Shopify is helping merchants and partners in these difficult times of COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) spreading around. One of the things they did is the enablement of gift cards for all stores. Prior to this, gift cards were available to Shopify Professional and up merchants. Not for the Shopify Basic merchants.

The use of gift cards should enable merchants to improve their cash flow immediately and help to make it through these difficult times. Especially those who are now seeing a massive decline (i.e. restaurants, fashion or travel businesses).

Technically gift cards work as a voucher which customers can apply later. The time limitation is up to each merchant. A gift card can be redeemed during the checkout process by entering its unique code into the discount code field. So you are basically collecting the money upfront which should help you to overcome these difficult times and improve your business cash flow.

➡️ To learn more about gift cards and how to set them up, please go to Shopify Help.

Gift cards strategy and recommendations

In general, gift cards are often purchased as gifts. So the customer buys a gift card with the intention to give it to someone as a present. But If you want to make most of it, you need to change the strategy and target a different audience. Primarily your existing and past customers.

1. Be authentic and don’t be afraid to ask for a help

Everyone understands the current situation is difficult for some businesses. And there’s nothing to be ashamed for. Be honest and authentic with your customers and ask them for your help. They will understand it and many of them will be happy to help you.

Try to be as precise as possible. Be open about how the COVID-19 influences your business, what are your losses and how long will you be able to keep it open without help.

2. Give something extra back

Don ‘t just ask for help but give back. Offer an additional discount on the value of a gift card or extra value. For example, if a customer is buying a $50 gift card, you can add $10 on top of its value. Or you can sell it with a 10% discount for $45.

Customers will appreciate the extra value and see you are not just asking for help but also giving something back to them. The extra value or discount.

3. Make the gift cards limited

In order to make the gift cards even more attractive make them somehow limited. Either by time period until they can be purchased which works great with the above-mentioned discount. For example, “Get one of our gift cards until the end of April and we’ll add 10% more on top of its value.”

Also, you can make the gift cards applicable to special products or collections which are not available for regular customers.

4. Promote this campaign to your customer base

Once you figure out the strategy, make sure you will spread the offer all over your existing customer base. Past customers are your primary target here so make sure you use all the typical channels (e-mail, social media). Don’t be afraid to invest a few bucks to make it fly. You can even ask your customers to share it further within their circles.

How to set up gift cards in Digismoothie apps

Gift cards in Candy Rack

Using Candy Rack you can offer gift cards as cross-sells to all your customers once they click on the Add to Cart button on the product page.

Simply create a new upsell offer, select Product Upsell and load your gift card. Customers will be able to select the value right on the pop-up. You can also add a discount on top of that.

You can also use a customized gift card offer which adds a possibility of adding a custom note.

Gift cards in Gift Box

Using Gift Box you can motivate customers to spend more and add a free gift card on top of that. Simply create your gift card and load it as a gift through the Gift Box app (Free Product offer). You can also combine it with your regular gift offers.

Just make sure you set the rules right so it will make sense from the business point of view. You don’t want to end up giving a free gift card to your every customer. Rather only to the ones who spend more.

Good luck and stay safe 🤞

From our team, we wish you to stay safe and your business to overcome these difficult times. We hope this guide will help you with that.

We have also put together a comprehensive overview showing what other help, freebies, and extra you can get from Shopify, app developers, and the community.

Besides this, we are always happy to improve the Candy Rack pop-up design for you or help you with a custom upsell strategy.

#StaySafeStayHome