Do Digital Gift Cards Make Good Employee Incentives? Why This Reward Works
As an employer, manager, supervisor, and/or boss we have our own responsibilities including but not limited to conducting meetings, starting and maintaining relationships with other businesses and clients, organizing schedules, coaching new hires, and maintaining a healthy work environment with your employees and team. Without our team we wouldn’t be where we are today, they keep things running, they’re normally the ones on the floor making sure day-to-day business goes well while you can focus on overseeing the future and bigger projects.
So it’s only right that we want to reward our hardworking team with incentives. There are of course so many recommendations for incentives out there, some that we will even explore further on in this article, but there is one that seems to be a popular choice amongst both small and big companies alike and that’s digital gift cards. But do digital gift cards actually make good employee incentives? We’re here to answer that question and go over a few others so you can surprise your team with rewards actually worth their time.
The Differences Between Digital and Physical Gift Cards
It didn’t feel like too long ago that the concept of digital gift cards were introduced as an alternative to the physical ones we’d get on the rack at our local grocery store. Just like a lot of other things in recent years, the “gift card” has made its way to the digital space in a sleek and efficient way, but what are the differences between digital and physical gift cards?
Well…
With a digital gift card as an option now, it makes any and all future gifts involving the gift card easier to handle, especially if you're someone who’s looking to get multiple gift cards for people who work at different times and different places.
Why Digital Gift Cards are Effective for Employees
There is no “one size fits all” gift that works for everyone in the workplace, especially when you have varying degrees of knowledge of your team. You don’t want to get one very specific gift that could be great for person A and person B ends up having no real use for it.
That’s why gift cards, specifically digital gift cards, are what we consider: the premium gift option for employers to employees. It’s a flexible reward that suits personal preferences. Take for instance the digital Visa gift card:
Speaking of limits, the “regular” gift card can be limiting as typically when you purchase one it can only be accepted at the store it’s made for. But with a Visa gift card you can go to any store, restaurant, or online shop that accepts Visa as a form of payment. This means that your employees will be able to shop where they want with virtually no restriction as most businesses accept Visa.
With PerfectGift you will get real-time fulfillment, reporting, and budget controls. We have no order limits – no minimum & no maximum number of gifts or purchase value which makes us great for businesses large and small.
To recap, with Co-Brand Visa Reward Cards:
Used anywhere Visa is accepted
$1 – $1000 denominations
Personalize with a message
In-house production facility
Same-day production & fulfillment
Funds never expire
No minimum volume requirements
No pre-production required
We have dedicated account manager(s) with 365-day support so if you need to get things moving quickly we can help you ASAP.
The power of choice when it comes to incentives can be very…incentivising and if a Visa gift card doesn’t quite check your boxes then a PerfectGift+ digital gift card might.
PerfectGift+ is our version of a super incentive as it takes gifting to a whole new level. This digital gift card allows you to give a gift card as an incentive but not tie it to any specific merchant. Instead the recipient, aka your employees, get to choose any merchant they want from our vast catalog. This way they get access to hundreds of major merchant gift cards with everyday discounts.
Having a digital gift card, like Visa and PerfectGift+, as an incentive is a great way to improve performance and boost morale among the office as yes, you are working to get your paycheck, but we all know how monotonous the daily grind can be even when you know you’re earning money. This is a goal, a reward on top of something you’re already getting.
Other Incentives to Improve Employee Retention
Obviously digital gift cards aren’t the only “good” employee incentive, there are other options out there so if you’re interested in both digital gift cards and something else, here are a few ideas we quite like as a business ourselves:
Work Flexibility and Time Off: This one is the most sought after incentive across the board for any company. Everyone loves time off, unscheduled days where you can enjoy time on the couch rotting away watching movies and vegging out, or finally going out with your friends to the new spot that opened up in town. A perfect incentive to give is a day off or extra PTO.
Recognition Programs: There’s nothing quite like getting recognized for the hard work you put into a project. Finally signing off on the last thing you need to do and turning it in is a feeling unlike any other so of course getting the recognition for all your hard work by you, the manager, and by their peers is a huge incentive that’s more than well received.
Casual Fridays: Wearing a uniform all the time isn’t fun for anyone, including you! So why not lean into a typical workplace environment and introduce “Casual Fridays” into the mix where people can wear what they want and be comfortable as they continue their day-to-day work.
Experiences: You remember being in school as a kid and the teacher announcing there was going to be a field trip soon? Remember how exciting that was knowing you were going to be able to leave school and go somewhere. You still learned but you got to have more fun and often built lasting memories.
Well who says that has to end at school?
Corporate retreats are a thing and you can add experiences to the list of incentives, they can be related to what your business pertains to or something you polled to your employees as something they would like to do. A great way to break up the monotony of work and introduce something fun into the mix.
Profit Sharing: An incentive that works is profit sharing and that is to: “distribute a portion of company profits to employees as a share of the company's achievements.” If the company is doing well, everyone is doing well, not just the big boss. They know that the work they’re putting into their job isn’t just for people outside their reach, no it’s for them too. They get to see monetary gain as something they can increase instead of hoping for a raise or being stuck at the same wage as what’s “typical” in their field.
Employee incentives don’t need to be complicated and they especially don’t need to be difficult, with a little budgeting and communication with your team you’ll be able to create an environment where people will want to continue the great work they are all already doing.
Why PerfectGift.com is Ideal for Small and Big Businesses
Combining the efforts and knowledge of our sister sites, GiftYa, GiftCardGranny, and GiftCards.com, we've made our site the perfect place for you to find the exact right gift for your employees. With robust branding with logos on physical & digital cards and packaging, you’ll be able to make your gift cards stand out from others.
For small businesses you’ll be able to pick between ordering 1 to 50 cards with a $10,000 limit; and for corporations you’ll be able to buy 50+, emphasis on the plus as we are the only on-demand fulfillment center in the country that can print & ship up to 50,000 cards with your logo - same- day, cards at a time.
Corporations will have to create a business account with PerfectGift to get started on an order of substantial size. Here you can hit your business goals and create incentives to further improve employee retention amongst both those who work at location and remotely.
Conclusion: Do Digital Gift Cards Make Good Employee Incentives?
So, do digital gift cards make good employee incentives?
Yes, yes they do!
Digital gift cards are among the easiest and most beneficial ways to improve employee relations between you as a manager and them as employees. You yourself don’t have to do a whole lot to set this all up thanks to PerfectGift’s easy-to-use interface and our many business-related programs. Offering something besides the paycheck is a quick way to make your business stand out in a good way, so take the steps to look into getting into the digital gift card space and start creating incentives for your team today.
