Why Stress Balls Are Effective Marketing Tools

Stress balls and other promotional materials get a bad rap.

They can be dismissed as junk, waste, or ineffective for marketing, but research shows that branded products are good advertising tools, and when it comes time to choose your promotional product, a stress ball stands out.

Why Promotional Products Are Effective

Promotional products are more effective than other forms of advertising because they are durable, memorable, and ultimately lead to more sales than other promotional forms.

Promotional products are durable.

They can last for years, giving repeated impressions of your brand name, logo, and message.

Even if they’re not wanted only 1 in 5 throws them out, according to research by the Promotional Products Association International (PPAI).

Sixty percent of recipients keep promotional products for up to two years. The rest give them away, passing them on to a new potential customer.

Promotional products are memorable. PPAI research shows that promotional products create more memorable impressions.

People remembered the brand advertised on a promotional product 83% of the time, compared to 68% for a TV ad, 61% for a print add, and 30% for an internet ad.

Promotional products lead to more sales. In the same survey that looked at memorable impressions, it was shown that people buy a product from an advertiser 21% of the time after receiving a promotional product, compared to 7% for TV commercials, 13% for print media, and only 5% for online advertising.

That’s advertising that can make a big difference on your bottom line.

Why Choose Stress Balls

Here’s some advice on picking the right promotional product for you, but stress balls are a good choice in general.

Stress balls are both useful and fun.

Stress can relieve stress by encouraging your body to release pent-up tenseness triggered when your body’s fight-or-flight response kicks in.

And they’ve been proven to help increase focus.

Plus, they’re fun items that become part of the office culture.

People may pull them out to toss around when hashing through some tough ideas or when having a little office celebration.

Stress balls are inexpensive. Sure, a stress ball isn’t cheap like a golf pencil, but it’s not going to break the bank, either.

They are available for less than a dollar apiece.

Stress balls are versatile.

Branded products are more effective if they are both distinctive and go along with your brand identity.

Stress balls come in hundreds of designs so it’s easy for you to find one that stands out and reinforces your brand.

People reach for stress balls right when advertising might work best.

Think when people are going to be reaching for branded items and you’ll see why stress balls can be the most effective.

People put on a branded shirt or hat when they go out to paint the house.

They will get out a travel mug when they’re bleary-eyed in the morning.

But they will reach for a stress ball when they have a problem.

And if your company offers a solution to that problem, your branded stress ball just made a sale.

In marketing, of course, there’re no guarantees, but smart strategies can lead to more sales with less investment.

And stress balls seem like a very smart strategy.

Author: Dr. Matthew B. Candelaria is a literary scholar who left academia’s ivory tower for the less exalted, faster-paced, and more stressful world of advertising in 2007. He works with Absorbent, Ink., a leading provider of promotional business products.