Advertising specialties are ads printed on small items like book matches, pens or key chains that can be imprinted with a company, logo or slogan. There is a business opportunity for those who want to provide advertising specialties to other businesses. Business to business companies can be quite profitable because all businesses are in the market for something to help them do their jobs better. That is where you come in.
Specialty advertising is an inexpensive way a company can promote their business by giving away items people frequently pass around to others without much thought. There is almost no limit to products that can be used as advertising specialties. They can be anything the client company can afford, your sponsoring company can imprint and the customer will use.
The ideal item is useful, costs comparatively little and keeps your clients' business name in front of the customer as long as possible. Pens and pencils are the most popular ones for advertising, but you can be even more creative to stand out from the crowd by considering putting your company logo on coffee mugs, book markers, pocket flashlights, or any handy, small item that will be very much appreciated.
If you want to make money by offering service as an advertising specialties dealer, this would be an ideal business to operate from home. You can market them on a route, by mail, through advertisements, by phone appointments or by personal contact. There are two main objectives in establishing yourself in this business.
What do you need to do to start your business?
Setting Up Your Base
Always check the local laws about running a business in your area and check to see if there are any rules about this business, whether you need a special permit and about tax rules that may apply.
Once you know what you need to become a legal business, you might want to decide if you wish to run this on your own (sole proprietor), as a family business, with partners, or form a corporation.
By starting as a sole proprietor, family business and partnership, your costs are much less to break into this business, but if your business is a disaster you could risk losing your personal assets. A corporation is expensive and requires a lot of yearly paperwork, but if it is a flop you only lose your business and not your personal assets.
Create a business plan based on the type of business you are setting up. Figure out the budget you have to work with and inquire with your business resources (printers, wholesale dealers, advertisers, etc) to get an idea of how much they will charge you for their services. Check out nearby competition and see what they charge others for specialty advertising. Then figure out what would be a good rate to charge for your service.
Create business cards, business stationery and business envelopes for a professional look. Hire a sales team that is self-employed working on commission. And remember, you also must dress for success. You need to look professional to your sales team and potential clients.
Develop your advertising campaign in order to get more clients and work out a plan to make it cost effective.
Finding Your Resources
This is a business where you will need a product to imprint things on and a way to imprint them on those products. Before you begin your ad campaign, you need to make sure you have these resources at your fingertips and ready to go.
You need to find products. What niche will you use? Pens? Pencils? Key chains? Mouse pads? Whatever product or products you wish to imprint for your clients, you need to find a reliable source with a lot of product that can be turned around quickly. Look for wholesale companies like Doba. Sign up with a wholesale company and then talk with the owner about getting bigger discounts for large volume orders. Verify with the owner that they do indeed have plenty of the item(s) you need and that this is something they plan on carrying for a long term period of time.
Don't just rely on only one company for your product. Have at least 2 or 3 backup companies in case the first one has trouble fulfilling your order. To be on the safe side, stock up on product by buying in bulk and re-order well before you run out.
You will also need a way to imprint logos on your items. There are two ways you can go about this. Either buy your own equipment to do the job or use a printer company to do it for you.
Buying your own equipment can be very expensive in the beginning and require maintenance which may make it a hard option for someone starting out without much money. The easier way is to shop around with printer companies and barter for the best deal. Try and get a contract with a printer stating you will continue to do business with them at a set price.
Next you need to consider how your product will be delivered. If you are only offering your service locally, you could always deliver it in person. The personal touch is very effective when it comes to repeat and referral. If you have done an excellent job and bring it to your customer, look them in their eye and shake their hand giving them a guarantee on your work, chances are that person will do business with you again.
If you want to expand your options, you can offer your services online. That would require you setting up a web site and a way to take payments online. You lose the personal touch to a certain degree, but you can always be accessible by posting your e-mail address, phone number, or even having a live chat option.
You could also do mail order by placing classified ads or doing direct mailing to businesses. The classified ads can be hit or miss unless you are advertising in business to business types of magazines and newspapers. Display ads are more effective, but expensive. Direct mailing would require a mailing list and money for printing and postage. If you are doing mail order, you will need to line up a good printing service to get a bulk rate for your print order and then go to the post office to set up a postage meter to avoid licking stamps.
You may consider using the same printer to do the printing for your business cards, stationery, business envelopes, ad flyers, as well as the print jobs for your customers.
Selling Your Services To The Clients
There is more strength in numbers than alone. You could do all the selling yourself, but imagine how much more effective your results would be if you had more than one person doing the sales for you.
Hire a sales staff that would be self employed working on commission. Give them a generous percent of the profit to make the sale and you can get the team motivated to try and get the biggest order possible. By letting your sales staff go out and pull the orders in for you, that gives you the time to fulfill the orders and deliver them.
You may wish to print out sales material for your staff and train them on exactly what image you want them to present to the potential customer. Always be fair with your sales team. Encourage hard work by offering bonuses and incentives for going over the top.
By having self-employed workers, you avoid having to take out taxes on their behalf. They can work from their homes and set their own hours making them more effective to go after the potential client when they are available.
When you are fully established, then you might consider hiring your best and brightest workers full time with benefits.
Of course you could do the selling yourself. If you want to start off small, dress up to look like a professional and visit your local businesses and politely ask for the owner or manager. Make sure they have time to talk to you. If they are busy, schedule an appointment that will be more convenient for them and leave them with a flyer and a business card. When you speak with them, present your sales pitch in a professional manner. Explain to them how having a specialty ad will circulate around quickly and their business logo and details will be seen by many people. Give them an introductory rate and explain to them this is a one time offer so they can have a taste of what this type of advertising will do. Press for a commitment on their part and close the sale.
One effective trick would be to post a coupon code on the item for a specific discount at their store so they will know it was your ad method that gave them the business.
Fulfilling Your Orders
As soon as you line up all your orders for the day, get the products (which you should already have stored on your own premises) and take them to the printers with the details of the design they are to print on the items and the time frame you need them.
When you know when your order will be completed, get back to the business owner and give them a ballpark idea of when their product will be ready. Always tell them 2-3 days after your printer says they will be ready if you are delivering in person. If sending by mail, give an additional 2 weeks after the print job is ready. Customers would rather have the order earlier than promised than later.
Repeat and Referrals
Delivering the order in person goes along way in gaining trust from your client. If your product is being shipped to the client by mail, it lacks that area of trust, so follow up with a phone call or a personal card to thank them for their business.
Once you gain the trust from a client, you could always ask them if they have any other business that might need their services. Let them know if they contact another business that contacts you, you will give that client a bonus of some sort. It could be in the form of a free order or a huge discount. Give their referral the same quality service and you can build up a large clientele in no time.
Record Keeping
Be sure to keep accurate records of your expenses and income. Unless you are fairly confident in your own bookkeeping abilities, you could consider hiring an outside accounting service that not only keeps track of your expenses, income and budget, but can be very helpful at tax time.
