If your mid-market business is running a gift card program, you already know most of the benefits:
- Additional annual revenue
- Customers typically spend more than the value of the card
- Great way to capture last-minute shoppers
- Easily run gift card promotions
- Promotes your brand
- Promotes customer loyalty
- And more
You started your program to get your piece of the growing global gift card market, which is growing at a very healthy rate. To be specific:
The global gift card market is expected to reach $750B by 2026.1
But just being in the game isn’t enough. By tracking results of a few key metrics, you can optimize your program and its effectiveness, and grab yourself a bigger piece of that multibillion-dollar pie.
1. Track Your Inventory
Keeping an eye on inventory is not new to retail, but is particularly important in a gift card program. Since the beginning of the pandemic, digital and no-touch products have been growing in sales and adoption rates. So, the mix of gift cards you were selling before the pandemic will be very different from the mix you’re selling now.
The overall idea is to offer what your customers want. If your eGift card sales are way up, for example, you might want to focus future promotions on eGifts vs. physical cards. You might want to run an entire program on mobile vs. in-store.
Of course, tracking your inventory will also tell you when it' time to order more physical cards-which denominations, which card designs, etc.-so you never have an empty display or an unsatisfied customer.
2. Track Sales Per Month
Tracking sales is very different than tracking inventory. This is where you learn what’s working and what’s not, as well as where every sale is coming from.
How many cards were sold during your recent promotion? How many cards were sold over Easter, Father’s Day or the winter holidays? How many sales were made online vs. in your stores? How many were made through shoppers visiting your website?
Maybe more importantly, who is buying each gift card and why?
All these tracked bits of information will help you plan for your future—even your present—helping you optimize every aspect of your gift card program.
3. Track Promotions Performance
Gift card promotions are one of the most effective ways to bring in additional revenue, sell a certain product or drive customer acquisition. But you don’t want to spend your marketing dollars (and your valuable time) on so-so results. So, track each promotion carefully – total revenue, number of gift cards, number of customers participating, days or weeks, etc.
In no time at all, you’ll start to see patterns which will prove invaluable for future planning—which promotions work best for your brand, which products sell best, which customers respond, how much they spend and much more.
4. Track Redemption Rates
Speaking of promotions performance, one of the most important indicators of success is the redemption rate, both for new customers and repeat customers. And there are two big factors to look for here:
• The amount of overspending. Some offers or items naturally lead to customers overspending their gift cards, leading to a ton of revenue for you. Once you’ve identified the biggest hits, you can replicate their success.
• Unredeemed cards. When you track redemption, you also track cards that haven’t been redeemed. With this information, you can message those recipients with a reminder to use their gift card so they can interact with your brand (and overspend, as mentioned above).
5. Track Marketing Efforts
Marketing takes time and money. The only way to understand if these investments pay off is by tracking every impression and every transaction.
Again, it’s about optimizing every aspect of your program. The more you know, the more effective your gift card program will be. Need help tracking and understanding what to do with all that information? Blackhawk Network is here to help.
We’ll Keep You On Track
Tracking is just one way to build or strengthen your gift card program. At Blackhawk Network, we can help you with best practices in every aspect of your program.
1Global Gift Cards Market Size, Market Share, Application Analysis, Regional Outlook, Growth Trends, Key Players, Competitive Strategies and Forecasts, 2018 to 2026, ResearchandMarkets.com, 2018