What It Means to Sell Promotional Products Consultatively

A product by any other name is still a product

I attended a rich, productive educational session at the PPAI Expo in Las Vegas last month. The topic: Using promotional products to gather customer data and track measurable goals. Although the speaker was a manufacturer of products especially suited to this purpose, he avoided turning the session into a commercial by speaking in generalities. He offered practical do’s and don’ts for implementing data-gathering campaigns, and when it came to defining the role of promotional products, he referred to them as ‘widgets’ and ‘trinkets,’ not singling out any particular products.

One woman in the audience had finally had enough. “I’ve spent the last 25 years trying to get my clients out of that mindset,” she yelled. “They’re not ‘widgets.’ They’re promotional products.” She stood up and started to leave the room, but she wasn’t done yelling. “They’re not ‘widgets.’ They’re promotional products,” she repeated.

You might think the audience sympathized. After all, the promotional products industry is proud of its consultative approach to helping clients meet marketing objectives. However that wasn’t the case at all. The audience practically booed this woman out the door. One member turned to the speaker and said, “Keep going. What you’re saying is good.”

They majority of attendees were learning something valuable, so it didn’t matter that the speaker called the products ‘widgets.’ The woman didn’t seem to realize that calling them promotional products doesn’t make them more or less effective. Nor does it suddenly make her or anyone else more or less of an expert. I know of a car dealership that refers to its car-washers as ‘hydrotechs.’ That’s fine, but the cars had still better be clean at the end of the day. In our segment, the preferred term is ‘distributor,’ but if a customer who spends tens of thousands of dollars buying print calls you a ‘broker,’ you’re still going to do the same quality job.

The same goes for promotional products. Whether they’re called ‘promotional products,’ ‘advertising specialties’ or ‘widgets,’ they still have to support the client’s marketing goals. One way to make sure they’re working is to measure their effectiveness. That was the speaker’s real lesson, and one that every truly consultative salesperson takes to heart. (I’ll cover more on the subject of trackable promotional products in our July issue.)

I bring this up because not all distributors are created equal, but it seems that everyone is making money selling promotional products. PPAI does a good job of pushing the consultative sales approach, and many of its members clearly are experts in their chosen field, but there are a lot of distributors out there just taking orders. Right now, end users have a high perceived value of promotional products, which leads to healthy profit margins for sales people, whether they’re consultative or not. That won’t last forever. When end users shift their marketing dollars to the “next big thing,” or question why they’re paying such ‘high’ prices for commodity items, only the consultants will continue to command those high margins.

Many members of our segment now sell promotional products. There’s a natural overlap when selling other print products, but consider whether you’re taking orders or offering value as a consultant. I asked a number of exhibitors at the PPAI Expo, “What differentiates you from other [pen, coffee mug, etc.] suppliers?” I heard same answer over and over. They touted their great customer service, quality and competitive pricing. I suspect that’s what most distributors would say as well.

In the promotional products industry, that’s okay for now, but customers already take those characteristics for granted. They aren’t enough to guarantee a customer will stay with you. To keep relationships strong in this business environment, distributors have to offer ideas along with products: Ideas that help their customers operate more efficiently or profitably. Ideas are really the key to consultative selling. The rest is just semantics.

—Andy Brown