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Small businesses often find themselves competing with much larger foes. They are usually at a distinct disadvantage when it comes to the ability to advertise their services or products against those of their more powerful competitors.

In this environment, small business owners must find creative ways to increase their customer base and, in turn, their share of the market. They must think in unconventional terms in order to compete with the conventionally-minded monsters against whom they are battling.

One very effective way to bring in more customers is through promotional giveaways. While it seems counter-intuitive to 'give away' your service or product when it seems that every single dollar of revenue must be poured back into the business, giveaway can actually generate much more than they cost.

An advantage that small businesses have over large corporations is their proximity to their customers. Most small businesses target customers in their immediate area. this means that promotional giveaways can be easily distributed to a large number of potential customers almost overnight. Small business owners will usually begin seeing profits generated by their giveaways in a very short period of time, making the cost of the promotions themselves much easier to tolerate.

There are a wide variety of ways in which businesses can distribute a giveaway. A service-based business can offer their service for free to customers for a certain amount of time. This free offer can be advertised by giving coupons to other business owners to give to their employees and customers. Or, the small business owner can send postcards out o local customers that include the offer right on them. Postcard printing is relatively cheap, and can be done very quickly and effectively. The business owner can have a number of postcards printed, and then take them to the post office for distribution to a certain zip code or street.

In the same way, postcard marketing plays a major role when doing a promotion in this way. Just as small business owners should send their 'free offer' postcards to customers in a specific area, they should also target a specific audience within that area. A pay day loan company, for instance, would not want to target high-end businesses where customers tend to be wealthy and self-employed. Instead, they would target traditionally 'blue-collared' neighborhoods where people generally have only one or two sources of income.

In addition to postcard printing as a promotional giveaway, there are other options as well. Business owners can print a small magazine-type publication (if they have the necessary resources) and distribute it for free to generate sales and name recognition. They can also use more traditional ways to advertise their giveaways, such as newspaper or radio ads.

There are many ways to let customers know about promotional giveaways, but the point is that small businesses can greatly benefit from them. They will spend a certain amount to giveaway their product, of course, but the resulting increase in profit is usually well worth the initial expense. Promotional giveaways are effective for small businesses because they can be directed right at the company's intended customers, and can generate a remarkably fast turnaround in profits.