What is a Gift Card?

It is a plastic card that can be printed with a business logo or custom graphics. The card can be sold and value added after payment is taken. The consumer can then give the card as gift to family or friends and can be used in the store as cash.

Over 83% of adults have received or given a gift card in the past. They are very popular and make it an easy gift for that hard to buy for person. It allows the recipient to get what they want.

Why Do People Buy Them?

Many consumers are very aware of gift cards and often buy them for family or friends. They are normally bought for birthdays, graduations, anniversaries, holidays, congratulations or other special time or event. Gift cards are sold year around and not just during the holidays.

Marketing Ideas

Put signs at the point of sale or check out area.

Example: Promote with signs, stickers, table tents, place mats, check binders, buttons or other printed item.

Have an internal contest with the staff or employees.

Example: Have each person upsell or mention to the customers. Person who gets the most sales on cards gets a prize or cash bonus.

Offer a discount for customers to purchase a gift card.

Example: Buy a $50.00 gift card and receive $55.00 on the card.

Activate a stack of cards and pass them out in town to bring in new customers.

Example: Hand out $5.00 gift card to attract customers to visit your store or restaurant.

Purchase sales leads with new homeowners within 20 miles of your location.

Example: Send letter to them welcoming them to the neighborhood.

Advertise gift cards in local paper or online

Example: Offer incentive to purchase a card at the location with an expiration date.

Getting set up to sell these cards is fairly easy. You can do a search online for providers that offer solutions to merchants. You can contact your credit card processing company and they should offer them.

Things to Look for in a Solution

• Real time tracking/reporting online
• 24-7 technical support and customer service
• Quality print and fast turn around time
• Marketing material and POS signs
• Artwork design and digital proofing
• Competitive monthly fees and card pricing

Keep in mind that in order to process gift cards you must have a credit card terminal, POS System that is compatible with the program that you want. Your sales person will be able to guide you through this. In some cases you may not have a compatible terminal so be open to purchasing a newer terminal that will allow for multiple programs to be added into the machine. Terminals are fairly cheap these days and should not be an issue.

What kind of fees or cost do these gift card systems have?

Normally programs have two main pricing models:

Transaction based model

Has a transaction fee per swipe and monthly service fee. Typical lifecycle of a gift card is about 3.2 swipes. Keep in mind even though you’re getting charged a transaction fee you only get charged when cards are swiped.

Pros: It’s more affordable and you pay as you go other than the small monthly service fee.

Flat Fee per Month 

Has a monthly flat fee per month with a transaction cap per year. After a year they calculate any overage in transactions and bill you if you went over the typical 3000+ transactions.

Cons: Can be more expensive for lower volume merchants. Monthly fee can be as high as $49.95+ so with low volume other than holidays its not the best option.

You might have heard that cash does not grow on trees so you must do what you can to help build your brand awareness and win over customers. Using gift cards to increase sales and tracking are very important.

If you do not want to move to the electronic gift card systems then you just might be loosing thousands of dollars in revenues each year.

Get started today…..don’t delay!

Production and manufacturing begins. Inventory is counted, accounting measures are implemented, salaries are paid and income is generated.

There are two ways to increase your sales. Sell more stuff to existing customers, or find new customers. Selling more to existing customers means up selling. Full line penetration. McDonald's is the most famous example of a company that successfully up sells... "Do you want fries with that?"

There is much to be said about full line penetration. But we'll save that for another time. This article will focus on finding and selling new customers.

Selling is a process - a structured presentation. Like a chain, any weak link, weakens the whole. Over the past 20-30 years there have been lots of new selling models developed. Some focus on questioning techniques. Some focus on personality types. The models are different, but the selling process remains the same.

• Pre-Call Research
• Approach
• Rapport / Relationship Building
• Demonstration / Presentation
• Objections
• Close
• Implementation & Follow-up

Each step must be covered. Sometimes you are forced to take them out of order, but each base must be touched or you will experience a problem with the sale, or after the sale.

10 Things You Can Do Today To Increase Your Sales

1. Sell Benefits, Not Features

   No one cares about the product; they only care about what the product does for them. It's all about WIIFM - What's In It For Me. People don't buy a power drill because they want a drill. They buy a drill because they want a hole.
   
   You don't buy a car, you buy transportation, or image. I know the owner of a cigar shop, but he doesn't sell cigars. He sells relaxation and the finer things in life. No one cares about features, but they will pay for benefits.

2. Define your Message

   What is your USP? (Unique Selling Proposition) What makes you special? Why are you better than your competition? What is it that you do better than anyone else? What is your primary focus? Who is your Ideal customer? Plan out your new message. Write out a script detailing word for word what you will say. Now practice it, and learn it. Say it well and say it often

3. Focus on the Pain

   Selling is problem solving, so you need to know all about your prospect's pain. Determine the solution that your primary benefit offers. Determine the implications of the problem, i.e. all the little problems that are created by not solving the big problem. Those all add up to a lot of pain, then show how your product relieves all that pain.

4. Ask Questions

   The stereotypical salesperson is a good talker. But the most successful sales people are actually better listeners. And they ask a lot of questions. Open-ended questions that require elaboration and explanation. Closed-ended questions that require only yes or no answers. Probing questions that dig deeper into an issue. And closing questions that ask for the business.

5. Focus on Prime Time Selling

   Prime time is when your target market is available for you to make presentation to. Prime time is the hours of operation for your customers. During prime time, the only place a salesperson should be is in front of a customer. During prime time, all other activities are a waste of time.
   
   How do you maximize prime time? Stay out of the office. Use all extra time to make additional calls. If you are the manager, schedule your meetings before or after prime time. Put your salespeople at a small desk, with an uncomfortable chair so they wont want to be in the office. Make sure they know that during prime selling time, they should not be in the office.

6. Track and Manage Selling Activities

   Activity expectations make your sales staff more productive and give the sales manager information to manage with. Establish an expected number of calls, demonstrations and proposals per day. Set an expected level of new prospects each week or month. Track expenses as well.
   
   Certainly monitoring these activities will give an indication of the work ethic of your salespeople, however, work toward using these statistics as a tool to improve rather that a hammer to punish. Too much negative use of the numbers will lead to bogus data, as the staff will start padding their reports to avoid punishment. If the staff sees the benefits of tracking their own data it will yield improved forecasting and goal setting. For example, once a salesperson determines their ratio of calls-to-closed sales, they tend to use that data to set even higher goals for themselves.
   
   Sales activity data can also identify training needs. For example, a large number of calls with a low number of sales might indicate a lack of trust, so the rep could work to develop their rapport building and people skills. A large number of calls with a low number of presentations indicates that the approach is weak and work should be done to improve the opening statements. Focusing on activities rather than results is also a good way to turn around a selling slump. It takes the rep back to basics and they can remind themselves, "If I make (x) number of calls I know that I will make a sale, so just focus on the steps of the process."
   

7. Know Your Competition

   Your competitor's biggest customer is a big opportunity for you. Don't write them off. Make yourself available for when your competitor makes a mistake. Your competition also offers you a reality check on the market. Keep a regular check on their pricing, the features and benefits they are presenting, and the tactics they are using. But most importantly know who is buying from them.

8. Follow Up

   Follow-up on leads. Follow-up on sales calls. Follow-up after the Sale. This is where the sale is really made, and more importantly, where the next sale is made. Nation wide statistics, across all industries show that 12% of new leads are never contacted. Also, a prospect must be contacted five to seven times before they become a customer. The average salesperson will follow-up only once. The more you follow-up, the more business you will close.

9. Ask for Feedback and Referrals

   As a customer, how many times have you been disappointed with poor service, but didn't say anything? You just didn't buy from that business again. As the seller, how many times, when asked, have you corrected a problem and made the customer happy? Probably every time. If you ask, your customers will tell. If you don't ask, you wont know, and you probably wont see that customer again. Ask them about the billing, the delivery, the courtesy of the customer service representatives. Ask your customer if there is anything that could make their experience better.
   
   When is the best time to ask for a referral? After a sale or after a successful service call. Nation wide statistics, across all industries show that:
   
   
   • 100 cold calls = 1 sale
   • 100 referrals = 48 sales. Ask and it will be given.

10. Bring Value

    Take care of your customer. Do the Right thing for the customer. If they are using a competitive product incorrectly, show them the correct way. If a customer wants to buy your product but it wont address their needs, turn down the sale. If you bring value to your customers they will bring their business to you. A salesperson should operate in a state of controlled paranoia and live by the maxim, "If you are not taking care of your customer.... Someone else is."

A strong work ethic and mastery of the fundamentals of the selling process will consistently grow your business. Now go sell something.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Information

Information is the life blood of marketing and you can use polls to collect vital details about the sort of people who visit as well as the more formal information about their thoughts on a product.

You can ask a straightforward question. For example, if you sell marmalade, you can ask: "What sort of Marmalade do you like?", and list various flavours. The answers will tell you the types liked and their order and this sort of information is useful, particularly if you have just introduced or will introduce a new product.

But as well as this, it tells you something equally useful. It tells you how likely your visitors are to respond to your polls since you can compare the number who answered as a percentage of the number who visited. If there is a wide discrepancy then you may need to look at the sort of polls you publish and be aware that you might not be getting good information back.

As a general rule, people like polls, seeing them as harmless ornamentation and entertainment. They also like to interact and feel part of the site and having an easy outlet for their preferences and ideas is useful in building sites that retain and encourage visitors. Again, if you don't get the results you expect, you may need to rethink the wording you use.

Of course, you can also ask questions that elicit other, more pertinent, information that is of use in planning your marketing and this area needs careful thought. Whatever you do, don't dash off a quick poll when a few minutes thought could have resulted in something that generates more relevant information.

It really is as easy as thinking what you would like to know and then producing a poll that is both interesting and fun to do and, thus, will be well supported.

Real Marketing

There are as many ways to use polls in real marketing as there are products. For example, if you sell t-shirts with a racing car motif you can use a Formula 1 or a Rally poll. It's a popular subject so visitors will probably be knowledgeable and enjoy putting their opinions and you will ensure that your t-shirt image and details are presented nearby, ready to receive the clicks.

In the same way, if you are marketing a new product or service you can use a poll to put the idea into the heads of visitors without making it too obvious what you are doing. If you have a new line in CDs, for instance, you might prepare a poll about the life of a singer to prompt buying of a new track or book.

There are many possibilities for using polls in this way that simply prompt people to think particular thoughts or think about a particular type of product. This can be very powerful since, for the most part, people will be unaware of the suggestion that is happening.

Polls like this take little preparation or implementation, they can be changed frequently and act as colourful additions to websites. The only problem is in integrating a poll policy into your marketing structure and then thinking what questions to ask and what answers to suggest.

However, I believe that, with thought, polls can act as clever marketing tools for the astute website owner who knows how to exploit and use them.