It’s a funny concept. Asking a prospect, customer, member or supplier to wear your brand sounds ridiculous, unless you’re a Nike or Manchester United. So why then do thousands of companies spend money on branded promotional products every year with the specific intention of encouraging people to wear their brand. This may entail wearing t-shirts, custom hats, pair of socks, sweatbands, a headband or lanyards. Anything from a construction company, to an accountant or a pet shop, will take a chance that you might be willing to become a walking billboard. Read more on Custom Hats and the Art of Wearing a Brand.
The branding and awareness benefits to a company are obvious – having someone walking around wearing your brand, in whatever product you see fit, is a tremendously powerful marketing statement. It’s a living, breathing, in your face, advocate for your company, your brand and your services. By choosing to wear your brand a customer, member, supplier etc is announcing to the world “this company is awesome, buy things from this company, I do and I’m awesome too!”.
But why would someone choose to wear branded promotional products like this? The first answer is simple and not the most flattering… we’re all suckers for free stuff! It’s true. Here at AAC we have a small glass bowl full of AAC branded lanyards and silicone wristbands and we find ourselves re-stocking it every Monday. And to be honest, we really don’t have a huge amount of walk in traffic, we look after the majority of our customers online and by phone and email. But the products are right there, screaming at the visitor ‘take me, I’m free, you never know when you might need me!”. And they do.
The same is true of other traditional merchandise items like hats, shirts etc. If they’re free, we take them. At a golf day last year sponsored by the Gold Coast Titans, one of the holes was sponsored by a stretch Hummer company and instead of staffing the display they simply left a range of free t-shirts out for the golfers to take. We may have been the 5th group through and the carnage that greeted us when we arrived was of epic proportions; people had ransacked the display for the right size, colours etc and no doubt had taken extras for their wives, kids etc. A free t-shirt display, evidently, does not bring out the best in humanity!
But did I grab t-shirts for myself and my wife? Yes, yes I did. It was free after all!
Custom Hats and the art of wearing a brand
Custom hats are one of the most popular promotional giveaways in the world, especially in climates with sunny weather. They combine two important factors that attract people:
1. They are functional
2. They are fashionable
Sport teams will often include hats in their membership packs because the members receiving them have a very high likelihood of wearing the hat often. It provides exceptional exposure for the brand, especially in towns where multiple teams and sports may be fighting for market share. The added benefit for a sport team, for instance, is that often the colour is a major brand association device – we associate gold and purple with the LA Lakers, Red with Manchester United etc. What a sports club wants is to see a wave of colour when the team appears on TV, and these kinds of giveaways allow this to happen.
At an Australian Wallabies game last year, Rugby Australia decided to hand out yellow body suits to everyone who wanted them. I already had my Wallabies jersey on so managed to refrain from wearing mine, but my wife immediately put hers on, becoming entirely yellow in the process. It was more like a radioactive lab suit than anything else, but with 50% of the crowd participating and wearing the suits, the spectators on TV saw a wall of yellow, which makes for great TV and encourages people at home to perhaps attend the game in person next time.
Hats are ideal as a promotional product because they are immediately visible to anyone else near the wearer. With the right customisation, a brand can be printed on the front, sides and back, creating a 360 degree billboard.
The keys to making sure your brand is worn
Of course, whilst we are all pretty keen to get our hands on free merchandise, we do have standards. For a company looking to turn their brand in to a wearable brand, it’s important that a few key rules are followed:
Rule 1: Use a product that is popular within your target market. Giving out free bandanas to advertise your nursing home might not quite hit the right buttons.
Rule 2: Use a quality product. Going for something cheap and cheerful might sound like a good idea at the time but remember, your brand is represented on the product and therefore so is your reputation. The last thing you want associated with your brand is a t-shirt with a lopsided logo and faded colour, or custom hats that are too small and have stitching coming off at all angles.
Rule 3: Don’t go on the offensive. You don’t want to offend people with a misunderstood joke or something else that could associate your brand with the wrong feelings. For maximum benefit, go simple with popular colours like white and black, and with your logo or message displayed tastefully.
Rule 4: Whilst keeping the above rules in mind, try to be creative in some way. A clever word play or memorable message goes a long way to ensuring your branded gear is worn.
Rule 5: Don’t forget to mention who you are! It’s a common mistake that a lot of companies make; whilst your name and brand might make a lot of sense to you, for someone who has never heard of you, you will need to explain who and what you are. I once saw custom hats branded to “Silverstar Service – your expert in service” alongside a big silver star. To this day, I have no idea what they did. Include a mention of your core product or service alongside a phone number and website URL. You may as well give people a chance to find you!
Branded promotional products can become wearable advertising – just do it right. Talk to AAC for more ideas on how to achieve this.
For more articles like, Custom Hats and the Art of Wearing a Brand, subscribe to our FREE mailing list. Updated regularly, you’ll never miss a beat!
