Using Gift Cards to Prompt Consumer Behavior

Gift cards are a great incentive to get employees to perform a certain behavior at a certain time, aligning your customers to advance your business goals. A great example of gift card use for mutual consumer and retailer benefit is currently being displayed by Microsoft with relation to the phase out of Windows XP. Microsoft will cease providing support and updates for the operating system next week, so the software giant is providing gift cards to any consumers who purchases a laptop running Windows 8.1 and can prove they previously had a computer running Windows XP. The gift card is good for laptops over $599 and also include a limited amount of tech support. Windows needs consumers to phase out use of Windows XP to prevent security issues for their customers. And if you're running a computer with Windows XP, chances are you could use a new laptop. The leverage gift cards provide solve both issues, while still offering consumers a choice in which product they upgrade to and giving them a wide time range to take advantage of the offer. How could you use gift cards to leverage your consumers' behavior?
For more information on the Microsoft offer or to learn how to use gift cards to prompt consumer behavior check out this article from Incentive Magazine.