A gift card put merely is a card that comes with a particular benefit (mostly cash) that enables the user of the map to make use of it until a specified period. However, this is a straightforward definition. In today’s world, one can get multiple kinds of gift cards that could be defined by the variations in the description. These cards are available offline and online. The online version, as one can easily guess, is known as the digital gift card which you can even get for free from sites like prizehog. Gift cards have certainly revolutionized the way of gifting.
The primary advantage that a gift card provides to its recipient is the power of choice. For the giver, it negates the stress of choosing an appropriate gift, thereby benefiting both the parties involved in the gifting transaction. Multiple businesses are opting for the gift card option to provide various types of benefits to their customers. It is not just the businesses, as several companies offer this as an option to their employees as a part of their employee benefits program.
Thus, the prominence of gift cards is on the rise as it is easy to store rewards, track and manage one’s usage, and instantly redeem it for transactions. Qwikcilver Solutions, ‘a global leader in end-to-end gifting solutions,’ that go on to help brands redesign their gifting and reward system through their unique SaaS model, conducted a study that shows 93% of Indians prefer using a gift card to settle transactions.
Keeping up with the transition experienced in the global markets, here are a few ways to maximize the value of a gift card:
1. Knowing the gift card
One of the effects of an expanding gift card industry is the emergence of a variety of gift cards. Based on the type of purchases that can be availed through the map, gift cards can be classified into open-loop and closed-loop gift cards.
Open-loop gift cards are the ones that can be availed at multiple places, and their usage is slightly more complicated to understand than the closed-loop cards, which are those gift cards that can be availed only at specific stores.
One must know the type of gift card to have to be able to extract maximum advantage. Moreover, you must also be aware of the other benefits and details, like the validity period of your card. All the required information can be obtained by conducting quick research about it.
2. Knowing When to buy the gift card
As the title suggests knowing when to buy is critical to achieving maximum utilization. Most cards come with an expiry date to avail of the benefits. The ideal thing to do in such cases is to buy the ticket right before the time when one has decided to make the purchase and not well in advance.
3. Knowing How to buy the gift card
As explained earlier, the gift card business is on its way to becoming a thriving business in the country. Many companies offer gift cards, and among them, there are a few who provide benefits to their purchases. In other words, these gift cards can be purchased at a discounted price using some select payment gateways. This is usually done for tickets having relatively short validity periods. Such kinds of offers are also very limited in occurrence.
4. We are selling a gift card!
Although the gift cards are in abundance, there lies a fair possibility that these cards may provide you with benefits that lie beyond your scope of interest, or maybe the gain is too small to fulfill your requirement. This is common in the case of closed-loop cards. In such cases, you could consider selling the ticket to an interested party at a fair price. There are websites too where you can sell your gift cards for real money. This option gives you the advantage of earning some cash, which could help towards your intended purchase, and it also saves you from the trouble of unnecessary spending.
5. Be on the lookout
When you have a need, buying a gift card is similar to digging a well when you are thirsty. One needs to always be on the lookout for opportunities to ace the process of using gift cards. Many companies issue gift card offers during the peak season, but there are a few others who operate during the other times. Usually, this is done to boost sales during the slack period. Additionally, there are a few companies that issue gift cards specifically to their target customers. In that case, the gift card offered to you might not create a need for the product for you, but, as explained earlier, there is a possibility that you could sell it to others.
Gift cards are here to stay, and therefore, there is a high possibility that, at some point in time in the future, we are going to be using them. So, learning about them is the logical way to be moving forward, and the more you learn, the quicker you adapt and extract it for its usage.
