The corporate market is one of the most lucrative customer segments in the award industry,” says Peter E. Ilaria, Marketing Manager for Tropar Mfg. Co., Florham Park, NJ. That opinion is echoed throughout the Recognition and Identification industry by both suppliers and retailers. For award dealers, gaining just one or two corporate clients represents great potential for repeat sales and ongoing profits. Even better, the corporate market is an area of this industry that is experiencing very positive growth. “The corporate award industry is growing on both ends of the demand and supply spectrum,” explains Bob D’Andrade, ATdesigns, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. “Corporate firms are devoting a part of their budget to developing employee recognition programs. Human resource departments are promoting these programs to enhance the corporate culture. In essence, corporate clients want to present employees with awards as part of their employee relations programs.” Landing corporate accounts does involve implementing an effective marketing plan, one that will convince potential customers that your business can offer the products and services that they need with minimal effort on their part. “The goal for award dealers is to make the job of the buyer easy—it’s much more important than price,” says Ilaria. “The buyer is probably not the one getting the award; they just want to get this task completed with a minimum of personal involvement and stress.” One of the best ways to initiate a strategic corporate marketing plan is to let your suppliers do some (okay, maybe even a lot) of the work for you. There are several corporate award suppliers that not only offer top quality award products but are also proactive marketing sources that are ready, willing and able to support your efforts with a host of marketing materials and sales aids, including catalogs, flyers, websites and even hands-on training. Utilizing these resources can save you both time and money in your corporate marketing efforts and can help you land lucrative corporate customers. “Our clients take full advantage of the services we provide,” says D’Andrade. “From their own experiences of being in the business, they know that marketing incentives will enhance their business and they fully appreciate the costs they are able to avoid by taking advantage of our experience and investment.” This article will explore the marketing aids available to you from leading industry suppliers. But first, let’s take a look at what’s new in corporate award products. |
||||||||||
|
||||||||||
|
Trends in Corporate Awards One of the first steps in corporate award marketing is to know what types of products these customers are looking for. As in the past, the trend in this particular market continues toward high-end, high-quality and unique items. Suppliers are continually introducing new corporate award products that have a high-quality look and that are designed to work with today’s latest marking method technology, such as laser engraving. “The industry has evolved and newer technology has replaced the typical generic award product and transformed it into a unique high quality product,” says Bob D’Andrade. “As the need for corporate recognition programs becomes an essential requirement for firms, the market is spiraling towards upscale merchandise—the more creative the item the better. This is something we make our living providing every day.” Traditional types of corporate awards remain popular, but there are also many customers looking for more modern choices. “We are seeing a trend toward more contemporary designs,” explains Diana Shih, Topmost Designs, Montclair, CA. “Products that are more unique looking, such as crystal pieces bonded with aluminum or decorative metal components, are very popular.” “Acrylic and glass awards continue to increase in popularity for corporate awards,” adds Mike May, JDS Industries, Sioux Falls, SD. “Dealers are becoming more and more creative with what they are using in their lasers so anything that can be engraved with a laser is popular right now. Our new line of Red Alder Picture Frames provides a good example of this. Dealers can customize them to fit any customer need they might have.” Chung-In Park, CIP Creation Corp., Garden Grove, CA, says, “It seems like size always matters and people are looking for bigger pieces than before. New materials and different shapes are also a trend in this market. For example, we have pieces that include black optical crystal matched with clear optic crystal and chrome. We also added more curves to the shapes of our crystal awards as opposed to straight, rigid cuts. People are not sticking to tradition anymore but are trying different things.” Here’s a brief look at just some of the new corporate award products suppliers are introducing. Be sure to check out the entire lines; there are a lot of classy, high-end awards to choose from. JDS Industries has introduced several new lines of free-standing glass awards for 2005, including a line called Jewel Glass with a gold metal base. Another new line features beautiful piano finish rosewood bases and yet a third line has incorporated the fusion of genuine green or black marble bases directly to glass blanks. A very unique new product offering from JDS features marbleized patterns screened onto the back side of glass plaques and paperweights. Glass mirrors in clear or black are also new from JDS. JDS has also introduced several new and exciting lines of acrylic awards. The Mirage Series features a gold mirror on the base of the piece, which creates a mirage-like effect of gold color throughout the piece. The Midnight Series is available in two shapes of clear acrylic blanks and includes an easy-to-assemble slide-in base made from black acrylic. Acrylic Crescents are designed specifically with laser engravers in mind and offer a large flat engraving area in four sizes of crescents. Majestic Star Acrylic Awards are a premium award ranging in height from 12"-14" and featuring a base that incorporates genuine black marble, black acrylic and a gold mirror to add elegance to the piece. Shooting Star Plaques are also new to the company’s corporate award line. These pieces incorporate a carved star colored in gold, marbleized screened graphics and a large black screened engraving area. Tropar continues to add new pieces to its line of elegant awards, something the company is well-known for in this industry. “At Tropar we are constantly developing new designs and incorporating new materials into our corporate recognition awards. Right now, acrylic awards are selling very strongly, especially our acrylic awards that feature piano-finish bases,” says Peter E. Ilaria. ATdesigns is another award supplier that’s continually introducing new product lines to the industry. The company is especially recognized for its large variety of unique “custom” products designed to meet the needs of a variety of clients. Some of ATdesigns’ newest lines include: Stand-up medals (which allow recipients to conveniently display their accomplishments); Photo-etch medals and plaques; Photo-real reproductions in fine pewter and 3D Medals featuring high relief and definition. Other popular lines include an expanded fine pewter desk accessory line, bookmarks, belt buckles and a new golf line. All of these products can be customized to integrate corporate colors and logos. Donor and perpetual awards are used extensively in the corporate awards market and you can find new products here as well. For example, JDS Industries offers a large line of perpetual plaques including three new styles for 2005. Piano finish perpetual awards in black or genuine walnut are now available along with the rosewood piano finish plaques. JDS has also designed three styles of 12-plate perpetual plaques that include a slide-in Plexiglas holder for changing pictures. |
||||||||||
|
||||||||||
|
Marketing & Sales Aids Award suppliers have realized the importance of providing retailers with effective marketing and sales aids that will help clinch a corporate sale. You can take advantage of what they have to offer and save yourself a great deal of time and money. Aids such as product samples and preprinted catalogs are excellent for showing customers what you can do. Some even offer experienced marketing professionals who can guide you through a sale from start to finish. Plus, most suppliers are now offering Internet-based marketing tools, including websites and E-catalogs. Here’s a look: Product Samples You can imagine the impact a beautiful crystal award sculpture or the gleaming shine of a piano-finish plaque will have on the potential customer who can actually hold the product in his hands. CIP Creation Corp., for example, sends out samples with the gift box so corporate customers can see the whole presentation. Everyone agrees that you have to “show” in order to “sell,” and that’s where supplier product samples come in. “Nothing is better than showing an actual product sample to a customer. Product samples continue to be our most often requested marketing item,” says JDS’ Mike May. According to May, JDS has one of the most generous product sample programs in the industry, including end column pricing for showroom samples and a large sample package that the company sends to larger retailers that includes several corporate awards as well as trophy related items. Bob D’Andrade, ATdesigns, agrees that one of the more popular requests for marketing items are random sample products. “End users want visual models to further understand the selection of products. There is such an array of metals and finishes that it can become a very confusing experience for the consumer. Samples are a great mechanism to make the process of ordering much more informative, thereby making the consumer feel more secure in placing an order.” ATdesigns also offers a “custom” sample program where they will create a pre-production sample for a nominal fee. This allows you to present an actual finished sample of the award to your customer, illustrating exactly how the finished award will look. If an order is placed, the pre-production fee is rebated against the sale. “No better marketing strategy exists for closing that sale,” says D’Andrade. CIP Creation Corp. offers a similar program for custom orders. The company creates drawings so customers can visualize the product before production and they also create prototypes of their awards. |
||||||||||
|
||||||||||
|
Dealer Catalogs A “marketing must” for your showroom and in your briefcase when you make sales calls is a catalog(s) of the products you can offer to corporate clients. Most award suppliers have created professional quality catalogs and flyers picturing their products that are available to you for a nominal fee. These catalogs are typically “generic,” meaning that the supplier’s company name is not printed on the piece, and are available with or without pricing. All of the work involved in creating the catalog is done for you—you just have to show it to the customer. What could be easier? Tropar, for example, has one of the most widely circulated “retail” catalogs in the industry. “Retail in this case meaning we use list prices in the catalog and provide dealers with a substantial discount for the item,” explains Peter E. Ilaria. “Most of our customers purchase generic, unimprinted catalogs to keep in their showrooms and hand out to corporate buyers.” According to Mike May, JDS distributes a large quantity of retail sales catalogs to dealers. “Our customers tell us that these are great sales tools that help them capture additional sales,” he says. JDS offers two dealer catalogs, one for sports awards and one for corporate awards. The Corporate Award Catalog is a 32-page, full-color catalog featuring various plaque styles, acrylic awards, glass awards and numerous desk accessories and gift items. Suggested retail price lists, blank price lists and components listings are available for both catalogs. “JDS makes these catalogs available at a very low cost to the retailer. They can be used for mailing, handouts or showroom sales purposes,” says May. Topmost offers dealer catalogs with the option for a customized catalog cover so you can personalize the catalog to your business. You pay the printing or design fee as quoted from printer or designer (Topmost does not charge any additional fees) and there is a minimum quantity of 2,000 copies. Once again, the supplier is handling the “hassle” work for you. “Most of our customers use our presentation catalogs to present the products to their corporate clients,” says Diana Shih. “We offer our beautifully made catalogs to our customers,” says CIP Creation Corp.’s Chung-In Park. “Since our catalogs do not include prices, dealers can use them as their own by adding their logo on the cover. Also, we send out the same professionally-taken images on CD so retailers can put them on their website or use them for other promotions.” E-Marketing The continued popularity and growth of the Internet has made E-marketing for many businesses a necessity. In simple terms, E-marketing is a marketing strategy that involves using the Internet, including websites and E-mail, as a communication and distribution channel to reach customers. Although some award dealers may be a little wary of taking this marketing approach, it really is an excellent cost- and time-effective method for reaching all kinds of corporate customers. You don’t necessarily need to set up a complete E-commerce website, where actual online sales transactions are carried out, but you definitely should consider using this resource as a marketing tool. “Corporate buyers need fast and accurate service. Many times recognition awards are the last thing ordered before a big meeting or ceremony. Given the need for speed, many corporate buyers are utilizing the Internet. Award dealers need to have some presence on the Internet to service these customers. I stress some presence because a full-blown E-commerce site is not usually required to close the sale,” says Tropar’s Peter E. Ilaria. Once again, front-running suppliers in this industry have stepped up to the online plate and are offering dealers ready-made E-marketing tools such as generic dealer websites featuring catalogs of award products and resources such as downloadable product images and templates for creating your own E-flyers that you can E-mail to potential customers. Tropar has a dealer website, which is essentially a generic version of the company’s home page, that more and more dealers are linking their own websites to. In addition, Tropar’s website features images of every catalog item so that you can copy those images to send along with E-mailed marketing messages. The JDS website features a large selection of corporate awards. According to Mike May, the site is generic so it works great for retailers as a link from their own site or to send their customers to for ideas. JDS also provides a CD ROM with high resolution images from all of the JDS catalogs to use on websites or for print advertisements. These CDs are available at no charge to the retailer. “The number of visitors to the JDS website continues to increase indicating that it is an effective tool for dealers to use in increasing their sales,” says May. Topmost Designs offers online marketing aids including a dealer E-catalog website link and an online quotation tool. At Topmost’s E-catalog website, you can select product images and edit your own message to E-mail to clients for product suggestions or quotations. The company also offers all of their product images on CD. “Many of our customers upload our product images from the CD we supply to their website. Many of our customers also link our E-catalog website to their website for a complete product selection,” explains Topmost’s Diana Shih. According to Bob D’Andrade, ATdesigns’ on-line marketing support includes a free turnkey website featuring your name and address and all of ATdesigns’ catalog pages (with no mention of ATdesigns’ name). “This powerful Web-link is available to the dealer for use in conversations with their many corporate clients or as links to their existing websites, allowing them to deliver maximum content without the associated development costs or time. ATdesigns also offers high resolution images of any of the catalog pages that retailers can use to reproduce their own advertising sheets or catalogs.”
Hands-On Marketing Many business owners in this industry come from the “production-side” of the business so when it comes to marketing issues, they’re not necessarily up on the latest sales trends and tactics and may feel uncomfortable when it comes to active marketing. In these cases, you can turn to your trusted award suppliers for professional guidance. JDS, for instance, has a team of outside sales representatives who have an average of 20 years of industry experience. These representatives can help retailers in their marketing efforts by offering product design and marketing ideas and by sharing with them what they see as trends in the marketplace. ATdesigns also has a leading-edge team of highly trained sales professionals, says Bob D’Andrade. As your appointed account executive, the sales professional will offer experienced coaching and direction about appropriate products that meet the client’s budget and event needs. “Our account executives will work very closely with the retailer and ATdesigns’ in-house creative art team to satisfy the needs of the end-user client. This provides dealers with the highest level of customer service,” D’Andrade says. It’s Time To Get Going! If this is a market you want to pursue, it’s time to sit down and take a look at your corporate marketing strategy. Are you offering the latest and greatest corporate award products and keeping up with current trends? Are you actively pursuing this market? Are you fully utilizing the many ready-made supplier marketing resources available to you, including dealer catalogs, product samples and E-marketing? Are you following up with a neat and professional-looking showroom and flawless customer service? (Be sure to check out the sidebar for more tips.) Remember that the corporate market can be one of your most profitable markets. With the resources available to you, it only makes sense to go after these customers full steam ahead. |
