Business gets more and more competitive every year. No matter what industry you are involved in, keeping good employees becomes harder as the business world becomes global. One of your most loyal employees might be enticed away by a siren's song of incentives and benefits - a situation you are able to prevent by using promotional gifts as an incentive program for your business.

You might not want to make room in the budget for a incentive program, but with many companies offering them, you will want to keep up to stay competitive. The last thing you want is to have your best employees spirited out from under your nose!

Just because it is an incentive program doesn't mean it has to be expensive - all you have to do is show that you care about and value your employees. No one wants to feel like they are just a number, plus you can use this opportunity to gain positive word of mouth promotion. After all, if your employees are happy to be a part of your business, they will tell their friends and family all about the great stuff that you do. This kind of promotion is priceless because there is no telling how far it can spread.

You can set up an incentive program in all sorts of ways, using sales, productivity, or other measures to determine who is getting rewarded. As mentioned above, you don't have to go right for high ticket items, although for exceptional employees you should consider something along those lines. Contests among your employees also work out well for incentive programs - you make work more like a game and focus employee competitiveness towards a tangible goal.

Incentive programs can be run during certain times of year, such as when productivity typically ebbs, or you could set up something different every week. The best part about using promotional items in your incentive program is that you have a way to easily get more brand awareness. Make sure it is something they would take with them when they go out, or something that is used often around the house.

If the products are small, you might want to consider a branded box or pouch to put them in. Double up the brand exposure and you can earn a ROI that much quicker. You don't want to go overboard, however, because that would tear down all of the positive feeling that adding in an incentive program has built up.

There is no hard and fast rule for the best promotional gifts to include in your incentive program. It can be small things like bath soaps or water bottles, or big things like mp3 players or TVs. It all depends on the type of corporate environment you have, as well as things that your employees could put to practical use. Don't get something that you would like, get something that they would both like and use. That's the key to success.