GiftCard Partners Blog

Not seeing the response rate you're hoping for when it comes to your company’s news, emails and promotions? The answer could be as simple and as affordable as gift cards. If you feel like you’re pulling teeth to get people to interact or respond to your content then this small reward can go a long way in changing that. Purchasing gift cards in bulk saves you money and also guarantees you have enough plastic incentives for all your prospects, all year long. Gift cards are a perfect way to incentivize or reward future prospects for thinking twice before clicking that delete button and moving an inch to the right and clicking that golden 'subscribe' button; thus giving you the possibility of reaching a new audience. If you are reaching out to a relatively small audience then a $5 or $10 gift card to
CVS/pharmacy or
SUBWAY could be offered as an incentive to subscribe or give a referral. Not only are gift cards great for working within a tight budget but they also offer you the opportunity to grow your company's database and eventually capture leads & sales.

With social media and current marketing trends it is becoming increasingly difficult to identify "insiders" and "outsiders" in an organization. This new and changing climate provides opportunity for brand ambassadors, and puts companies in a position where they hope their organization is put in good standing on social media sites, message boards, and on blogs. Ensuring that your employees are engaged at work creates a likely environment that they will become positive brand ambassadors in online public spaces, and in turn engage consumers.
Here are some tips from a PR Web article on how to engage your employees to become positive brand representatives and teach them how to drive the consumer brand experience. 

For small businesses, using efficient, low-cost marketing is essential to growing a brand and growing the business. Social media is a great way for small businesses to spread their brand. According to a recent survey, 81% of small businesses use social media in their marketing plan, and that number is constantly growing. Giving gift cards through social media outlets is a great way to handle customer service inquiries that are brought through social media. Gift cards are also a great way to reward and recognize loyal customers publicly. Social media provides inexpensive, effective ways to grow business and small businesses are catching on quickly. How is your small business using social media?  
For more information on how your business can utilize social media check out the abc-13 article.

The Citi Thank You Program is revolutionizing the use of rewards points. Imagine being able to share points with your friends to save up for a get-away weekend, or save up points with one friend for another friends' birthday present. Many people pool points for gift cards from retailers who partner with Citi to make their gift cards available through the Citi ThankYou program such as CVS/Pharmacy and Charming Shoppes stores. This allows consumers to use points for gift cards for themselves, or to use as gifts, giving the recipient of the gift a chance to choose their own gift. You could even pool points with friends and family to make a group contribution to a good cause. Well, now you can. The new Citi ThankYou Point Sharing App on Facebook allows groups of friends to pool points in order to redeem the value of the points for a bigger reward. This app is the beginning of a revolution in monetizing social media. This app is allowing users to move assets and share funds through Facebook, a social media platform. This app will soon promote itself, benefiting not just the Citi ThankYou Program, but its users and potential users as well. The more people use the Point Sharing App, the more people will post on Facebook about it, making the App and its use go viral across the platform. A rewards program that rewards itself, an incentive social media innovation.
For more information on the Citi ThankYou Points Sharing App check out the pymnts.com article.

We don't tend to cover topics outside of the gift card industry in our blog, but this story came to us and we found it so compelling, we decided we have to share. Through the NBA lockout the entire NBA community was on edge wondering if there would be a 2011-2012 NBA season, and for teams they were wondering if there would be any opportunity to take in ticket revenue this year. But not Boston Celtics’ Interactive Media Director, Peter Stringer. He was busy maximizing the Celtics' 3-Point-Play Facebook App. This App turned 5.6 million Facebook followers into revenue generating ticket holders. He used the popularity of a Facebook App to raise awareness and strength for his brand, and parlayed that into thousands of dollars in revenue for his organization. This is one instance that proves the power of social media. How will you use that power for your organization?
This social media success earned Stringer the Pymnts.com Innovator of the Week Award this week. For more information check out the article.