GiftCard Partners Blog

Why is a B2B Gift Card Program so crucial? Take a look at this infographic to better understand how a well-designed and executed program generates incremental business. A well designed B2B gift card program can help you generate incremental business by:

Although we all know that gift cards are nothing new, it's also clear that they're not going anywhere anytime soon. Much of their stable market has to do with the new digital trends and shifts happening within the gift card industry. With these shifts, comes a change in consumer perception of gift cards as well. Gift cards are a way for retailers to appeal to their consumers, making loyal shoppers out of many of their customers through gift card reward programs. But gift cards have also remained popular as purchases for, well, gifts. Much of this is due to convenience, especially with the growth of digital e-cards, which make it simple to purchase and send quickly and without waiting in line. For those retailers  looking to increase their gift card sales, however, they may have to offer a little something extra along with them. According to a new survey,
17 percent of consumers won't buy a gift card until they see a promotion of some sort happening along side it, and 23 percent take promotions into consideration when deciding where to buy their gift cards between competing retailers. But as anyone in retail or the gift card industry knows, no matter how the technology or promotions change, gift cards will always give customers an incentive to visit your store, a gift that's priceless.
Statistics are courtesy of Incentive -- read the full article here.

The weather is getting warmer and employees minds are starting to wander to that summer vacation to the beach or the lake. Springtime is the perfect time to devise a way to keep employees focused and motivated from Memorial Day to Labor Day. Variety is the name of the game with employee motivation, the key to success is finding a reward that everyone likes. Here are a few ideas:

On the surface hiring "selfish" employees doesn't seem like a great idea. They can lack a "team player" mentality, can be out only for themselves and can be totally unwilling to collaborate and listen to other people's ideas. The counterargument to that is that "selfish" employees are highly motivated and know what they want to succeed. Knowing that an employee is self motivated allows their employer to play to their personal goals and motivate them efficiently and effectively. Offering small denomination gift cards for reaching small goals at work, that will help them reach small milestones in their personal life are a great way to get a self-centered employee working hard and accomplishing your company goals. If you have a runner on staff training for a race a gift card to
GNC might be a great way to help them stay fit. If you have a car enthusiast an
AutoZone gift card may be a great way to keep them focused at work but excited to fix up the car in their garage. Find out what your employees do outside of work and help them create a work-life balance by motivating both parts of their like. Selfish may become self-motivated before you know it.
For more information on motivating self-driven employees check out Business Management Daily.

Every organization wants to maintain loyal customers and employees. How a business goes about this large task can vary in tact and effectiveness. Organizations of all kinds spend untold amounts of money on loyalty program implementation for both customers and employees. However, many organizations don't spend the time learning the loyalty they lose, or fail to maintain. Organizations get so caught up in trying to activate loyalty programs that they often fail to check up on them and ensure that they maintain the captive audience they seek to create. Making even small adjustments can significantly improve a customer or employee's experience. For instance, Virgin Atlantic implemented a system to allow passengers to order food and beverages from screens at their seats. This improved a customers (often miserable) flying experience, and made the flight attendant's job easier. Less sweeping up and down the seats to see if anyone needs anything makes the employee and the (potentially) loyal customer coming back for a more serene flying experience. Virgin tested the program and uses the data from the engagement to measure loyalty and quality of customer experience. Are you doing everything you can to measure your customer and employee experiences?