Advantidge’s LIFT (gift and loyalty) program is an exciting new service that allows your business to increase customer loyalty and drive repeat purchases. At the foundation of this program is a smart card system built to bring the latest stored value and loyalty programs to independent retailers. This program provides two primary services in one convenient package: electronic gift cards and automated customer loyalty programs.

Electronic Gift Cards
  The electronic gift card program replaces your manual paper-based gift certificates that are cumbersome to manage, hard to track, time-consuming for your staff and customers, and far less secure. You will work with professional graphic artists to custom design your own eye-catching cards that attract attention at the point-of-sale and in your customer’s wallet. These multi-functional cards can be used for preloaded value and earning rewards in your own customized loyalty program.
  Electronic gift cards eliminate the practice of giving cash back for unused balances. Any unused dollar value remains in your business account. The secure electronic system has optional PIN-based security and clerk ID codes to greatly reduce the risk of fraud and theft.

 

  Electronic Loyalty Programs
  Many businesses have the “punch card” style rewards program. These are popular with customers and do help generate repeat purchases. However, there’s no effective way to track a program like this, it’s not very secure or flexible, and it doesn’t provide you with any customer data. With the electronic loyalty program, you will not only drive repeat purchases but also simultaneously build a customer database to use for ongoing marketing promotions. You tailor the reward structure to fit your business, selecting whether a purchase frequency, cash-back or point-based system works best for you and your customers. Using the same custom cards as for the gift program, customers build reward value with every purchase they make.

  Both the gift and loyalty components work seamlessly together through a single piece of processing equipment, which can also process your credit and debit card transactions. Whether it’s loading gift card value, activating a new customer’s card or redeeming loyalty points, the simple screen prompts make all the transactions quick and easy to process. Plus you will have access to real-time online reporting that lets you know how many points customers have stored and the value on outstanding cards.

 
  There is an enormous potential to generate incremental and ongoing revenue for your business with gift and loyalty tools. Research shows that gift and loyalty cards can increase customer spending 10-40%. Plus there is an industry wide average of 14-22% unspent value left on gift cards (The Nilson Report).

  Revenue Generating Potential

  Gift and loyalty cards are proven marketing tools; many major retailers have invested millions of dollars in these programs and continue to do so. This program is an excellent opportunity for your business to capitalize on that initiative without the huge financial investment in research and development.

 

  Key Program Features:

	Fully customized color cards
	Smart card technology
	Simple One Rate Plan makes it easy to project program expenses
	No transaction fees — process as many gift or loyalty transactions, balance inquiries or activations as you want each month for one low price
	Flexible loyalty programs that fit your business needs
	Online viewing for cardholders (balance) and your business (activity and customer database)
	Professional graphic design support for artwork
	Custom point-of-sale marketing materials
	Gift and loyalty programs both work on the same card
	State-of-the-art equipment and software
	Fast transactions with simple user prompts on the terminal screen
	Optional clerk tracking, PIN number, and management level security help protect your business
	Comprehensive start-up kit

  The Advantidge program provides everything your business needs to launch your own gift and loyalty program. From fully customized color card graphics to flexible reward options, the program is designed to meet your unique needs and set your business apart from the competition and make you money!

 

  Facts and Tips

  Gift card sales hit an estimated $17.34 billion during the 2004 November-December holiday season, an increase of $100 million over last year.

  National Retail Federation

  Gift card sales accounted for 10-13% of retail sales during the 2004 holiday season.

  Wall Street Journal

  The average gift card expenditure was $108 during the 2004 holiday season.

  National Retail Federation

  70% of U.S. households surveyed participate in some form of loyalty programs and 83% of these households use them every time they shop at those stores.

  ACNielsen

  Almost 70% of consumers bought a gift card during the 2004 holidays.

  National Retail Federation

  Raising customer retention rates by 5% could increase value (profits) by 25% to 100%.

  Bain & Company

  It costs as much as six to ten times more to acquire a new customer than to maintain an existing one.

  Wall Street Journal

  Retailers Perspective:

  Starbucks sold 2.3 Million cards in 45 days for $32 million in pre-loaded value.

  Seattle Times, January 2002

  Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse had a 300% jump in prepaid gift sales in the first year.

  Atlanta Journal-Constitution, August 2002

  Win-Win Program:

  A well-structured gift and reward program is successful because it offers value to both the business and the customer.

 

  The Business:

	Distributes a custom advertisement with built in value in customers’ wallets
	Increases repeat business and average purchase amounts
	Builds a customer database for effective marketing
	Tracks spending habits to develop customer profiles

 

  The Customer:

	Earns rewards that add up to future purchase value
	Receives special discounts from promotions
	Enjoys the convenience of giving and receiving gift cards

For ideas on your loyalty or gift card design, click here