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A USB Memory Sticks That Is As Tough As Nails

Thursday, July 29th, 2010

Not all USB memory sticks get treated with the respect they are due. In fact, some USB memory sticks can expect nothing other than a life of hard knocks and brutal punishment from the day they start being used.

Fortunately not all memory sticks are “born” equal and for some everyday punishment and abuse is like water off a ducks back. When you’re looking to source USB sticks for students, contractors working outside, architects spending lots of time outside on-site or staff working in near military conditions it is critical to know which USB sticks will be robust enough to stand up to the rigours of daily use.

Capsule USB

Capsule USB

The vast majority of promotional and branded USB flash drives are manufactured from plastic, lightweight aluminium or a combination of the two. These drives are absolutely fine for general everyday use but they won’t necessarily stand up to lots of physical punishment and the certainly won’t be waterproof.

If you are looking for a branded USB memory sticks that is incredibly tough, is manufactured from metal, has a screw cap to protect the USB connector and is waterproof then you should consider the Capsule USB model from USB2U.

Capsule USB Stick

Capsule USB Stick

These capsule shaped USB sticks available in a wide range of memory sizes starting at 512MB and the body shell can be spray painted to whatever colour you want it to be. Your logo will then be applied over the top the body shell colour you’re requested. Typically these Capsule USB sticks are supplied with a lanyard or keyring attachment so that you don’t lose them! Its one thing being near indestructible but that does not help if your absent minded or prone to losing things once you’ve put them down somewhere!

Whilst they may be tough there is no compromise on the aesthetics because the finished product when spray-painted and logo’d up looks every bit as good as its more “namby pamby” cousins.

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A USB Memory Sticks That Is As Tough As Nails

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The Open Championship – USB Flash Drivers At The Ready

Thursday, July 15th, 2010

Today sees the return of The Open Championship to St Andrews, which is recognised the world over as the home of golf. With all of the fun and games off the course over the past few months and with the Ryder Cup looming large on the horizon the tournament this year will be as interesting as ever no doubt helped a little by the challenging conditions that seem likely to greet the players. Hopefully golf will be the winner and we’ll be in for a cracking contest.

Golfbag USB Flash Drive

Golfbag USB Flash Drive

With a global TV audience of millions and an on-course crowd that will run into the hundreds of thousands the pressure is not just on the players but the event organisers, its sponsors and the companies that use the event to provide hospitality to its key clients, customers and prospects.

Of course for the fans it’s all about the golf and just being at St Andrews to soak up the history, the spectacle and the atmosphere and for following your favourite player(s) around the course. But for the on-course concessions, and for major brands that are a participant in the golfing industry like Nike, Ping, Titelist, TaylorMade, Adidas it’s an important event to connect with and sell to the fans and the legion of amateur players that turn up or tune in.

One of the more innovative options open to companies to engage with their customers at The Open is to use a branded USB flash drive. These can be customised in the shape of golfing equipment or golf balls and branded up with

USB Golf Ball

USB Golf Ball

the company’s logo or, more simply, a standard USB flash drive can be printed or engraved with the company’s logo.

Flash drives of this type are then typically given away as a “keepsake” or “memento” for clients attending hospitality days or by vendors who want to promote their products or services to the fans (customers) on the course. When you’re spending all day walking around a golf course the last thing you want is a bag full of brochures to weigh you down but a USB flash drive weighs next to nothing and can be pre-loaded to contain tons of information including sales brochures, video clips, media files, and web links. But, unlike just handing out a business card with a website address on you can pretty much guarantee a USB memory stick is going to get used and therefore your content is going to be viewed and your branded remembered.

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The Open Championship – USB Flash Drivers At The Ready

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Got A Product Launch – Make An Impact With A Custom USB Flash Drive

Friday, July 2nd, 2010

If you’ve got a product launch coming up and you need to make a bit of a splash about it then, in addition to all of the regular “fanfare” activities that you’re no doubt planning, its worthwhile considering supporting your product launch with a fully customised USB flash drive.

Custom USB

Custom USB

One of the primary objectives of any product launch event has got to be getting your audience informed, excited and enthused about your company and your product(s). You want them to go away from your event as advocates; you want them to write positive articles about the product, to post articles on their blogs and to use social networking sites to create plenty of “chatter” about what they’ve seen and what you’re launching.

Typically at any launch event there’ll be plenty of new information to disseminate and then distribute. You’ll have executives and product managers briefed, primed, and well rehearsed to deliver a knock out pitch, your Q & A’s will have been developed and honed to perfection and the venue carefully chosen to create the right ambience and put your audience in the right frame of mind.

With all of this attention to detail don’t forget that at the end of it all when the lights go up and the audience goes to leave you want them to have at hand all of the information on your new product or service. Loading them up with piles of brochures, copies of FAQ’s, technical sheets is unlikely to be popular. You could of course email this information out after the event or post it onto a web site or you could do something a little more interesting and unusual and pre-load

Custom Flash Drive

Custom Flash Drive

all of this information onto a customised (bespoke) USB flash drive.

A Custom USB Flash drive can be manufactured in the shape of your new product or designed to look like your product brand. It will be unique to you and your company, it will function just like any normal USB flash drive and done well it really grab people attention. In addition to carrying your product launch information its highly likely that the flash drive will get used by the recipient after the event to save and carry their own data around. This on-going usage of the flash drive all adds to the viral effect that you need to underpin your launch.

Bear in mind that if you do order custom USB flash drives that you need to allow around 3-4 weeks for the design and production of the flash drives. The data-loading can be done during the manufacturing process or any time right up to the event itself.

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Got A Product Launch – Make An Impact With A Custom USB Flash Drive

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Build Your Own USB Flash Drive – A Great School Project

Thursday, June 24th, 2010

Ever thought of designing and building your own customised USB flash drive? Well it’s easier than you think but great fun all the same and it makes for a great project for students.

Rather than just buying standard factory designed USB flash drives and printing your school crest or logo one why not engage the students and get them to design something unique to the school or better still unique to them. Anything is possible and some great results can be achieved relatively easily because if you can get your hands on the core components its really just an assembly job.

The two core components of any USB flash drive are the controller chip and the flash memory module. These are then assembled on a PCB and connected to a USB interface. This single (assembled) PCB can then be embedded into any outer casing to create a unique USB flash drive. Just like any commercially available (and assembled) USB flash drive you can buy the PCB’s in a range of memory capacities starting at 128MB all the way up to 16GB albeit 1GB and 2GB tend to be the most popular.

USB PCB

USB PCB

If you do want to build your own USB flash drives then USB2U can supply you with all the components you need including any accessories your might want for your finished product including key ring attachments, lanyards and gift-boxes. So if you feel your creative juices rising and fancy building your own unique USB memory sticks or setting a challenge for your students then give us a call and we’ll talk you through the options.

Who knows if you can use your imagination to tap into something big and create some demand for your design it’s always possible to move production from your back bedroom or classroom to the factory.

We do have a minimum order of 50 pieces for the PCB USB’s so if you did want to get a project off the ground and you’re not a school or company then get your entrepreneurial hat on and start raising the capital you need. Next step -  Dragons Den and a grilling from the likes of Peter and Theo!

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Build Your Own USB Flash Drive – A Great School Project

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Custom USB Strawberries – Made For Wimbledon

Thursday, June 24th, 2010

Strawberries are one of the most popular soft fruits in the UK and they are synonymous with the Wimbledon Tennis Tournament where around 30,000 kilos are eaten during the course of the Championships (topped off with thousands of litres of cream of course!)

Its not surprising that strawberries are so popular because not only do they taste great but they are a source of natural sugar and provide excellent amounts of vitamin C and potassium both of which are minerals essential in our diet.

Less tasty but nevertheless just as popular are custom USB flash drives and just to illustrate that they can be supplied in any shape you want here’s an example of a tasty looking strawberry that is actually a custom USB flash drive so it would be best to avoid covering these in cream!

Strawberry USB Flash Drives

Strawberry Flash Drives

Of course USB strawberries are not going to be to everyone’s taste but they work just like standard USB flash drives albeit they generate a little more “buzz” and interest when used to promote a product or service. Standard flash drives printed up with a logo are almost as popular as Strawberries at Wimbledon but custom versions are getting more and more popular.

If you’ve got an event, show, conference or press launch and you really want to grab people’s attention and give them something to take away that reminds then of your and you company/product then it’s definitely worth considering a bespoke memory stick. Any design, any product, any shape can be manufactured in 2-D or 3-D and a wide range of materials are available to create the right overall effect.

All that’s needed to start the process is an idea! Once you have this get in touch and our in-house design team will work up some concepts for you and then develop these with you until you’re happy. The next stage is the production of physical samples for your approval and after that the final mass production. Lead times for custom flash drives are understandably a little longer at around 4 weeks but the finished results are definitely worth the wait.

Custom USB Flash Drives

Various Custom USB

Don’t forget to you can pre-load your data onto custom USB flash drives just as you can with any standard drive. So, make sure you have your sales material, your media files, presentation slides and any other data ready to load onto the drives when they arrive. If you don’t want the hassle of having to data load the memory sticks yourself then this can be done by the factory during the manufacturing process (normally free of charge) or the data can be loaded just before they are despatched to your offices.

So, as you sit back in the sunshine and watch the tennis get your thinking cap on and come up with your own ideas for a killer custom flash drive!

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Custom USB Strawberries – Made For Wimbledon

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Car Manufacturers Turn to Branded Memory Sticks

Friday, June 11th, 2010

The annual global advertising and marketing spend of the motor industry runs into billions of pounds and even though there was a dip in 2009 the sector is still a gorilla in terms of its overall expenditure. With sales of cars in 2010 expected to grow and exceed 53 million** its perhaps no surprise that the sector has continued to put its faith and

maserati usb

Maserati USB Flash Drive

money in advertising.

Whilst ad spend continues to be high the mix of media, promotional tools and techniques used is changing. Today far more money is pumped into on-line advertising than ever before with the internet now being seen by many leading car manufacturers as not only the start of a consumers search for a new car but in many cases they will also end their search on-line by buying a car over the web.

Dramatic changes in research and buying patterns by the consumer means that the manufacturers have had to respond and respond with multi-channel and multi-platform adverts. Its no longer possible to rely on TV and Print advertising,

USB Key Fob

USB Key Fob

today its critical that car manufactures have a broad mix of advertising that fully embraces on-line advertising, social network ad placement, Twitter, and mobile phones.

At motor shows and car showrooms things are changing as well so don’t expect to walk away with armfuls of glossy brochures in future. Instead you’ll be able to hook up to the manufacturers web sites, download content to your iPad, Mobile phone or notebook or alternatively take all of the content away in a digitised format on a branded memory stick.

Branded memory sticks or fully customised flash drives (for example made in the shape of a car or key-fob) are becoming increasingly popular at shows because they are an innovative and fun way to engage with customers, to draw people onto the stand(s) and to send them away with lots of electronics brochures, specifications, prices, video clips, reviews and web links but without the need to print or carry anything.

Mini Car USB

Mini Car USB

The reduction in printed material is great for the environment, great for the car manufacturer as it reduces print and transportation costs and great for the consumers as they are not burdened with lots of heavy brochures to lug around all day at the shows.

Custom flash drives are particularly popular for press events and new car launches because they are a fantastic way to send the journalists away armed with something memorable and something easy to carry and use that contains all of the press pack information, web links, video clips etc.

On-line advertising and promotion is clearly set to be with us for some time to come but branded memory sticks also have a place in the overall mix.

(**Source: Scotia Capital Global Auto Report)

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Branded Memory Sticks – Pick A Colour

Thursday, April 29th, 2010

When you’re selecting a branded memory stick to print your company logo on its easy to think that your only options are the standard colours the sticks come in. Typically these will be the usual red, blue, black, white and silver with the occasional green and yellow thrown in for good measure depending on the model you’re interested in.

Pantone Matched Memory Sticks

Pantone Matched Memory Sticks

But don’t be fooled because memory sticks can be produced in pretty much any colour you want. So, if you’ve got a particular colour in mind that might work really well with your logo or brand then it can be done you just need to allow a couple more days for them to be manufactured.

Producing branded memory sticks in a colour that contrasts well with your logo or picking one of the primary colours from your logo and using this pantone colour to produce the memory stick in can look great. There are lots of flash drives produced in the standard colours so if you are looking to stand out from the crowd a flash drive manufactured in your own colour will really help.

At USB2U we offer free pantone matching of the memory sticks body shell absolutely free of charge on our most popular models. The only caveat is that we ask you to order at least 100 pieces to qualify for the free offer. Where we do charge for pantone matching it still won’t break the bank and typically adds just a few pennies to the cost per memory stick.

If a fully customised USB memory stick in a 2-D or 3-D shape is a stretch to far for you then a pantone matched version is a fantastic compromise. Don’t forget that if you want to raise the bar a little higher you can also order printed gift boxes and/or lanyards to go with them.

USB memory sticks are currently one of the most popular promotional items in the market today so if you’re ordering them don’t settle for second best. Make sure you take the time to work with our designer to get the best colour for your brand. We’ll work up some examples and mock-ups free of charge and then we’ll produce the pantone matched sticks for you for no extra charge.

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