[One of my favorite piecees of swag ever: the “I’m Not Delusional” show catalogue from December ’13. You can get your copy here.]
Back win my advertising agency days, suppliers used to send us free swag all the time. Sometimes it was quite good, the vast majority of the time it sucked: some Made-In-China tchotchke with their logo stamped on it or whatever. What separates the good from the bad? Here are some thoughts on the subject:
1. A good piece of swag should have “Social Object” baked into its DNA. “Dude, where did you get that?!! I want one!!!!” Or else you’re just wasting your money.
2. Swag shouldn’t just be a cute. It should be about something *higher*, somethiong meaningful. It should express a big idea or at least, a strongly held belief.
3. Swag needs to be original. It needs to scream your personality. Remember, it should really be coming from you, not from that aforementioned factory in China.
4. Swag should make your employees feel proud to be part of something that matters, somethiong that they’re proud to be handing out.
5. The best swag undersupplies demand. People should be fighting over it. Better to make too few than too many.
6. Customized fine art is an INSANELY GREAT promotional tool, when done right. If people like your stuff enough to hang it up on their office wall and tell their friends about it, yes, you’ve won.
7. People think of most swag as “Molecular Spam”. Don’t kid yourself, most promotional swag goes straight into the trash, the minute it’s humanly possible to put it there. Accept this and plan around it.
8. Just because you paid a lot for it, doesn’t people will appreciate you sending it to them. People have enough stuff already.
9. When it comes to sending swag, the best strategy is GIVING A DAMN. Expressing real emotion about stuff that actually matters. People can tell.
10. I find books (especially one you’ve written yourself) the best swag of all (See photo above). Forget that there’s no money in publishing, the value you get from giving it to people will be far higher.
