We recommend that every single company, no matter their size or budget, has some type of gifting program in place for employees, prospects, and existing clients. Of course you’d expect us to say that as a company who specializes in gifting, so read below to learn who your gifts should be targeted towards, and how sending gifts actually increases your bottom line.
The most common reasons people are hesitant about gifting:
- They only want to invest in marketing that shows quantitative numbers that it “worked”
- They have never sent gifts before and it seems complicated
- Gifting seems frivolous / “extra”
But what if there was a marketing strategy that could:
- Help retain employees and create loyalty to your firm
- Crack the door open to work with your dream prospects
- Keep the clients you invested so much into getting
EMPLOYEE WELCOME + APPRECIATION: MILLENIALS WANT PERKS
While most businesses can’t compete with Facebook’s unlimited free meals or Google’s on-site gym, 75% of the global workforce will be made up of millennials by 2025 (Deloitte) and guess what? They want perks.
Whether it’s some simple corporate branded items (make it cool enough for employees to actually wear or use outside of the office and hello, free advertising!) or a small welcome gift of office essentials, employees appreciate feeling appreciated. And since the average cost-per-hire is over $4,000 (SHRM), welcome and appreciation gifts should be looked at as investments well worth the cost.
PROSPECTS: A UNIQUE GIFT CAN BREAK DOWN SALES RESISTANCE Have you ever tried to sneak past the conference booth with cheap swag, notebooks, and keychains avoiding eye contact so you don’t have to actually talk with them? That’s why we don’t believe in spending thousands of dollars on promotional items before a tradeshow or conference. Hate to break it to you, but no one is picking up your pens and calling to hire you in six months. Instead, we recommend compiling a list of your top 50 clients before or after a big event and coming up with a gifting strategy to build a relationship with them.
Below is the typical industry standard cost of customer acquisition (Entrepreneur) so you may as well spend the marketing budget on something that actually works!
- Travel: Priceline.com: $7
- Retail: Barnesandnoble.com: $10
- Financial: TD Waterhouse: $175
- Telecom: Sprint PCS: $315
EXISTING CLIENT: IT COSTS MORE TO GAIN THAN RETAIN
It’s significantly more expensive to attract a new customer than it is to retain an existing one, so be sure to show your existing clients some love! Client gifting is designed to create such loyalty that bells and whistles the competition offers will fall on deaf ears.