There are many reasons why you may choose to use promotional gifts as part of a marketing plan. Whether you are introducing new products, thanking customers for support, or even motivating your own staff for their dedication, promotional gifts remain popular among recipients. Tradeshows are the best venues for distributing promotional merchandise, as the audiences there are always receptive to receiving free items.

Which item to select as a promotional gift is a bit complex. Here, a number of factors come into play. Your industry, your area of service, your clientele, geographical area where you do business are some of the basic considerations that determine the selection. However, the most important determinant is usability. In other words, it has repeatedly been observed that that usable items as promotional items have scored higher than promotional items that look good but are not useful. In other words, the value that you deliver through your promotional items matters.

Promotional pens are a good choice for distributing and are most likely the widely used corporate gift today. They can be purchased in a variety of materials and styles, some may have lights, some may have other attractive features. But make sure the pens you purchase are the best quality pens you can afford. You don’t want your company to be remembered as the one which distributed pens that ran out of ink in a week.

If you are planning to make your promotional marketing endeavor more innovative, you may consider delivering promotional mouse mats. Not as common as promotional pens, mouse mats too can serve as an excellent tool for brand awareness. In fact, promotional mouse mats have a number of advantages over pens. First, mouse mats are bigger enough to display your marketing message in a much more visible way than a pen. Secondly, mouse mats are more target oriented than pens. You can distribute promotional pens to everyone but not mouse mats. Your customers will even prefer to have a mouse mat to promotional pens, which they already have in plenty.

Whichever promotional gift you choose do distribute, make sure it is pertinent and appropriate for the clients you are giving it to. Not everyone can use a mouse mat, so be aware of that, unless virtually all of your audience operates computers. The whole concept of giving promotional merchandise is to say thank you to your customers. If you give them something that is useless, your money will have been wasted.