Searches for Gift Cards and Gift Certificates Skyrocket
Hot off the press from a Hitwise news release:
According to Hitwise, the world’s leading online competitive intelligence service, the market share of U.S. Internet searches containing the words “gift card” was up 32 percent for the week ending December 10, 2005 compared to the previous week (week ending December 3, 2005). Hitwise captured 643 unique search phrases containing the words “gift card” for the four weeks ending December 10, 2005, up 13 percent versus the same week last year (week ending December 11, 2004). Retailer-agnostic gift cards associated with major credit cards such as; “visa gift card,” “american express gift card” and “master card gift card” dominated general gift card searches, while “itunes gift card,” “olive garden gift card” and “gas gift card” dominated specific gift card searches.
Speaking from personal experience, I bought more gift cards this year than in years past. I bought gift cards from iTunes, Tony Romas, Target and Nordstrom.
Another little tidbit from the Hitwise release:
...the week after Christmas will be a busy one for online retailers as shoppers seek to take advantage of post-holiday sales and redeem their gift cards.
I was just talking to my wife the other day about what a good idea gift cards are form a business standpoint. The nice thing about gift cards (from the stores' perspective) is that they get the money up front, and the cards will be redeemed sometime in the future, and a certain percentage don't ever get redeemed, so they turn into 100% profit. Not bad. Plus, gift cards are easy to send to far away friends and they carry a high perceived value (depends on the face value of the card, I guess), and they allow the receiver to redeem it for exactly what they want.
I've been giving out Super Certificates from GiftCertificates.com lately and people really seem to like them. They let the receiver choose the merchant they want to use the certificate at. Very cool. I'm guessing that business is booming for the guys over at GiftCertificates.com right now.
According to Hitwise, the world’s leading online competitive intelligence service, the market share of U.S. Internet searches containing the words “gift card” was up 32 percent for the week ending December 10, 2005 compared to the previous week (week ending December 3, 2005). Hitwise captured 643 unique search phrases containing the words “gift card” for the four weeks ending December 10, 2005, up 13 percent versus the same week last year (week ending December 11, 2004). Retailer-agnostic gift cards associated with major credit cards such as; “visa gift card,” “american express gift card” and “master card gift card” dominated general gift card searches, while “itunes gift card,” “olive garden gift card” and “gas gift card” dominated specific gift card searches.
Speaking from personal experience, I bought more gift cards this year than in years past. I bought gift cards from iTunes, Tony Romas, Target and Nordstrom.
Another little tidbit from the Hitwise release:
...the week after Christmas will be a busy one for online retailers as shoppers seek to take advantage of post-holiday sales and redeem their gift cards.
I was just talking to my wife the other day about what a good idea gift cards are form a business standpoint. The nice thing about gift cards (from the stores' perspective) is that they get the money up front, and the cards will be redeemed sometime in the future, and a certain percentage don't ever get redeemed, so they turn into 100% profit. Not bad. Plus, gift cards are easy to send to far away friends and they carry a high perceived value (depends on the face value of the card, I guess), and they allow the receiver to redeem it for exactly what they want.
I've been giving out Super Certificates from GiftCertificates.com lately and people really seem to like them. They let the receiver choose the merchant they want to use the certificate at. Very cool. I'm guessing that business is booming for the guys over at GiftCertificates.com right now.
posted by Dave @ 12:10 PM
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