Everybody receives promotional pens at some point, but this does not mean they are no longer a valid part of a well-planned marketing strategy. Every item you can think of has already been given hundreds of times over to potential customers, mass markets and your valued clients – pens are no exception. However, you can still use this simple item as an important part of your marketing drive if you take the time to come up with something different.

If you are looking into promotional pens you have two options to have them made. Either you can go with a promotional gifts supplier who will already have several models of pens to choose from. They allow you to choose colors and print your logo on the pens, but you are limited to the designs they have in store. The other option is to go with a plastics fabricating company or a company who actually make pens and approach them to see if they can make your design, or help you come up with your own.

If you are distributing your promotional gifts to mass markets, the latter approach is probably far too expensive. On the other hand, having custom pens made is not really viable if you are only distributing them to a few offices. Promotional pens are supposed to be one of the more affordable ways of promoting your brand, so try to find the best deal before you sign anything. Custom made pens typically have a lot of impact, but they have to be gimmicky or serve some purpose besides being a writing implement. They could be laser pointers, LED lights, dosage meters, voice recorders or a whole lot more.

If you are promoting your brand by giving promotional pens to every company and school within a fifty mile radius it is probably a better idea to go with a company who already have a line of pens that you like. Most good quality pens can be bought in large batches for well under $1 per unit. There are pens that only cost a few cents each, but everybody already has a collection of cheap plastic pens given to them by various companies. All your pens have to do is look to be of a slightly higher quality than everybody else’s in order to really impress people.

If you want your promotional pens to make an impact, don’t just have your company name and logo printed on the side of some plain color pens and shipped off. Take the time to find a funky design and bright colors. Have your logo placed in a clever spot, and make the pens look different to those that people have been receiving as promotional gifts for years. If you do this and give people a pen that they will actually use to write instead of simply give to their children when they need stationery for school you will have created an incredibly affordable yet powerful branding tool.