As a business owner, you should already know about the importance of getting your brand name out there. What you may not know is how to achieve that. You can seek out lists of the world’s most valuable brands for inspiration, but your small business doesn’t exactly have the budget of a major player like American Express or Pepsi. No, your best bet is going to be starting a little smaller than, say, putting a billboard in New York City’s Times Square. Promotional calendars can be a good way to connect with your community and tell local people more about what your business does.
Calendars are Something Tangible
As of 2018, Americans spend in excess of 11 hours a day consuming media. When you take things like watching television out of the equation, Americans are still spending almost four hours a day on a computer, tablet, or smartphone.
Our lives are increasingly ruled by what we see on a screen. And all too often, what we see on a screen is an advertisement. You search Google for bridesmaid dresses for your sister’s wedding, and soon you’re getting wedding registry ads all over your Facebook. You might even get a few pregnancy test or diaper ads, considering that a lot of advertising assumes you’ll go straight from marriage to babies. Nevermind that you’re not even the one getting married. Once the Internet thinks it has useful information about you, it will start bombarding you with “relevant” ads. One poll found that 74 percent of social media users think there are too many ads.
What does that have to do with promotional calendars? For one thing, a promotional calendar is something tangible you can give a customer. Plus, they look at it when they need to; it’s not something that’s going to pop up in their Facebook feed without warning. The tangible part is important because, sometimes, we prefer to write things down rather than just adding it to our phone’s calendar. Writing “Dental appointment” on a physical calendar can make you more likely to remember something.
A Subtle Way to Develop Brand Awareness
Calendars are also subtle while a lot of advertising is not. Sure, your brand logo is an important part of the page, but it’s not the only thing going on. You’ve also got photos of local attractions or local puppies or something local that makes the calendar feel like a community tool rather than just a brand tool.
Dentist appointments aside, we often look at a calendar because we want to take note of something that’s worth anticipating. That’s a very good thing for your company, because you want people to associate your brand with pleasant, happy things. Just about every business looks better in relation to something like a planned vacation that’s marked on a calendar. It doesn’t matter if the logo at the bottom of the page belongs to vein care specialists in New Jersey or a cats-only veterinary office in California.
They’re Versatile
There’s nothing that says you can’t give out full-sized wall calendars if you feel like that’s what works for you. Promotional calendars, however, are especially versatile because of how many shapes and sizes they come in. A study out of Britain found that homeowners there open their fridge an average of 14 times a day. If you assume the numbers for Americans are similar, then that’s a lot of chances for someone to catch a glimpse of your magnetic fridge calendar right before opening the fridge door.
Maybe you run a business that mostly serves other businesses, though. In that case, hand out desk calendars for people to place in their cubicle. Someone who is in a working environment may be more likely to check a calendar than someone who’s at home relaxing. Think about the type of customers your business wants to attract, then look for a type of promotional calendar that best allows you to draw those people in.
