Hearts on Fire drives sales with employee incentive.

Situation: Hearts on Fire, the world’s most perfectly cut diamond, wanted to boost their fourth-quarter sales. However, their products are never discounted to consumers. So, how could Hearts on Fire increase their premium jewelry sales without having their patrons pay the premium for traditional advertising?

Solution: Hearts on Fire recognized that they could meet their objective of increasing sales by making it their employees’ objective as well. They implemented a Scratch and Win employee incentive program and gave employees a game card for each sale made at specific trunk show events. The program ran on a points system, where accumulated points could be traded for Hearts on Fire merchandise, and each card was worth from 2,000 to 200,000 points with their top prize requiring 500,000 points.

Number of Cards: 10,000 – CR80

Prizes:

• Points redeemable for free Hearts on Fire merchandise for employees only

Results: “The program definitely drove sales! Our employees felt it really gave them incentive to perform better and we could see the sales impact in our results.”

Perazelli's Ristorante steps up its marketing efforts.

Situation: Perazelli’s Italian Ristorante was looking for a way to start the New Year with a great first quarter by increasing traffic to its two locations. They had tried using the “envelope method” in which coupons were printed in-house, inserted in envelopes and handed to customers in the restaurant. It turned out to be far more work than the results merited. They wanted the same effect in an alternative that was less work, more results.

Solution: Perazelli’s Italian Ristorante accomplished delivering the same style of prizes as their previous "envelope method", but added interaction and a professional appearance by using a Scratch and Win promotion. They distributed half their cards to new prospects by direct mail and handed-out the other half to customers entering their restaurants. Recipients were instructed to hold their cards until the month of January, when they could bring their card to one of Perazelli’s locations and scratch to see what they had won.

Number of Cards: 750 – 4”x6”

Prizes:

• 10% and 20% discount
• $25 and $100 gift cards
• Free appetizer or dessert with purchase
• Free meal with purchase

Results: Perazelli’s Italian Ristorante received a 35% redemption rate! "The cards really helped us step up our marketing efforts. The promotion was so easy to complete and made us look much more professional than what we had done in the past."

Ezine Article: Successful Sales Promotions and the Disadvantages of Coupons

There is no question that sales promotions provide excellent benefits to businesses and their customers and are a necessary component of any marketing mix. Discounting products and services through a sales promotion adds value that entices increased frequency from current customers and attracts new business. The most common tool in use today for delivering discounts is the coupon. The real question here is…why coupons?

Despite the widespread use of coupons, there is little proof that these are the best form of delivering discounts. In fact, there's a lot of proof to say otherwise. In this article we discuss what factors influence the effectiveness of coupons, such as clutter and why of the 2.6 billion coupons distributed annually only 1% are redeemed.

Click here to read the full article and see the benefits of using scratch and win game cards instead of coupons.

Steve Madden has most successful sales day with a scratch and win promotion!

Situation: Black Friday is a big sales day for every business. But with so many customers expecting sales and so many stores offering the same boring discounts, how was Steve Madden going to make their stores stand out from the rest?

Solution: Steve Madden broke the mold by keeping everything in their store the regular price but offering every customer a scratch and win card worth discounts and free merchandise.

Number of Cards: 325,000 – CR80 (credit card size)

Prizes:

• Free shoes
• Free handbags
• 20%, 30%, 40%, and 50% off merchandise

The Results: To put it simply: “It was the biggest and most successful sales day in the history of our stores!” –Steve Madden, National Footwear Brand

Welcome to "The Scratch Off Impression"!

We are very excited to be using this blog to help people understand the promotional power of scratch off cards and the impression they can make for your business! They are effective tools in any industry, so we know there will be something here for you. In addition to some very persuasive information on scratch off cards, you will also find information on prepaid card printing and how effective gift cards can be for business growth.

We'll be demonstrating all of this through case studies, articles, discussion and much more, so subscribe to our RSS feed and check back often to not miss any of the great goodies. Be sure to leave lots of comments, questions, feedback, really anything to help us make this an open discussion as well as a reference tool, and we will make sure to answer all of your questions.