Gautam Budh Nagar, Uttar Pradesh -- (SBWIRE) -- 09/01/2010 -- The key place for any promotional merchandise is on an office desk

As with any approach to gaining new business, if you can get your brand into the office environment of your target, you've got yourself over a massive hurdle. Promotional desk top items can play a key role in this struggle and that's why you should consider which promotional item you choose very carefully. From paper based promotional ideas through to desk top promotional items you need to hit the mark with a promotional product that reflects your business. Get it right and it will stay on the desk…get it wrong and it goes straight in the bin!

So consider the target audience, what they need (and what they may have 100's of!) and what will make that instant impression when they receive it. And as promotional electrical items become more prolific you can broaden your thinking. USB's are increasing in popularity along with desk clocks, promotional lights and calculators.

Get your brand 'out and about' with promotional merchandise

Promotional travel and leisure gifts offer you the opportunity to get out of the office environment and communicate with your target audience in their travel and leisure time.

In 2008 a survey by the Promotional Products Association International (PPAI) conducted a survey of business class travellers at two of America's largest airports, Chicago and Dallas. A massive 72% of the interviewees had in their possession at least one promotional product and, of that group, 73% could recall the advertisers name or message before looking at it. And if you consider these audiences were all sat together for a prolonged period of time, the networking opportunities for your brand are phenomenal.

But we all have leisure time too. So consider your choice of leisure promotional items carefully and see you brand marketed in office-free environments too. Promotional umbrellas are consistently popular as are promotional torches, promotional luggage tags, promotional car accessories such as ice scrapers and promotional golf accessories.

So from promotional bottled water to promotional beauty items at Code Promotional Merchandise you have real opportunity to make promotional merchandise work for you at work and at play.

Demonstrate your social responsibility with eco promotional merchandise

As the pressure on all businesses grows to act responsibly, there is now a growing range of these promotional items have been specifically sourced to allow you to do just that in your marketing. Derived from recycled paper and other materials you will find a wide range of eco-friendly promotional products that grow consistently in range as demand grows. From natural ink based promotional pens and recycled note pads through to organic cotton bags and fair trade clothing, any organisation has ample opportunity to demonstrate its eco credentials via its choice of promotional merchandise from Code Promotional Merchandise.

In retail commerce, visual display merchandising means maximizing merchandise sales using product design, selection, packaging, pricing, and display that stimulates consumers to spend more. This includes disciplines in pricing and discounting, physical presentation of products and displays, and the decisions about which products should be presented to which customers at what time.

This annual cycle of merchandising differs between countries and even within them, particularly relating to cultural customs like holidays, and seasonal issues like climate and local sporting and recreation.

In the United States for example, the basic retail cycle begins in early January with merchandise for Valentine's Day, which is not until mid-February. Following this, Easter is the major holiday, while springtime clothing and garden-related merchandise is already arriving at stores, often as early as mid-winter (toward the beginning of this section, St. Patrick's Day merchandise, including green items and products pertaining to Irish culture, is also promoted). Mothers Day and Fathers Day are next, with graduation gifts (typically small consumer electronics like digital cameras) often being marketed as "dads and grads" in June (though most college semesters end in May; the grads portion usually refers to high school graduation, which ends one to two weeks after Father's Day in many U.S. states). Summer merchandise is next, including patriotic-themed products with the American flag, out by Memorial Day in preparation for Independence Day (with Flag Day in between).

By July, back-to-school is on the shelves and autumn merchandise is already arriving, and at some arts and crafts stores, Christmas decorations. (Often, a Christmas in July celebration is held around this time.) The back-to-school market is promoted heavily in August, a time when there are no holidays to promote. By September, particularly after Labor Day, the summer merchandise is on final closeout and overstock of school supplies is marked-down some as well, and Halloween (and often even more of the Christmas) merchandise is appearing. As the Halloween decorations and costumes dwindle in October, Christmas is already being pushed on consumers, and by the day after Halloween retailers are going full-force with advertising, even though the "official" season doesn't start until the day after Thanksgiving. Christmas clearance sales now begin even before Christmas at most retailers, and continue on at least until New Year's Day but sometimes as far out as February.

Merchandising also varies within retail chains, where stores in places like Buffalo might carry snowblowers, while stores in Florida and southern California might instead carry beach clothing and barbecue grills all year. Coastal-area stores might carry water skiing equipment, while ones near mountain ranges would likely have snow skiing and snowboarding gear if there are ski areas nearby.

There is no better way of passing your promotional message to your customers than through promotional items. Promotional products are many and of varied nature. They can help in many different ways in enabling your organization achieve the people during new product launch. It can also be used as a permanent way of letting the customers know about your product and improving their loyalty to it. Choosing the right promotional merchandise can mean a lot between delivering the intended marketing results and failure to deliver.

A superior material is the one that can easily be passed to those who help in passing the message or those who are interested in the message. They should be fitting your target audience. It is not easy to do so. You will have to do a lot of preparation for that. The requirements of each group should be taken into consideration. If you are targeting the youths, the promotional materials should be stylish enough to make them appreciate using it even after your promotion hence passing the message to many different people even long after your aggressive promotion.

When advertising with promotional items the cost factor should essentially be focused. You will be far from reaching your goals if you adopt expensive promotional items.

It may not make sense in the long term since you will be increasing your expenses by a bigger margin. The items must create the required connection with the intended group since there is no other way of winning them if you do not connect well to them.

For instance, when you select an attractive t-shirt as your choice, then it is expedient. A majority of the viewers would like to wear it. When going about their daily activities they do pass on your message to many people who may be interested in your products. This is the key aspect behind this way of promotion. Further, many people love free things. You can offer the customers and potential customers gifts with your promotional message embossed like a pen with your company name.

Since the pen will be more beautiful than what can be found in the shops, the recipients will tend to love it. The more they use it as often and in varied places the more is the promotion. Hence you will succeed in passing your message.

Promotional merchandise can assist in promoting the publicity of your business to significant levels. When you are planning to use this form of advertisement, it is advisable that you have the promotional items manufactured with the consideration of the requirements of your target clientele. Do not use similar products for youth and the elderly ones since their style and design requirements vary.

Young people will appreciate delightful designs that match the current trend while the old people are a little conservative. With this in mind, you can make merchandise that will help you win the attention of your target audience.

There are all kinds of different fun items that can be for a concert or special event, items such as t-shirts and other clothes, pens, flashlights, key chains, and much more. The fact that the merchandise continues to advertise the event and anything else printed on it is the best part of promotional merchandise. Usually event organiser orders the promotional merchandise long before the event from an online supplier and then this is distributed through stores, people or magazines. There might be a couple of shops available for purchases on the event site, plus an effective way to boost sales is to have merchandisers walk bearing the types of good that can be purchased for a souvenir.

Perhaps the most effective for an event is the basic T-shirt. This is a low cost clothing item that is a very popular item. T-shirts being one of the most popular worn items of clothing but also make fantastic promotion long after the even t is finished. Perhaps you want to put the event name, the artists and the location in full view on the T-shirt, whilst the subject is wearing it with a "I went there" feeling, the event will be advertised to everybody in the vicinity in full view for all to see, gaining maximum exposure for any future events, or to increase exposure of the artists. The T-shirts act as a walking billboard and is a "vote" from that person towards the event for all to see.

There are even less expensive to purchase, so they sell much cheaper, this means that there will be far more buys. Also, by having merchandisers walk around offering these little knick knacks the sales will increase drastically. For example, a flashlight would be a real fun way to unite the crowd at a concert. Everyone will want a flashlight to waive around when the sun sets.

In fact, it is such successful revenue stream that it has been deployed by TV, film and music. You may be surprised to learn that more money has been made from the merchandising of Harry Potter than the sale of books alone.

Promotional merchandise has been utilised by companies not for the sales directly but for the successful advertising achieves.

Merchandise display artists are people who make the attractive displays. They use products, color, lighting and space to attract customers. Stores and retailers hire them. Their job is to build displays, dress mannequins, hang decorations, and construct whole scenes in store windows, on sales floors, and for trade shows. Their responsibility is also to decide how all the store's merchandise should be presented, designing the store's overall layout. Top level Merchandise display artists work in collaboration with corporate marketers to develop display designs for entire chains of stores. They work in corporate head quarters while other top merchandise display artists create the one-of-a-kind, trend-setting designs for the windows and mannequins in high-profile stores. Merchandise display artists display a complete extent or range from high fashion apparel to hardware. They use very diverse techniques to exhibit these products. Merchandise display artists are combination of artistry, marketer, creativity, craftsmanship and a natural talent with in depth knowledge of latest fashion and buying trends of the customer. The initial step of displaying is thinking of an idea that is imagining things. This involves sketching of an idea. Sketch can be made on a computer or by use of simple pen and page. Artists need to work in constant contact with the management people because they have to ensure that their displays promote am image in line with the organization's overall marketing techniques. In contrast to this the merchandise display artists who work in individual stores have more freedom in creating and implementing their own ideas and designs. Thus it becomes necessary for merchandise display artists to promote and market the right product in the right way as these are people who lead market. Also a merchandise display artist who works in chain stores starts with his work downloading the guidelines and design images sent from the corporation's visual design department. Also merchandise display artists should have skills to work on with tools. Like he should know to cut wood or metal or acrylic that he should be able to do basic carpentry, sculpting, and painting. In addition to this they should have knowledge of a huge variety of materials, props, and other embellishments and should be able to use them creatively to achieve the effects they want. As erecting forms major part of store fixtures so they should have the strength and agility to erect the displays and take them down if this is part of their job. Thus in short we can say that job of a merchandise display artists is to understand the organization's marketing strategy and design displays that reflect it, sketch and model proposed displays, find or create props for displays, assemble, maintain, and take down displays, arrange display fixtures and lighting and order merchandising units like racks, mannequins, and shelves.