For gift givers, convenience and flexibility are the two key benefits of gift cards, driving their adoption among people, companies, and marketers the world over. Not so much for the recipient. As efficient and utilitarian as these cards are, they are also highly impersonal and typically have little to do with the tastes, sensibilities, and style of the recipient. Nonetheless, the United States Gift Cards Market was estimated at $158.26 billion in 2021 and is expected to reach $167.71 billion in 2022. It is projected to grow at a 6.25 percent annual rate, and reach $227.82 billion by 2030, according to Digital Journal. The Global Gift Cards Market will grow to US$1.4 trillion by the Year 2026.
Gift cards may be a better deal for the brands; according to CardFunder’s over $3 billion of worth of those cards go unredeemed annually, totaling over $40 billion over the past decade. In fact, 51 percent of U.S. adults have at least one unused gift card, and the average person has $116 in these unspent funds, and 73 percent hold onto their gift card for a year or more.
Consumers want personalization and customization. A Shopify gift registry delivers that personal service as a searchable, resource to create and access highly curated and personal lists for every occasion and any price point. It popularizes a superior way to avoid mindless and impersonal, last minute gifting waste, and gives friends and loved ones what they really want, for any occasion.
A New Gifting Model
Google searches for gift registries algorithmically assume that you mean weddings, showers or baby registries. But what about all the other milestone events in everyone’s lives, including birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, housewarmings, retirements, Christenings, Bar and Bat-Mitzvahs, Christmas, Hannukah, Ramadan, or just having an it’s-all-about-me moment.
There is a more relevant way to gift someone other than gift cards. What if you give and get what you actually need and want? And that gift model involves a highly personal and “sticky” two-way engagement between sellers and buyers. Think: gift registry on steroids.
The gift registry space is primed for disruption and reimagining –and one company has positioned itself to fill this gifting reboot. MyRegistry.com is the largest gift registry software provider to U.S. and Canadian retailers. It is specifically designed for anyone running an ecommerce business and offers e-retailers the tools to create complete transparency around an individual’s wants and needs.
My Registry.com also enables consumers to have multiple, sharable, and shoppable lists from any store. Individuals can sync existing gift lists from any store in the system. MyRegistry works with major chains as well as independent online retailers. CEO Oded Berkowitz states ” A gift list is a must have feature for any ecommerce site to stay relevant and competitive. Our goal is to provide smaller and mid-size ecommerce companies, such as Shopify.com retailers with the tools needed to capture gifting sales and get their share of the $400 billion gifting market”.
The Shopification of Gifting
Established in 2006, Shopify is a one-stop business to business ecommerce platform utilized by 1.75 million businesses globally. In 2021 Shopify processed $79.5 billion in orders. In 2022, Shopify’s 5.6 million online stores will sell to over 500 million buyers. It has been reported by Insider Intelligence’s eMarketer that by 2024, Shopify’s U.S. gross merchandising value (GMV) will rise to $146.92 billion and represent nearly a quarter (23.3 percent) of the total US GMV on digital ecommerce platforms. That is a stunning number for a 16-year-old company.
Many Shopify retailers lack a valuable gift registry or shareable, shoppable gift list. Until recently there has not been an efficient on ramp for Shopify.com retailers to leverage the type of gift registry muscle that brands like Target, Crate and Barrel, Zola, and The Knot have built. Now Shopify.com sellers are able join MyRegistry.com’s gift registry network by easily installing customizable software that adds universal gift registry functionality to their website and/or in-store displays. Compatible with all major website platforms, this software is the easiest way for small retailers to gain more customers and revenue. This collaboration has the potential to disrupt gift giving in a powerfully personal way.
Now Shopify shoppers can create their own gift lists including any items they may want from a specific retailer’s store utilizing the downloadable the MyRegistry.com Gift List & Gift Registry app from the Shopify app store. Shopify retailers can simply add the “free for life” Gift Registry to their website. A new Gift Registry landing page becomes customizable for the retailer.
Once loaded, Shopify customers can create a Gift List, search for friends and family members registries, as well as manage their own registry. Additionally, each one of the retailer’s product pages will also get an “add to Gift List” button. The Shopify retailers also receive a dashboard which enables them to track signups.
Gift Pairing
The pairing of Shopify.com retailers and MyRegistry.com becomes a great marriage and potential gift giving game changer. By having the Gift List & Gift Registry tied to the retailer’s Shopify storefront, as well as each product page, it marries the retailer’s outgoing push marketing efforts with a dynamic and organic incoming pull strategy that brings the Shopify.com retailers’ best customers and brand advocates back, again and again to refresh their gift lists. It also motivates them to share lists with friends and family members, year-round.
Additionally, successful Shopify/MyRegistry push campaigns bring new customers to the retail site and motivate shoppers to download the MyRegistry.com app, with the expectation they will return often and become new brand advocates.
The partnership offers every Shopify.com retailer the ability to offer solutions for what consumers want and need for any occasion and milestone event. It also enables retailers to transition from push marketing to pull marketing, while creating a collaborative universal gift registry program.
Gift Customization
Consumers want personalization and customization. A Shopify gift registry delivers that personal service as a searchable, resource to create and access highly curated and personal lists for every occasion and any price point. This gift program creates a new parity among even the most specialized Shopify.com niche retailers, and the traditional gift-registry retailers. It popularizes a superior way to avoid mindless and impersonal, last minute gifting waste, and gives friends and loved ones what they really want, for any occasion.
Footnote
To address the money left on the table with unclaimed, lost or simply forgotten gift cards, CardFunder has the generous idea of turning those “lost dollars” into a vital source of charity funding, with their “turnkey” event-in-a-box fund-raising concept. CEO Russ Howard recently announced the addition of a CardFunder Mobile App available for download on Google Play or the App Store, “which expands and accelerates the existing platform.” A school or church fundraiser can prompt supporters to download the app to contribute to their cause by repurposing gift cards. Think “lost and fund” for the forgotten cards.
