People typically think of promotional gifts as swag bags, keychains, or stress balls handed out at marketing events or after a sales pitch. But a well-timed gift to a potential client—particularly in B2B marketing or high-value sales—can motivate the company into giving you their time and attention, and in turn, nudge them into doing business with you.
In this blog, we’re going to unpack how gifting can help you get the attention of your target audience, accelerate the prospecting funnel, and strengthen your marketing and sales strategies.
Marketing: Gifts make them pay attention
Most people don’t like the gifts they receive from businesses, but the right gifting options can help marketers win the battle for attention.
For example, say you want to engage your target market with a webinar. So, you invest your time and resources into creating an email marketing campaign to promote the webinar. And while the right design elements and copywriting can pull people in, studies show 95% of full-time professionals receive at least two to three emails per week inviting them to attend or view a webinar. Who knew! Yet, most of those emails tend to be ignored. Now you have to come up with a way to make your e-vite stand out amongst the rest. But how? Gifting. Another study found that if your e-vite mentions a gifting opportunity attached to the webinar (i.e., a giveaway or everyone who attends gets a gift), people are more likely to stop, open the email, join or download the webinar, and pay attention.
Gifting works because it helps marketers win the battle for attention, which is half the battle of any successful strategy. Using a different channel like gifting can increase your reach and generate more awareness than usual. In sum, a well-timed gift will make people pay attention.
Sales: Match gifts to your funnel
When it comes to sales, gifting can be a hook that’s going to provide a connection, and it gives the prospect an incentive to act. The benefit of gifts is to move prospects through your sales funnel and close deals effectively and efficiently. Here’s how gifting can nurture and accelerate your sales funnel:
- High in the funnel, gifting and high-value marketing collateral perform the best. Gifts show that you’re motivated to win their business.
- Expert advice: Research shows that the number of people you’re gifting will be high, so while gifts at this stage are important, don’t indulge all of your budget quite yet.
- As prospects move further down the sales funnel, gifting helps ensure executive and organizational buy-in. This brings more people into the sales cycle, accelerating the deal. This stage is akin to a political candidate stumping for votes.
- Toward the bottom of the funnel, gifting becomes key to generate total buy-in across the company and turning the tide of opinion in your favor.
- And after a sale is completed, gifting can be used as a way to say “thank you” and an opportunity to celebrate.
The secret to successful strategies
The problem with marketing and sales gifting strategies is that people often want something completely different than what they receive when they don’t get to select it themselves. A survey on B2B gifting found that 88% of people would trade in a corporate gift for something else. However, 70% of people said that thoughtful, uniquely selected gifts would encourage them to do business with a company.
A benefit of gifting with us is choice. Rather than sending unwanted gifts, we invite people to select a gift of their choice. Do they want a new watch or a pair of sunglasses? Would they prefer to select a gift for their significant other? These choices allow the gift to be more engaging and personalized to the person on the receiving end.
Companies looking to add gifting to their marketing and sales strategies and win high-value attention from potential clients should consider our Virtual & Event Gifting services. We make it easy to impress and appreciate people, engage with prospects, and drive brand awareness. Whether you’re gifting people on-site at a marketing event or tradeshow, or want to send a follow-up ‘thank you’ gift to prospects, we’re here to make your gifting strategy a success.
Connect with a Gifting Expert to learn more!
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