Imagine you are selling products that can be used as a gift or for personal use.
Does it make a difference whether your customers buy your products for themselves or someone else?
What do you think?
Researchers found that customers who buy the product as a gift feel a greater sense of gratitude and commitment towards the brand compared to purchasing the same product for personal use.
Putting yourself into the shoes of the customers.
More gratitude, because the brand helped you to solve an important problem and find the perfect gift.
More commitment, because you publicly declare that the product is awesome by presenting it as a gift.
You bought the product as a gift. How do you behave afterwards?
The study showed – because of elevated levels of gratitude and commitment – that customers have a more positive attitude towards the brand, which translates into higher purchase intentions.
More specifically, in the year following the gift purchase,
- gift buyers bought 25% more often,
- spent 41% more per shopping trip, and
- bought 49% more different products.
Overall, gift buyers spent 63% more on the particular brand the year after buying a gift than customers who purchased the same product for personal use.
What does this mean for your business?
Make people gift your products: they return more often, spend more on your brand, and become more loyal.
References
Eggert, Andreas, Lena Steinhoff, and Carina Witte (2019), "Gift purchases as catalysts for strengthening customer-brand relationships," Journal of Marketing, 83(5), 115-132.