Top 3 giveaways and promotional products for 2021

“The era of the ballpoint pen, the USB stick and the rest is over!” No, of course it is not. Traditional promotional products still have their place too. The question is: are these promotional products doing their job? To answer that, you first have to think about the concrete goal behind using your giveaways. We have assessed our top 3 giveaways and promotional products for 2020/2021 against the criteria of brand awareness, usefulness, wow effect, cost and service life. For comparison, the all-time classic among promotional products is judged by the same criteria.

If you want to be “top of mind” with your audience, the ballpoint pen is probably not the promotional gift of choice. If, on the other hand, you want to encourage people to write by hand — which could well make sense for a manufacturer of writing materials — then it probably is. Remember: a promotional product is not simply good or bad in itself, it is the goal behind it that decides. And as there are proportionally fewer manufacturers of writing materials than there are branded ballpoint pens in circulation, we present our top 3 alternative and above all innovative giveaways for 2020/2021 below.

4 key questions for an effective promotional product

With a giveaway, a company should above all try to stay in its audience's memory in a positive way. That requires the giveaway to suit the company and its service. These are the most important questions to ask yourself before buying any promotional product:

• Does the giveaway carry the emotions you want to your audience?
• Do the company's service and the promotional product fit together thematically?
• Does the giveaway have a particular use? Does it solve a concrete problem?
• Would I be pleased with this promotional product myself (putting myself in the audience's place)?

If you can answer all these questions positively, you can assume the giveaway or promotional product is worth the investment. In short: the purchase will pay off for the company sooner or later (positive effects on image and turnover).

For the giveaway and promotional product ideas below we assume the classic company goal of “standing out, being top of mind” — without taking the company's industry or service into account.

1. The phone ring

This trendy gadget is certain to draw attention, and not only among friends. The smartphone is, after all, omnipresent in our daily lives. A phone ring is not just a nice accessory, though — first and foremost it is simply useful. It makes holding the smartphone safely easier, can be used as a practical smartphone stand (to watch videos, for instance) and offers a new and entertaining user experience; ideal conditions, then, for using the phone ring as an innovative giveaway with your logo.

High brand awareness

Many conventional promotional products have a rather modest service life. But once the phone ring is attached to the smartphone, it usually stays there for a long time — and your brand with it — and remains visible. Please note: quality differs enormously with this product. With poor quality the promotional product can quickly achieve the opposite (broken smartphones).

Assessment of the phone ring (as a promotional product with a logo)

1. Brand awareness 2. Usefulness

3. Wow effect 4. Cost 5. Service life

2. The webcam cover

Who does not know them? The colourful Post-its or strips of tape on the laptops in the university lecture hall. Why complicated when it can be simple and much more elegant? The answer is called a webcam cover.

It is a smart little slider that is stuck over the camera of a laptop, tablet or smartphone. It solves two problems at once: on the one hand it simply looks better, it is permanent and it puts an end to worn-out Post-its. On the other, privacy is effectively protected. The little slider stays nicely closed, of course, except during a video call, when it can simply be pushed open.

Useful, affordable, innovative: the ideal item to hand out

This gadget works as an affordable promotional product not only because it solves a problem in an innovative way, but also because your brand is highly visible on it — and therefore top of mind. We do, after all, spend a fair amount of time at the laptop these days.

Another big advantage of this smart giveaway is that the packaging can be branded along with it (at Twing). That lets companies place their messages to best effect and deliver a completely thought-through product in their own corporate design.

Assessment of the webcam cover (as a promotional product with a logo)

1. Brand awareness 2. Usefulness

3. Wow effect 4. Cost 5. Service life

3. The wallet or card holder

Admittedly, the idea is not a world first. Done right, a small, elegant purse or a mini card wallet is an ideal (premium) client gift, and therefore takes third place in our best promotional products of 2018/2019.

As a somewhat more expensive promotional gift, it is not a classic giveaway. For certain industries — security or finance, for instance — it works particularly well as a high-quality client gift. It is best handed over in person in a small gift box, which can be branded as well.

The logo branding is what decides

For special occasions such as Christmas in particular, this personal promotional gift is something rather special. What matters is that the logo is engraved discreetly. On a wallet above all, large-scale branding can put people off. The goal, after all, is for the wallet to be genuinely used in daily life and to give the client pleasure for many years. Imagine the positive word of mouth about your brand, possibly for years.

Assessment of the wallet (as a promotional product with a logo)

1. Brand awareness 2. Usefulness

3. Wow effect 4. Cost 5. Service life

4. The ballpoint pen

As a reference and for comparison, we assess the (still) most widespread and therefore most popular promotional product below against the same 5 criteria: it is still the classic ballpoint pen. #nohate

Assessment of the ballpoint pen (as a promotional product with a logo)

1. Brand awareness 2. Usefulness

3. Wow effect 4. Cost 5. Service life

About Twing

Twing has set itself the goal of saving the world from bad promotional products. Together with companies we develop the best giveaways. Find out more about Twing.