Sales and Marketing
Strategies & News
January/February
2001
Pure Choice: Give Them
Flexibility
by Janine Nunes
Senior Writer
When it comes to salespeople,
everybody wants to be the big dog. Big dogs get bigger bones, and so do their
sales managers.
So when Xerox sales manager
Tracy Chernay was choosing a gift certificate program to help to drive sales
in her Greater Pennsylvania/Delaware division, it seemed like a good fit to
ask Big Dogs Sportswear to help.
"There was a lot of fun
associated with the Big Dogs theme," says Chernay. She used Big Dogs' products-and
images-in a number of aggressive promotions, including a drive to capture competitor
information and another to steal competitor accounts.
"It was an excellent experience
that caused a lot of enthusiasm and was easy to administer," says Chernay.
"We're fortunate to have
a brand that fits any venue, whether you're the big dogs of the airlines or
the big dogs of computers or whatever," says David Wolf, senior vice president
of sales and marketing, Big Dogs Sportswear, Santa Barbara, Calif. People like
to think of themselves as the big dogs in any setting, and Big Dogs merchandise
reinforces that proud feeling, making the award larger than just a fleece jacket
or shirt, says Wolf. Big Dogs gift certificates can be redeemed online or in
one of 200 nationwide stores.
Wolf thinks companies should
give more thought to choosing incentives that please employees but also tie
in appropriately to a specific sales campaign theme and corporate culture.
Just as more traditional
companies tend to choose traditional sales awards, Information Age companies
gravitate toward electronic merchandise gift certificates, says Karen Doyle,
corporate awards program rep, Best Buy, Eden Prairie, Minn.
"We work with a lot of dot.com
companies that use either our plastic gift cards or personalized paper certificates
as rewards for specific sales contests, monthly volume awards, quarterly and
yearly high achievements," says Doyle. "Good salespeople are difficult to find
and hold onto. The value of gift cards is huge. What you get with a gift card
is pure choice, allowing people to choose something with high trophy value.
And the employer has no inventory, shipping or storage to worry about."
Many traditional companies
feel they can't go wrong by presenting gift certificates from high-quality department
stores to their star performers.
The debit card offered by
May Dept. Stores Co., St. Louis, for example, offers $10 to $500 denominations
that may be used interchangeably at Filene's, Lord & Taylor, Hecht's, Strawbridge's,
Foley's, Robinson-May, Kaufmann's, Famous-Barr, L.S. Ayres, the jones store,
Meier & Frank and ZCMI.
"Our gift cards are always
appreciated and never returned," says Sarah Sullivan, gift card department director
for Filene's, Boston. "We're a good mid-range choice offering a lot of bang
for the buck."
"Part of the award is the
experience of physically roaming the aisles of a fine department store and choosing
a gift for oneself," says James Flattum, marketing support specialist for corporate
gifts and incentives at the Minneapolis office of Target Corp.
The certificates are redeemable
at Marshall Field's, Dayton's and Hudson's department stores; and at Mervyn's
California and Target discount stores.
"We have the benefit of
strong name recognition, high-quality merchandise and a variety of items that
appeal to both men and women, all ages. Employers can stockpile our certificates
or place orders as needed," says Flattum.
"Gift certificates absolutely
continue to be more popular than ever," says Ross Sawai, director of incentive
sales at Blockbuster Entertainment Inc., Dallas. Many companies are using movie
theme tie-ins to enliven a sales motivation program, making video gift cards
a perfect added-value piece, says Sawai.
"There's certainly an increased
awareness on the part of corporations that it's imperative to find ways to incent
their sales employees on an ongoing basis, not just in one big gift at the end
of the year," says Sawai. "As the shrinking employee marketplace makes it tougher
for managers to hire good people, this becomes all the more important. Video
rentals provide a low-cost, high-perceived-value option for doing that."
The Web has introduced new
versatility to incentive buyers that should be saving them both money and time.
"There are tremendous efficiencies
provided through the Internet when it's used right," says Edward Brookshire,
president, Giveanything.com, New York.
"The bottom line is that a lot of companies are not bringing the efficiencies
to the table that the Internet makes possible. They're charging companies setup
fees and administration fees over and above product value and they aren't addressing
the tax issues."
Since most successful salespeople
already own the popular items they want, it's a good fit to offer them extraordinary,
novel choices, says Brookshire.
"The obvious, popular stores
are on our site, but so are the very obscure, specialized stores that make the
browsing an adventure," says Brookshire. "You can buy everything from skydiving
equipment to fiberglass cows-kosher food from 123kosher.com to specialized beer
mugs from PubGear.com, for example. We give no exclusive contracts to merchants,
which leaves the gamut much wider open." By the end of the year the site will
boast more than 5,000 merchants. Certificates are redeemed online.
Instantaneous delivery of
gift certificates is available and the print-your-own gift certificate option
is hugely popular with managers who procrastinate, says Brookshire.
Incorporating more than
merchandise into gift certificate options also broadens the appeal to salespeople,
some of whom are better motivated by travel, dining or entertainment than merchandise,
says Jackie Schneider, vice president of sales at Gift Certificate Center-A
Hallmark Company, Minneapolis. "A lot of our customers use our certificates
to reward for direct sales each quarter, to pump up enthusiasm during downtimes,
to reward for new business prospecting or to award as the big end-of-year incentive
gift," says Schneider.
About GiveAnything.com:
GiveAnything.com
is a New York-based online gift solutions company offering proprietary online
gift certificates redeemable at thousands of the Web's most unique online merchants;
highly automated corporate rewards and incentive programs; and providing small
to mid-sized online merchants with turnkey digital gift certificate enabling
technology.
Contact:
Michelle Chase
PerkettPR
617/470-3309
michelle@perkettpr.com
Gina Kussman
212/252-8891
press@giveanything.com
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