When talking about imprinted promotional items, merchandizing is the main tool. Through merchandizing, companies help reinforce the awareness about the product among the customers. When a customer visits a retail shop, his attention can be caught by an attractive display of a new product/ brand, increasing his awareness of and his interest in the product. The merchandizing activities, which include displays, complement the selling efforts of the company and act as a silent salesman at the retail outlet.

Often, it is merchandizing at the store level-- all those dealer level activities, including display and service-- that speeds up the movement of products from the store counter to the shoppers basket. A consumer who normally goes to a retail store to buy his usual brand may switch over to a competing brand after seeing the product on display. In todays highly competitive market, many companies see to it that the store as a total unit becomes a display unit attracting high consumer traffic.

Good imprinted promotional items at the store level often prompt the buyer in different ways to buy now rather than later, buy more than the originally intended quantity or buy a particular pack size in preference to another. All these are essentially sales promotional objectives. While advertising can only make a consumer aware of the product or generate in him a desire for it, merchandizing in many cases instantly motivates a consumer to buy a product.

Merchandizing activity can be rightly described as a clincher in the marketing process. After all, the word merchandise means goods for sale, and the term merchandizing embraces all activities undertaken at the retail level to promote sales. In particular, it includes two elements-- imaginative uses of dealer service material and alluring displays of products in the retail outlet. As such, it is apt that merchandizing is well-recognized for its sales promotional role.