Flexible Innovations (asi/54596) has been an official member of the ad specialty industry since 2006, when they started with one product: a line of anti-slip adhesive stickers called egrips® non-slip strips, perfect for electronic devices. Now, they’ve expanded their product line with a number of useful items, including DigiClean® screen cleaners, egrips® phone grips and MemoSpot® note holders for computer monitors, refrigerators, dashboards and cabinets... anywhere you place temporary notes, cards or photos. “Our products all come attached to marketing cards for people to truly advertise their products and services,” says Fred Antonini, general partner. “Our products don’t just include a logo; they come with marketing copy on a card, which is so important. It makes people engage with the product and the company being advertised.”

The MemoSpot® and egrips® products feature a four-color process digital print, while the screen cleaners are dye sublimated with amazing color and detail. “I would say our dye sublimation has better color matching and higher resolution than 98% of the industry items out there,” says Antonini. “Screen cleaners with crisp, colorful, detailed graphics are very effective reminders when combined with advertising.”

True advertising, says Antonini, informs and educates customers and prospects and encourages some type of action. The best advertising items include a description of the benefits of a product or service the advertiser offers, and clear contact information. It’s more influential than just a branded item, which only reminds the consumer of the expectation that the company has already created in the marketplace (“If it even exists!” says Antonini), but it doesn’t influence action. “Just because you see a Coca-Cola billboard, that doesn’t compel you to drink it; that brand expectation has already been set,” Antonini explains. “But your local car dealership most likely doesn’t have an established brand expectation yet, so there has to be a reason communicated as why to buy a car from them or have your car serviced by them.”

And that’s where the power of print media comes in. Flexible Innovations believes wholeheartedly in the importance of marketing cards and the information they contain, so they include them with every order, even those that don’t include a request for the card. “There’s so much competition to get people to read,” says Antonini, “because we retain more of what we read than what we hear, and we base our actions on what we know. So if something useful and unique is attached to print media, like our products, consumers are more than encouraged; there’s almost a psychological obligation to read whatever it is.” The card should include short bullet points about why a customer should do business with the advertiser. “It needs to tell a story!” says Antonini. “Our products compel the recipient to read about the company on the card, even if he or she doesn’t end up using the promotional item.”

So what should be the true intent of advertising? As Antonini explains, “When you get right down to it, the purpose of advertising is to generate sales of a product or service, and the goal of every marketing department is to create the need for that product or service in the marketplace. We offer the opportunity for every promotional products salesperson to bring one of the most effective advertising solutions to each of their clients, on the same level as some ad agencies offer. Just explain to your client how it works to achieve their goals and you will catch their interest… guaranteed!”