Promotional incentive- what exactly does that term mean? If you look in Wikipedia, you won't find anything. I guess that means that the definition is still up for grabs and that the definition is whatever you want it to be. For us, promotional incentives are simple. They are not personalized pens or ?gimme? hats. Promotional incentives are what marketers give you to build and maintain brand loyalty.

Prime promotional incentive programs include free bread from Sara Lee, Coca Cola bottles with the chance to win money and prizes and free Beyonce ringtones when consumers purchased Loreal cosmetics. Consumers love to get something for nothing and that is why non monetary rewards and promotional incentives are proving to build brands and customer loyalty.

Millions of people downloaded free music from iTunes in 2004 when Pepsi gave away 100 million songs. This noted music download promotion was announced at Super bowl XXXVlll. What better stage to introduce a promotional strategy of this magnitude? This was the introduction into the era of monetized digital content.

This customer reward program was successful for Pepsi, for iTunes and for the consumer. All parties involved received what they wanted. The consumers received free music. Pepsi received increased brand recognition and loyalty. iTunes, who was only a year old at the time, received brand exposure which millions of dollars of advertising could not have accomplished.

are not a new phenomenon, but they are here to stay and digital music incentives are the rage. According to Risk Analyst Steve Dersch, ?The DIGITAL part makes it portable, easy to distribute, and harder to abuse.? Because of the safeguards from abuse, the price of promotional music downloads can be as low as $.04- $.06 at scale instead of the expected $.86- $1.

Brands are built through customer loyalty. including promotional incentives and music download promotions, provide customers with a reason to be loyal to a brand.