Chinese New Year – Year of the Dog

In 2018, Chinese New Year will be celebrated on Friday, February 16.

With a growing Chinese community in the past few years, Chinese New Year is becoming a more and more prevalent celebration of culture and tradition in Australia. Families gather and festivities are held in the Asian communities to welcome the new year in.

With the upcoming Year of the Dog, which signifies fortune, career, health, and love prospects,  this is what we can expect to see as we have seen in the past few decades.

  • Lots of red.
  • Street festivals and markets are bustling with people and noise and displays of food, art and entertainment.
  • The exchange of well wishes and chattering can be heard above the beating of the drums and the cymbals clashing for the lion dances.
  • Occasional firecrackers exploding in the distance.
  • A trade of red pockets/envelopes (which also happens in both a physical and digital environment) and blessings occur between the elders and the young at home
  • A delicious feast is prepared and eaten before families visit the temples to pray for a prosperous future.

So why not join in the celebration by participating or gifting? To the Chinese, gifting is seen as a nice gesture and effort made that shows your level of  involvement. And the key thing to know here is that the Chinese LOVE their red. Anything red will capture their eye and will be kept as a symbol of luck. At Turnkey this is one our favourite times of the year, so we are more than happy to help you with this.

New Year New Budget – Good Marketing practices to bring in the new year.  

Whether you work on a financial year or calendar year, the start of a new year brings a new vitality and refreshed mindset. It’s a good time to review both current and future performance in respect to activity, results and investment/spend.

Healthy marketing practices to bring in the new year:

  1. Where did you enjoy your best results? How can you not just replicate, but do this better? The wheel doesn’t always need to be reinvented. A slight change on a good performer – whether it’s a product or campaign can be very effective.
  2. Reach out to your finance team. Have a bit of healthy sparring session with them. They thinking differently to the marketing team and the collaboration of thinking can bring new ways of managing your marketing dollars.
  3. If things are a little tight, and you didn’t achieve the results you were after, instead of cost cutting as being your first point of call, shift the thinking  to what would we do if we doubled our expenditure expenditure budget. What this does is change your mindset to think a lot wider and deeper, beyond where you currently are. This helps prompt more strategic solutions that can deliver higher returns.
  4. Think quality over quantity. What content is resonating, impacting, cutting through with your audience? Keep doing this. The content that is not having any impact, ask yourself if it’s worth continuing?
  5. Evaluate the correlation between marketing projects and business goals. Are they aligned? Have conversations with other departments. Are you all aligned on the business direction. How can you work even better together in 2018?
  6. Is there an opportunity to enrich your marketing activity – both in respect to content depth and results by collaborating with new partners? Who do you share a similar audience with? Can you mutually benefit from working together through adding value to them?
  7. Spend some time with your current business partners. What are they doing in 2018 to improve their business. What do they think you should be doing in 2018 to improve your? An opportunity for reflection and authentic relationship building.
  8. How, as a marketing team, can you bring an elevated energy level to 2018? More enthusiasm, leads to better ideas, working relationships and results.
  9. Include the key actions from the list above to your weekly marketing meetings, so they don’t become a ‘conversation I remember once having’, but they lead to actionable outcomes that drive marketing and business improvement.

Not Just Another… Beach Towel

Who knew we could change the way we relax at a beach? The rectangle beach towel seems only made for one person use. And then here comes the Round Beach Towel. What’s so good about a beach towel being round? Why has it become a envied beach accessory?

  • More beach coverage – which is good when you find yourself at a packed beach.
  • One towel can suffice two people
  • Enough space to manage fish and chips, computer, bag, beach ball
  • Visibility – for your brand.

It’s the ideal promotional product of the season especially when the Australian Summer means that we have plenty of opportunity to soak up some rays in this heat. On top of that, it is highly Instagrammable when the design aesthetic is captivating and therefore more likely to be included in that beach photo where others can see and will want one for themselves.

A nice alignment with a brand that speaks summer time – fresh, summer, beach, family & friends, enjoyment, carefree.

Not Just Another… Coffee Mug

A great all year round promotional product, hands down. And anyone and everyone loves a coffee mug.

Whilst there’s nothing wrong with a coffee mug with your logo proudly displayed, there are other creative ways you can decorate your mug, ensuring the user will love it.

Coffee mugs can come to life that your customers/clients/staff will love with a little bit of creativity. Things to consider:

  1. Size and weight of the mug
  2. Texture – shiny matte
  3. Material – ceramic, porcelain, china
  4. Number of colours to be printed
  5. Design
  6. Message
  7. Brand presence
  8. Print quality
  9. Price
  10. Delivery Date
  11. How will you deliver it to the receiver?
  12. Can you personalise it?
  13. Quantity and lead-time, with larger quantities custom designs can be produced offshore
  14. Decoration position, consider a lip imprint, decoration on the base or on the inside to reveal your message

Also think about the packaging. How will the gift be received? A bit part of opening anything is the anticipation. Also when working with breakables, plan for the rough handling, so you protect the product as much as possible.

With the increase in digital decoration, there are more options to print coffee mugs with full colour and personalisation … your staff will always be able to find their mug in the staff kitchen cupboard and who doesn’t love receiving a gift with their name on it!

Branding Appears Magically

A thermochromic coffee mug with a unique thermochromic coating, allowing the dishwasher safe wrap, around branding to appear ‘magically’ when hot liquid is added, and then disappear again as it cools. A bit of fun. And it is nicely presented in a black gift box.

The Top 15 Most Popular Promotional Products in 2017

Interestingly, the list doesn’t change much from year to year. The innovation comes through on the application…. adding a twist on an old idea works well!

  1. A5 Notebooks
  2. Sports Bottles – Plastic, Tritan, Stainless Steel, Aluminium and A5 Size
  3. Pencils & Pens – Ballpoint Pens always popular
  4. Takeaway Coffee Cups
  5. Fidget Spinners
  6. Drawstring Backpack
  7. Picnic Blankets
  8. Cooler Bags
  9. Powerbanks
  10. Umbrellas
  11. Tote Bags – Cotton always a winner
  12. Coffee Mugs
  13. Jellybeans
  14. Swivel USB Flash Drives
  15. Bluetooth Speakers

Back to School

A number of large companies love to celebrate back to school, so there is a lot of noise around this time, which makes it even more important to be creative and stand out from the crowd if you want to cut-through. Your products and services may not be specifically targeted to school age students, however, imagine the exposure of your logo to mums, dads, teachers and the future generation. Consider the following questions and perhaps you too could run your own back to school campaign.

  1. Who is your customer – Mums, Dads, Children, Teachers, School Suppliers?
  2. Why would they want to hear from you?
  3. How can your product make their life better?
  4. What is your message?
  5. What channel would you use to get your message across?
  6. How can you reach them?
  7. Who would you close the loop, so they continue their engagement with you?
  8. What will the customer feel about your brand after this experience?

A promotional product is a great way to get your message out there, especially if you do it in
a way that’s unique to your brand and is purposeful for the user.

Not Just Another….. Bag

Tote bags are a dime a dozen. If your brand doesn’t have a tote bag, there’s a good chance you have had discussions about it, or it’s on the to do list. And for good reason – it stops us using plastic bags. Good for the shopping, good for carrying your laptop in, good for the beach, good to take to events.

A good idea made better when the design or the intended usage matches up well with your brand positioning.

What we are liking are clear tote bags. A nice opportunity for brands that want to target people at events, as clear bags have become mandatory at a lot of big venues for security reasons.

So why not tap into this opportunity and leverage your brand engagement in a meaningful and useful way for your audience.

A Direct Route to the Heart

If you go to any office with a cake you are instantly the most loved person in the room. Particularly around 10.30am or 3.30pm. When people typically are thinking about food. It’s not time for lunch yet, but they want a distraction of some sort, and they are feeling food could help on both a physical and emotional level. Unfortunately driving around delivering cakes is not something we can do every day.

A hamper could be the way to go. Yes, there are a lot of daggy hampers out there, but there is also plenty of beautiful gourmet Hampers to choose from. Recently we produced a box of Truffles for a client. And for Christmas, you cannot go past a beautifully wrapped Christmas Pudding.

Whichever way you go, just give some thought to your customers and your business – finding that sweet spot between giving them something they want and something that reflects the type of business you are.

If you need some ideas let’s talk.

The Christmas Gift that Keeps on Giving (and receiving)

When you receive a gift that looks like it has been well thought-through, it’s a good moment for the receiver. You are impressed with the effort someone has gone to. Or the fact that someone knows you well enough to give you a gift that really resonates. A gift that you love so much you can’t stop talking about it.

That’s the receiving bit. Not that this is the intention of giving, but the effect of how a client will feel about you and/or your brand going forward.

So instead of giving for the sake of giving, give to create a moment or even better, many moments. That’s why well thought through branded promotional items that you gift to your customers and clients can really have an ongoing impact, and not become a one hit wonder… off their desk into the secret santa basket!

8 Step Process of Creating a Promotional Gift Experience

  1. Who is the gift for? What type of person are they? What kinds of things currently resonate with them?
  2. Think about your business / brand – Who are you? What’s essence of your brand and your brand values? Is there something that you are feeling increasingly passionate about?
  3. Brainstorm with your Promotional Specialist to discuss the tried and tested and the latest and greatest, along with any other ideas you have.
  4. A good promotional idea connects customer, business/brand, and the message – in a memorable way.
  5. Strategic Design – Think beyond placing a logo on the promotional item. How can you create more for the customer through this experience?
  6. Quality Check – Great design, poor quality promotional item – is not a good look. You want something to last more than 5 minutes. The ideal scenario is for the customer to integrate the promotional item into what they do. So they keep using, keep being reminded of you.
  7. The packaging – Create the experience right through to the end. You want your customer/client to be excited about opening your gift. Anticipation is a beautiful thing. So don’t miss this opportunity.
  8. If it’s a good gift, people will tell you and continue to talk about it. I have lost count of how many people speak to me about my Promotional Pens.

 If you are looking for Christmas Gifts for your Customers/Clients I encourage you to start to finalise your plans to avoid missing your required dates.

November at the Very Latest

The one time of the year that no matter how hard we pushed there is no way of getting around factory closures in Christmas and Chinese New Year.

Generally factories can be on leave 1 week prior and 3 weeks following the Chinese New Year which falls on Friday 16th February.

Dependent on what products you order, there could be a 12-14 week lead time. So to work through the holidays in the best way possible we encourage you to plan ahead by placing orders in no later than November.

Please do not hesitate to give us a call to work through the precise timing, based on the product, design requirements and your deadlines.

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