Looking to improve your social outreach and brand messaging? Sidestepping these pitfalls will boost your success rate and help you better connect with buyers.

1. Focusing on Quantity
   Instead of Quality Instead of rushing to create as many content pieces as possible to blast out via social platforms and newsletters, step back and take the time to develop thoughtful, well-rounded content that’ll be truly useful and entertaining to your desired audiences. The quantity of content you produce will decline, but it’s likely that overall engagement will increase, as more are drawn to view the better pieces.


2. Creating Content Just Because It Interests You
   Sometimes, marketers produce content that they might find compelling, but that doesn’t ultimately carry great significance for their prospects. The remedy is to always create blogs, videos, social posts and white papers that appeal to the particular audience you’re targeting. One way to get a feel for what audiences want is to simply ask them. Also, utilize data and research, which can include tracking the types of content topics and forms that perform best.


3. Branding Too Broadly
   This issue can arise for businesses that serve a variety of markets and end-buyers. One solution is to segment recipients of your emailed content into different lists, with the lists being composed of clients/prospects that have mutual interests. For instance, you could group all your manufacturing clients onto one list. By segmenting, you can develop and share content that’s crafted to the specific interests of the list audience. You’ll likely get more clicks. A similar tactic can work with your content mediums: Consider creating differently branded blogs and social accounts that focus on the verticals you target.

Promotional products distributors can capitalize by selling similar styles to a variety of markets.

A time traveler from the ’90s would feel right at home these days. Retailers are hawking Friends-inspired merch – like the “Pivot” hoodie at Target, inspired from the iconic couch-moving scene in the 25-year-old sitcom – and fanny packs are cool again. Need further evidence? That once-ubiquitous hair accessory, the humble scrunchy, is back with a vengeance.


Custom scrunchies, like these from Martini-Vispak, are trending.

“Nostalgia has a strong pull, and we’ve seen the cyclical patterns of ‘what was old is new’ pop back up a number of times,” says Jesse Gray, marketing director at Pop! Promos (asi/45657). “But the lure of the scrunchy is also that it’s a fun, and useful, piece of promo that brands have found their customers wanting.”

Fabric-covered elastics are a big hit with the teen and early 20s crowd, Gray and other suppliers say. In fact, scrunchies are part of the unofficial uniform (along with Hydro Flask brand water bottles) of the latest flavor of Instagram influencer, the VSCO girl. “It seems the resurgence is real and here to stay,” says Karen Slabotsky of Martini-Vispak (asi/93987).


Quashies offers full-color customization of its scrunchies.

Schools and universities are a natural fit for scrunchy-centered promotions. “Tap into the school spirit,” Gray says. He suggests pairing branded scrunchies with items teens and college students view as valuable promos, such as drawstring bags and silicone sticky wallets for phones. “These are items that when bundled together make for great opportunities that will actually get their customers those valuable brand impressions they want from effective promo items,” Gray adds.

Other possibilities for scrunchy sales include dance studios, spas, camps, sports teams and gymnastics clubs, Slabotsky says. Scrunchies have also been popular with restaurants, according to Jonathan Shapiro of Harstan Ties & Accessories (asi/60080), whether for servers to wear or as giveaways.

Another winning sales strategy, Slabotsky says, is to position a branded scrunchy as a “gift with purchase” for makeup and skincare brands. “Who doesn’t tie their hair back when washing their face?” she asks.


This packaging tree, stocked with three custom scrunchies, is a popular item for Pop! Promos.

Lest you fear that scrunchy styles are stuck in the ’90s, Kim Fisher, owner of Quashies (asi/80127), assures us that there are many fresh versions of the stretchy staple. Quashies, for example, is releasing a “double ruffle” scrunchy soon. Most suppliers that offer scrunchies have the ability to do full-color custom prints on the fabric. Consider also branding add-ons like a woven tag or custom hang tags, Gray says. “Our most popular option is the scrunchie packaging tree, which is a full-color packaging option that holds three scrunchies together for a retail-ready piece,” he says.

The headline is the section on your LinkedIn profile below your picture. Here, you have 120 characters to say something about yourself. The description pops up in search results.

Many LinkedIn profiles simply feature the default headline – one’s job title. However, you can get much more out of this valuable piece of digital real estate if you provide a headline that conveys the essence of what you’re all about professionally – a statement that compels people you’d like to connect with to click on your profile.

To do this, consider the audience you aim to entice, your unique value proposition, and the language prospects commonly use. Then, roll all of that into something pithy. A distributor sales professional in the promotional products industry might have a headline that reads: “Strategic partner who builds brand awareness and drives ROI through cost-effective branded merchandise solutions.”

Bottom line: Make your headline about the results and value you can deliver, and it will be more of an asset for you.