Well, as we were talking a person walked back with a folder under their arm with a large company logo across the front of it. The guy I was talking to motioned towards it for me to see, and commented that he knew the company who was handing those things out.

This was their give away that tradeshow to help people carry around all of the papers they were going to be picking up at various booths. Of course, the first folder itself already had some papers inside from the company handing them out to make sure people would take the material with them. I rather liked the idea of the hand out, and so did the guy I was talking to.

He informed me the company had been handing them out for the past year or so, and that they were quite literally one of the only companies at the show handing them out.

Well, I inquired why this person's company wasn't handing any out if he thought they were such a good idea. The only answer was that they prefer to focus on coming up with their own marketing ideas, and they don't really bother looking at what anyone else is doing.

I had to step back in surprise at this concept. If you see someone else using pocket folder printing and having success with it, why wouldn't you figure out a way to take advantage of it yourself. Now, I do understand that for certain parts of marketing you need your own message.

If you see a core marketing message someone is using that you like, it can be hard to incorporate it into your own marketing because the other company might strongly identify with it. But something like pocket folder printing isn't so much as a marketing message, but a way of delivering your message.

I think this idea comes up a lot with forms of marketing that aren't as widespread. Obviously more than one company is willing to use postcards or brochures, but in this instance the guy I spoke to was hesitant about using the folders because not as many companies were using them.

If you run your marketing the choose will be yours for what you end up doing, but I would suggest that you don't cut yourself off from some perfectly good marketing just because you see someone else doing it as well. Why let them have an advantage like that, when all you have to do is figure out an effective way to make a certain form of marketing work for you.

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