Make it different, but relevant

Don’t be boring. No one needs another umbrella. You should make something unusual. It’s more memorable, more likely to make people smile, more likely to be shared, more likely to be wanted by people. But being different is easy. There’s loads of swag you may never seen made - a kite, a garlic press, nail scissors 🤮

The hard part of being different is keeping it relevant.

This means making something that says something about your brand or product. Granola sends people beautifully designed spoons. It’s relevant for Granola because we’re named after a breakfast cereal. If Otter sent their customers spoons, it would be weird. The best ideas are the ones where you can nail being different whilst relevant.

Make it something people want to use

To start, it must be useful. Something that people actually need, not something that they have in abundance (pens) or that’s not useful (a puzzle). Most brands get this right but go too functional (and boring) with bags, umbrellas, pens, notepads etc.

Secondly, make it beautiful and well made. We’ve all been given s--t caps with embarrassingly large printed-on logos. Some simple guidance that’s generally always true: embroider or don’t bother. Small logo is better than big logo. Your benchmark here is to make something that you would pay for in a shop.

Story99.com is a Branding & Storytelling Consultancy for B2B, Tech & Deeptech