Top Tips To Create Iconic Promotional Products

Last Updated: 20 May 2026

Key Points

• Iconic branded products build recognition by linking a simple item or colour consistently with your brand over time.
• Strong examples use one core product or colour repeated across marketing, packaging, and merchandise to stay memorable.
• We recommend picking one product and sticking with it long-term so customers instantly associate it with your brand.

Flagship Iconic Products

Want to make your branding as iconic as a Red London Bus?  Read on.  Firstly though what are flagship iconic products?  Well they are items or images that are typically instantly recognised and associated with a brand.  It can be a very popular product that your company sells that everyone knows about or it may be a service or even a fund raising event.  Having an instantly recognized symbol of you is extremely desirable. Easy examples of instantly recognisable products and images include:  Coke, Bic Mac, Red Noses, The Apple image to name a few.

There are literally thousands of more examples like these which essentially make up how we perceive things around us every single day.

Developing a promotional product or an image to create instant recognition is not easy.  It takes a lot of time, a lot of patience, strategy and a bit of luck.  If you are a new company starting out or an existing event and would like to gain a lot of recognition then it would be a good idea to create a flagship iconic image.  The easiest way would be to use something generic and make it your own using promotional products.  For example many people will have heard of the Star Light charity foundation, and many people would associate it with its key fundraising product which is a star shaped stressball.  Other examples include Yellow Brick Road who have started using the round yellow stressball intensively to really represent their brand name and to cement it on the minds of potential customers.

So how to use promotional products and develop and iconic product which makes you instantly memorable?  Here are a few tips which we have learnt along the way:

1. Consistent Use of the Same Colour – The easiest thing to do is to always use the same colour.  Letterheads, email footers, business cards, logos etc.  Go for the same colour.
2. Select a shade of colour and make it your own.  If you are starting out then there is no better place to be when it comes to creating something for yourself.  Consider selecting a shade of colour (there are thousands to choose from) that is distinct from your competitors
3. Choose a product that represents you best.  Afterwards stick with it religously.  Even if you undergo a branding change over the years make sure you still stick with the same product as your core promotional product.
4. Supplement your core promotional product by building other types of product around it for diversity and to attract a more diverse range of attention.  These can change year in year out but just make sure you stick with point number 3 as your absolute core.
5. Create brand motifs as part of your letterhead and communication around that key product

Overtime and with a bit of luck your designated promotional product may be instantly recognisable which will make your event or your company a huge drawcard.  Another point that many people do not realise is that having a truly memorable product that represents you does not need to be something unique and created just for you.  Of course it certainly helps but using existing products such as frisbees, jelly beans yoyos and promoted in the right way and with consistency can certainly turn ordinary branded products into iconic ones!