GiftCard Partners Blog

Looking to reward employees and show them you care? Showing organizational support with employee rewards for a job well done can be an easy, low-cost way to invest in your workforce. Here are 3 easy ways to incorporate employee rewards into your employee loyalty and recognition strategy.
Take your team out: Using simple gestures like a team lunch out, or a group happy hour after work, or even an activity like a team bowling night, is a great way to reward employees. Getting your team together outside of the office is a great way to bring people together, and form interpersonal relationships while rewarding your employees for the hard work they do. Investing in hard work, and rewarding employees is a great way to keep employees satisfied at work, and raise productivity and retention rates.
Time off: Reward employees with extra time off, or flexible work hours for hard work, or a job well done on a specific project; it’s another low-cost reward strategy that resonates with employees. Time is valuable to employees, especially personal time. Giving employees extra personal time, as a reward is a great strategy to perpetuate desired behavior, and show other employees that going above and beyond will be noticed and rewarded by management.

It’s a social world out there!  And loyalty programs are firmly embracing the concept of social loyalty, an extension of loyalty programs that supports customers’ actions on social channels. As a marketing and incentive engagement company, are you including a social loyalty component in your loyalty program offerings?

A positive customer experience is something that every company strives for on a daily basis; experience is the main driver for loyalty. Happy customers are loyal customers and loyal customers are brand advocates. Oracle released a global survey of 1,300 senior-level executives from 18 countries that yielded new insights on succeeding in the ‘customer service era.’ Key findings from the survey included:

You may find it easy to attract new customers with the lure of incentives, deals or promotions. BUT, are you keeping them after that? A recent Forbes article,
Warning: Is Your New Customer Coming Back? 4 Steps You Should Take Now, explains that spending all that effort and time bringing in new customers may be costing you a lot more than it would keeping an existing one- in some cases 6 to 7 times more! Of course attracting new customers is a crucial part of your loyalty program that should not be abandoned but a healthy balance between attracting the new and nurturing the current can spell success for your loyalty program as a whole. Recognizing your current customers in a unique way can give them that sense of ‘special’ treatment that encourages them to stick around: Try Saying Thanks - Sounds simple enough but it’s sometimes forgotten that a thank you goes a long way. Try sending a ‘Thank You for Your Loyalty’ email to customers who reach the one year mark, five year mark, etc. Customers don’t always need an incentive or reward for being loyal, just a little appreciation. Use holidays as a way to appreciate your current customers- Sending out gift cards to
The Children’s Place on Mother’s Day, gift cards to
1-800-Flowers on Valentine’s Day, or gift cards to
CVS/pharmacy on a customer’s birthday shows how much their loyalty means all year round. Take the time to take a special interest in your customer, it’s got its rewards. Check out Forbes,
Warning: Is Your New Customer Coming Back? 4 Steps You Should Take Now to get more ideas on keeping your customers close.