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26/10/2009 -
Among the buzz of holiday shopping seen in online discussions, gift cards have been an increasingly popular topic of conversation, according to a recent study from Nielsen.The study found that online buzz about gift cards has experienced 15 percent growth in the year between September 2008 and September 2009, led by Amazon.com and Toys R Us.
The report also found that this increased attention given to gift cards is largely due to a recent trend of retailers combining gift cards with purchase incentives. For example, a customer that buys a certain item can receive, in addition to a discount, an additional gift card which can be used for another purchase or as a gift.
Nielsen found that retailers who pursued these campaigns saw significantly more online discussions, which can likely translate into higher sales.
"Retailers who do not currently use gift cards to encourage purchases may want to consider taking advantage of this growing opportunity during the holiday season," said Nielsen.
To offer and be able to process gift cards, retailers must have POS terminals that feature a variety of payment processing capabilities, such as accepting credit, debit and prepaid cards. Fortunately, many of the POS terminals currently on the market feature these capabilities, so retailers should talk with their payment processing providers about upgrading their terminals.
