Feature: Vouchers and gift cards: VA Conference

“I’ve just been around the world and the outlook is very good,” announced a be-shaded Tony Craddock of Giftex Prepay as the fifth annual Va Conference reached its closing presentation of the day. And a very successful day it was too, with an agenda packed full of the latest issues and opportunities in the buoyant voucher and gift card industry, leading figures providing the expertise, and a capacity crowd of delegates from diverse organisations looking for inside knowledge.

Evidently Tony had enjoyed some time to surf during his world trip as he filled the conference hall with his infectious enthusiasm while pretending to ride the crest of a wave. Indeed, “catching the big wave” proved to be a good metaphor for the range of new and exciting opportunities emerging in this market, as the conference duly highlighted.

I was delighted to meet so many people with a keen interest in future market opportunities, including a significantly large number of non-Va members. Here’s a brief run-down of some of the key messages from the day.

In Tim Danaher’s opening presentation, the editor of Retail Week provided an overview of how the threat of recession was affecting spending habits in the UK. Tim raised an interesting point on the expectations of today’s customer. More importantly than ever, he argued, the customer continues to expect a high quality of goods and personal service, value for money and distinctive, innovative products in spite of hard economic times. Certainly there was a lesson to take on board here that transcends the current economic climate and promoting best practice and good customer service were ideas that other speakers would touch upon throughout the day.

Yvonne West from Sainsbury’s urged that strategy be kept customer-centric. Yvonne called for the simplification and conformity of industry terms to make purchasing and using gift cards as easy and consumer-friendly as possible. Yvonne also noted that the industry has grown, not because of a mass marketing strategy, but because of customer satisfaction. This is a point worth emphasising, I feel, as we must continue to uphold the importance of creating a good customer experience as the factor that really sets this industry apart.

Positive customer experience and quality products are two aspects that link to a new word that I introduced at the conference: “giftability”. This essentially refers to all qualities that make a voucher, gift card, or anything else for that matter, a good gift. While giftability was a factor that hinged on many of the topics – with the variety of available gifting options a key focus through all sales channels – another key message from the conference pertaining to giftability was the importance of presentation and packaging.

Keith Brand of Tefisto Partners stated that gift cards needed to be packaged and marketed to reflect their emotional, personal and aspirational appeal. While Keith’s personal favourite designs seemed to have a running theme of scantily clad ladies, the message that all stops should be pulled out to market these products in a way that makes them as appealing as possible was clear.

This idea applies equally to the corporate sector, as gift card and voucher incentives need to be presented to employees and clients as aspirational rewards that achieve their full added value.

The topic of selling to the corporate market was covered in a panel discussion headed by Graham Sellors of Jordan Media and including representatives from G-T-P Group, Grass Roots Group, John Lewis and Ernst & Young. While the panel highlighted that the technology and systems for gift cards were available, the business-to-business market continues to favour paper vouchers as this, noted Daniel Gillborn of Grass Roots, is what customers are demanding.

Other key themes that were covered over the day included the rise of gift card centres, the growth of multi-use cards, the diverse new applications for gift cards, changes to e-money legislation and the future of the virtual market. I am sure that all in attendance gained many invaluable insights and the buzz of enthusiasm that was evident throughout the day really made it an occasion to remember.