing out t-shirts could be a great idea. You can easily tie t-shirts up in knots and throw them to the crowds. Lower expense items for events could be things like pens, pencils, keychains, wristbands, badges, magnets, calendars, tape measures and more.

Finally, cost is something to keep in mind too. You don't want to spend the same amount on a prospect as you would on a loyal customer. Use this as a suggestion:

Under RM5 - Prospect

RM5 – RM25 - Reward

Over RM25- Loyalty

The important thing here is that corporate gifts should not be ordered just because you like it. The item should clearly be in the plan to help meet your business objectives. In many cases, it's possible to obtain custom items that aren't found in any catalog, so if you have a unique idea, don't hesitate to bring it up with us.

5. Distributing Corporate Gifts

Distribution of a corporate gift is as important as the item itself. Research shows that a carefully executed distribution plan significantly increases the effectiveness of corporate gifts. For example, a pre-trade show mailing to a select audience delivers more trade show traffic and qualified leads than simply distributing items to passerby at the trade show.

6. Artwork and logo

Once you choose the corporate gifts you want, you'll need to supply your logo to us for imprinting. Sending the logo file via email is fairly straightforward, but getting the right type of file in the first place can be a challenge.

First, it's important to know that the logo used on your web site is not sufficient for the job. It may be the wrong format, the wrong size, not detailed enough, or all three. Sending non-standard graphics can result in delays and additional charges when we have to covert the file for you before printing your corporate gifts.

As you get into the world of digital artwork, you'll need to know the difference between vector and raster files. Vector artwork is easily scaled up and down without loss of quality, while raster artwork quickly gets “blocky” and jagged as it's enlarged. Raster file formats like JPEG and GIF are standard on the Web, but usually aren't acceptable for imprinting.

The files you send need to supply the correct color information for the printing of your logo. We may ask for RGB, CMYK, or PANTONE color , depending on the type of printing your project calls for. And the images will need to have an adequate resolution. Most web images have a resolution of only 72 DPI (dots per inch), but imprinting promo items works best with 300 DPI or higher.

This may seem like a lot of details, but to someone familiar with graphic file formats, it's all routine. The main point you should come away with is that to get the best results from an imprinted corporate gift, your images should be prepared by a qualified professional using graphics software like Adobe Illustrator or CorelDraw . Preferably, files should be converted to curve (select all words + ctrl Q ) and saved in .ai format . You may be able to copy an image file into Microsoft Word and make it look good on screen, but you won't wind up with satisfactory results.

7. Pricing

Pricing for corporate gifts varies enormously depending on what items you choose. Prices can range from under RM1 per item for simple magnets and pens to RM10 to RM30 for t-shirts, calculators, and leather diaries, to RM100 or more for USB drives and lavish gift baskets. Knowing the price per item that you're shooting for will help you narrow down your choices to a manageable range.

As with any bulk order, your per-item price for corporate gifts gets lower as your quantity increases. These discounts are tiered at pre-set levels, so be sure to ask what quantity you would need to order to get the next price break: you can always distribute a few more of your items.

In addition to the per-item cost, most manufacturers of corporate gifts require a set-up fee of RM30 to RM100 to prepare your order. Many will also have a minimum order, which can range from as little as 50 pieces to as much as 1000 pieces.

If you don't supply the right type of artwork, we may levy an expensive per-hour charge for converting your files into a usable format. If you don't have a graphics person on staff, you will save money by using a freelancer to prepare your files.

Whatever you decide, make sure you're getting the most for your money while not resorting to using shoddy materials. After all, whether it's a baseball cap or a desktop accessory, the end result will be a tangible symbol of your company. Make it worthy of your company's logo.

8. Shipping and Delivery

Depending on the gifts you choose and the manufacturer's workload, production and printing of your gifts may be ready in a few days, or it might take as long as eight weeks. If you're planning on using your items at a specific event, make sure you leave enough time to get them produced, and then shipped to you. Kindly refer to us on the exact date of delivery.

Various modes of shipment are available i.e. sea freight, air freight, lorry transport and courier service. The mode of shipment to use will depend on:

a) the volume & weight of your gifts,

b) your location

c) the urgency to use your gifts

d) your budget

We shall be most happy to advise on the most appropriate and economical mode of shipment for your gifts.

9. Payment

50% down payment upon order confirmation before production/printing begins & 50% payment before delivery of your gifts.

Production and delivery can only be effected after the clearance of your cheque. Kindly email or fax your bank-in slips to us for reference.

Company name : BenzGifts

Bank: Public Bank (Sibu)

A/c no. 312 847 2526

10. Samples

Upon order confirmation, and depending on your order volume and urgency, an actual sample of your gift with your logo imprinted usually can be prepared for your visual confirmation.

If a sample is required prior to order confirmation, we will charge a nominal sum to cover the product and freight costs, which are refundable once your order is confirmed.

11. Buying Tips

Avoid the rush. If possible, give yourself at least three weeks from start to finish to ensure the smooth production of your gifts. Please allocate more time for very large or highly customized orders. Rush services will cost you more, as delivery will have to be by courier service, and manufacturers may charge a premium for overtime production runs.

Choose your gift carefully. Don't choose your gift based on the latest trend, or on the rock-bottom price. The right gift will have value to your target audience and help you achieve the results you want.

Promote from within. Giving employees logo t-shirts or baseball caps can be a great way to increase external brand awareness while also building company loyalty.

Planning pays. Developing a consistent theme for your promotion and preparing a detailed distribution strategy will maximize the impact of the gifts. Get some feedback. Test a sample of the corporate gift you're considering on members of your intended audience. You may get valuable information, for example that the gift you picked was the top giveaway at a recent tradeshow, or that while your employees enjoy working for you, they may not be interested in clothes made in the company colors.