Promotion Strategies: How Small Flash Drives Offer Big Marketing Opportunities

By Jim McKinley

USB flash drives – also often referred to as thumb drives or jump drives – act as reusable portable hard drives. These small units – about the size of a pack of gum – can easily be carried in a pocket, worn around the neck like a necklace or used as a key chain by your clients and prospects. There are even USB flash pens – with the flash drive ‘hidden’ inside the writing utensil.

USB flash drives plug directly into your Universal Serial Bus (USB) port of a computer and are typically built to hold between 64 megabytes and 2 gigabytes of data. The popularity of flash drives have grown significantly over the past several years as storage capacities have increased and USB-enabled computers have become ubiquitous. The popularity and capabilities of flash drives has led to the advent of flash drive marketing.

The use of USB flash drives as effective marketing tools is continuing to evolve for forward thinking marketing professionals.

Custom Flash Drive Marketing Delivers Branded Product To Customers

Thumb drives can be stamped with a company’s logo and as a result, custom logo USB drives have become trade show and convention favorites.

Companies are giving branded custom logo flash drives to key customers and prospects providing them with an instant reminder of your company every time they use the flash drive to transfer files or back up a document. Providing your customers (and potential customers) with a branded custom logo USB flash delivers a great way to market by keeping your brand in front of customers while giving them something of real value they will use over and over.

Flash Drive Marketing Delivers Branded Product With Targeted Messages

Using flash drives as branded giveaways and corporate gifts are just the tip of the marketing iceberg. Savvy marketers are increasingly using the storage capabilities of these compact devices to deliver their message. Flash drives can now be pre-loaded with data, music, video or other content. The devices can also be setup to auto-run a marketing message or load a specific website when inserted into a computer. Customers are able to continue to use the flash drive, storing their data alongside the pre-loaded content. A custom logo USB flash drive that also holds a pre-loaded message or presentation offers companies the benefit of delivering a branded product AND targeted message at the same time.

The concept of delivering your marketing messages via thumb drive was started several years ago when automobile manufacturers provided flash drives pre-loaded with presentations touting the features of their latest models. The idea has caught on – and not just for big companies. Looking for creative and cutting edge ways to stand out from the competition, large, medium, and small sized firms, companies and organizations across a wide range of industries are now looking to flash drive marketing to communicate their messages.

Ways That Organizations Can Utilize Flash Drive Marketing:

— Schools can provide handbooks and required course materials to incoming students via thumb drives featuring school colors and mascot. Students can continue to use the thumb drive for data storage and transfer throughout the school year

— Design and creative agencies can provide multi-media portfolios with links to additional web-based content

— Bands can promote and deliver new music via flash drive. In addition, bands can use USB mp3 players to allow users to listen to music directly from the device

As the popularity and capabilities of USB flash drives continue to grow, marketing professionals will continue to find unique and innovative ways to utilize flash drive marketing. The marketing possibilities may only be limited by the imagination.

About the Author: Jim McKinley, Marketing Director of

CFGear.com

— the leading retailer of USB flash drives — helps companies increase their awareness by over 100% with customized flash drive marketing programs. By providing customers and prospects with a branded product and a targeted message, you can cut your advertising and direct marketing expenses in half. Become a forward thinking marketing professional and visit our Custom Logo Flash Drive page.

Source:

isnare.com

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