You advertise to promote your brand. But your advertising is part of your brand.

Here’s the deal. There are at least 31 zillion ways that a company could choose to advertise. So the decision that is ultimately made does say something about the company. A company that chooses to distribute branded grocery bags is sending a different implicit message from a company that chooses, say, branded water guns. While both promotional products could bear the same logo, the recipient of a grocery bag may catch a different vibe about the company than the recipient of the water gun would.

Now On To a Seemingly Unrelated Topic

We caught an article the other day that focused on the recent announcement that Power Balance has bought the naming rights to the Sacramento Kings’ home arena. If you’re not familiar with Power Balance, it’s that company that sells silicone wristbands with holograms that are supposed to emit a positive frequency that helps the body in various ways. Pro athletes and other celebrities have been seen wearing these, and they were even named CNBC’s Sports Product of the Year – despite controversy about whether the company has been using misleading statements to market their product.

The article got us thinking about a lot of things. First, inspired by the way Power Balance’s product took off and became an international sensation, we developed a prototype for suspenders with magical clips that help people improve their tuba playing abilities, dance “The Macarena” with increased skill, and fly.

But after a few mishaps relating to that failed attempt, we focused our thoughts on the concept of naming an arena as a marketing strategy.

Aha! So It Was a Related Topic After All!

It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what naming an arena after your company says about your brand. In this particular case, in light of some bad press Power Balance has been getting recently, we wonder if it might mean, “Look! We still are a great sports product! See? We even have a sports arena named after us!” But what about in other cases? What about our local Pepsi Arena turned Times Union Center? A company like Power Balance seems like it would be quite different from a soft drink manufacturer and a newspaper, yet they all selected the same, big-ticket marketing strategy.

And if you want to know the truth, it’s not even our favorite big-ticket marketing strategy. You could distribute an absurd amount of promotional products for the amount of money it costs to buy the naming rights for an arena. Having an arena named after your company would be cool, to an extent, but we can think of a lot of marketing techniques that are likely to be much more effective for much less money.

If naming an arena after your company is out of your budget (and even if it’s not) imPress can help you select advertising materials and promotional products that will get the word out about your company effectively without breaking the bank. And we’ll work with you to make sure that you’re choosing promotional products that work best for your unique company so your advertising says the right thing about your brand.

We can even get you those branded grocery bags or water guns we mentioned, if you want. But we’ll probably hold off on hooking you up with those magical suspenders for now.