How Gifting Influences Sales Performance

A simple balloon increased sales by 25%. Here's how 👇 McDonald's in Brazil and Colombia ran a simple experiment that changed everything I thought I knew about customer psychology. The setup was ridiculously simple: Half the restaurants gave children balloons as families left. The other half gave balloons as families entered. Same balloon. Same cost. Just different timing. The results were mind-blowing: When balloons were given FIRST (upon entering), total family spending jumped by 25%. But here's the kicker - coffee sales increased by 20%. Coffee! Something kids don't even drink. What was happening? Parents weren't just thinking "my kid got a free balloon." They were thinking "this place cares about my family." The psychology behind it: When you give first, you trigger reciprocity. But when you give to someone's child, you trigger something even stronger - parental gratitude. "A gift to my child is a gift to me." That balloon wasn't just making the kid happy. It was making the parent feel valued, appreciated, and emotionally connected to the brand. Why this works in any business: 1️⃣ Give before you receive. 2️⃣ Target the emotions, not just the logic. 3️⃣ Small gestures create big feelings. 4️⃣ Timing matters more than the gift itself. The lesson for every business owner: 👉 People buy with their hearts and justify with their heads. When you make someone feel good before they pay, they'll pay more and feel good about it. 👉 The most powerful sales strategy isn't about selling harder - it's about caring first. What small gesture could you add to your business that would make customers feel valued before they buy? Share your ideas! #CustomerExperience #SalesPsychology #Reciprocity #BusinessStrategy #CustomerLoyalty #SmallGesturesBigResults #Hospitality

I've worked in sales for over a decade, and I've seen the best AEs restrict their gifting to the 2 most popular moments: holidays and raises. Here's how to map gifting to your entire customer lifecycle: → During discovery. If you're reaching out cold, include a gift offer in exchange for their time. It's acknowledging that their time has value. → When building your champion. If someone just spent 30 minutes prepping you for a stakeholder call or otherwise getting ahead in the process, send them something. They just did you a real favor and you want them to know you noticed. → After closed-won. Now is the best time to send some company swag. Nobody really wants your logo'd gear when they haven't signed yet, but when the deal is done and you're excited to grow together? Send something they'll actually keep on their desk. → Within the first 90 days of working together. Think about what activities you want your new customer to complete. If you need multiple users on the platform, gamify it. When they invite 10 people who accept, send a gift. You're celebrating their success and reinforcing the behavior that makes them stick. → When you're going for expansion. When it's time to renew or grow the account, a thoughtful touch goes further than another slide deck. Gifting is the ultimate strategic sales play- steal my playbook and remove the hassle with Goody.

One thing €10M in hotel experiences taught us is that people buy much more emotionally than most hotels think. When you're looking at a small number of bookings, individual purchases can feel random. But after processing thousands and thousands of transactions, certain patterns become impossible to ignore. People don't book a spa day because they've carefully compared all the available options in their city. They book because they had a stressful week. They don't reserve a breakfast because it's the most rational decision they could make that morning. They book because they're celebrating something, meeting someone, or simply want a different start to their day. The same happens with Day Passes. A sunny weekend arrives. The weather changes. Friends make plans. And demand appears almost instantly. One of the most interesting patterns we discovered is how often hospitality purchases are connected to emotions rather than necessity. The same applies to gifting. A significant part of our sales comes from people buying experiences for someone else. Not because they need them. Because they want to create a moment. What surprised me even more is how often these customers come back. Many hotels still see these experiences as occasional purchases, but a large number of customers end up returning repeatedly. A breakfast becomes a monthly tradition. A spa becomes part of someone's routine. A hotel they discovered through a gift becomes their preferred place to celebrate future occasions. At scale, these patterns stop feeling anecdotal. They start influencing how you think about pricing, positioning, product design and even operations. Because once you've seen the same behaviour repeat thousands of times across different cities, hotels and customer types, it becomes very difficult to believe that customers buy primarily with logic. Most of the time, emotion gets there first. And if the experience is good, habit often follows.

I’ve received 100s of gifts from marketers and sales teams over the last 10 years that went unused or (unfortunately) in the trash. Only one stood out so much recently that I will never forget about it for the rest of my life 👇 Here’s what 🐶 Jacco van der Kooij at Winning by Design did differently. He sent me his new ‘Revenue Architecture’ book. Why did this stand out? 1️⃣ Design. If their company name doesn’t speak for itself, the design of this book is next level. This is the 10x cooler B2B version of a Tom Ford coffee book. I’ve now got this on the main dining table as soon as you walk in, and I can’t wait to show it off at my upcoming CRO/CCO NY Dinner Series (an unplanned multiplier effect, as I'm sure other CXOs will want this book).   2️⃣ Education. I love learning new things. Like everyone else, I’m tired of the 101 fluff in the market and thought leadership that doesn’t teach you anything. This came with six new models about sales, marketing, cs, GTM, efficient growth, and usable frameworks to apply in this economic climate. VPs of Marketing and Sales team sending gifts should take away the following ⬇️ ♦️ Marketing suffers the same problem as sales… activity OVER impact when it should be the other way around. Generic nurture campaigns and generic gifts. It’s about the impact, not activity. Quality over quantity. It’s about how you “set the table.” What you send and message people is a representation of your company and the experience they’d get if they ever worked with you. If you treat them as a number, they’ll treat you like every other “cold email seller” in their inbox ——> spam, archive, and delete. As the saying goes, if you don’t break through the noise you’re just creating it. ♦️ Brand isn't just attention-grabbing stuff and content that has “clicks.” Real brand dominance is Its credibility. It’s trust. Its authenticity. It’s education. That’s what a lot of “brand” marketers get wrong. This book was a representation of strong brand that will generate demand. ♦️ Thought Leadership. The winners in B2B will demonstrate to their buyer that they know where the puck is going. Not where the puck has been. They know that they challenge the status quo. They’re here to redefine the market. They’re here to TEACH them something. TLDR - a hard lesson for all marketers out there. Stop giving your sales team wasted budget on gift cards, t-shirts, notebooks, and pen/pencils. Your buyers don’t need that, nor do they want it. Give them something memorable they will obsess and stare at. Give them something that they learn from. And the next time your SDR calls them... they won’t hang up the phone in 2 seconds. #sales #marketing #customersuccess

A $60 gift just outperformed most LinkedIn ad campaigns I’ve seen this year. Slack recorded their huddle hold music and sent it out to a handful of influencers. One post. 17k followers. 160 likes. 59 comments. I imagine around 30k impressions. Compare that to your average LinkedIn CPM. I’ll wait. Granola did the same thing differently. They make a note-taking app. Their name is Granola. So they sent fancy spoons, beautifully designed, with copy that actually made you stop and read it. Congrats Rob Denton and team! One post generated 1,900 likes and 272 comments. Probably 300k impressions if I had to guess... Not because the gift was expensive. Because it was considered. Relevant and useful! The brief wasn’t “send something with our logo on it.” It was “what would make someone pick this up, smile, and want to tell people about it?” That’s the whole game. Most B2B gifting fails because it’s wallpaper. A branded notebook. A tote bag. Something forgettable sent to feel like effort was made. The viral plays that work share three things: • The gift connects directly to the product, message or brand name • The recipient has an audience that matches your ICP • The moment of receiving it is worth sharing You don’t need a big list. You need the right ten people and a gift that earns its own post. One influencer post from a targeted $60 send has driven 3 pipeline opportunities for us at Reachdesk. The math starts looking very different when you frame gifting as a way to amplify your channels. This is how you start conversations. The question worth asking before your next ad spend: what could I send instead?

𝐖𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐜𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐝𝐨𝐧’𝐭 𝐦𝐞𝐚𝐧 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐝𝐮𝐜𝐭 𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐞𝐭 𝐅𝐢𝐭. We learned this the hard way. I started Smilie mid last year, seeing a gap in the market after years building traditional companies. Gifting is everywhere in businesses, especially in Asia. It’s cultural. So, why not combine that with data? Create data-backed gifting that powers sales and marketing teams. By November 23, we were growing and profitable with over: - 50k in MRR, - 50 subscribers, - and a 20-30% growth month on month But then came the catch. Folks subscribed because of me, not our solution. It was funny—they didn’t even know what we were actually selling. I thought we could skip the “messy” part—the gifts—and just build the software for teams to give gifts. Within months, everything crashed. We lost our way, started chasing whatever seemed shiny. AI for consumer gifting, turning products into gift cards, smarter gift recommendations for merchants. But I forgot why I started this—helping sales and marketing folks enjoy and scale with gifting. So, we decided to dive into the messy work and learn from the ground up: - Understanding gift trends, - Curating gift sets, - Handling storage and packaging, - Product photoshoots. Today, we store, pack, send and track engagement from gifting for some of the fastest growing brands around the region, turning it into a growth engine for different customer journey. And for the first time in a long while, clients see, understand and appreciate what we truly do. In such a traditional industry, where first impressions are everything, we learned a crucial lesson: exceptional gifts must precede exceptional software. While our technology delivers impressive results - 20% cost savings and 10x ROI - we first had to win hearts with stunning gifts. Only then could we demonstrate how our software enhances campaigns through automation, tracking, and compliance. So a note to all founders tackling traditional spaces out there. Never assume your clients actually understand the pain points and be willing to change, sometimes its become such a norm that people just accept it. It took a year to feel the wind shift. We’re not there yet, but we’re heading in the right direction. 🎁

THIS is what creative strategy is all about. We work with an outdoor grilling product, with 89% of purchases typically attributed to male buyers. Heading into BFCM, the Brighter Click team faced a challenge: how to drive more purchases and lower CPAs despite seasonal trends showing a decline in outdoor grilling due to cooler weather. We knew we couldn’t rely on the same messaging with a simple discount slapped on top. After completing social listening, we discovered a key insight: choosing the perfect gift for your dad, husband, fiancé, or boyfriend can feel like pulling teeth. This became our angle. We crafted a creative strategy centered around a “gifting for him” message and the results BLEW us away: Performance Data: 9/1/24 - 10/31/24 • Male Purchases: 483 (CPA: $88.98) • Female Purchases: 56 (CPA: $98.38) 11/1/24 - 12/10/24 • Male Purchases: 270 (CPA: $69.21) • Female Purchases: 353 (CPA: $55.53) Year-Over-Year Growth: • Revenue: 263.98% increase • CPA: 32.07% decrease • Orders: 104.62% increase For context, the November and December ads ran in an ASC+ campaign with zero gender exclusions. The algorithm, fueled by our creative and purchase data, naturally pivoted towards the female demographic, who became the primary purchasers. When creative strategy aligns with insights, data, and execution, the results speak for themselves. This is how we redefine performance marketing. 👏

73% of consumers say they'd rather receive a food gift than a physical object. The buyer is ready. The gifting occasion is real. The brands in the fastest-growing categories just haven't shown up to take the order. The gifting numbers: - The protein bar market is $12.6B in 2026, growing to $19B by 2033. Gifting infrastructure in the category: nearly nonexistent. - The food gift box segment is $5.2B, growing at 7.5% annually. Premium snacks are the primary driver. - Wellness snacks are the fastest-growing sub-segment in corporate food gifting. - 61% of Father's Day alcohol buyers choose beer. Almost no craft beer brand has a DTC gifting program to capture them. - Hot sauce sales at Selfridges were up 80% YoY last holiday season. These aren't fringe categories. They're the categories most of the people reading this are actually in. 𝗚𝗶𝗳𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱𝘀 A corporate client who orders once reorders. A gift recipient becomes a direct buyer. AOV on gifting is higher than standard DTC because people spend more on things for other people. Grove Cookie Company gifting storefront hit 20% of total revenue in its first 11 months. Brightland grew corporate gift revenue 50% after building the infrastructure. Most brands in the highest-growth gifting categories are still at zero. 𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗯𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗺𝗲𝗮𝗻𝘀 Not a gift card page. Not a December email. Six things: → A dedicated gifting landing page → Gift-appropriate packaging options → A corporate gifting portal with bulk ordering → Occasion-specific campaigns across the calendar year → Personalization options → A CRM workflow built for gifting buyers Most brands have zero of these. Chocolate built its gifting infrastructure 50 years ago. Wine built it in the 90s. Hot sauce, protein, premium snacks - that construction is happening right now. The brands that show up early own the category association for a decade.

Here’s how most teams use gifting: Rep has an idea → Finds something cool → Sends it → Hopes it works No rules. No tracking. No alignment. And then they wonder why their CFO keeps slashing the budget. I’ve seen this happen more times than I can count. And to be fair, I’ve been that rep, but as a marketer. The one who sent cookies with no plan and then got defensive when someone asked for ROI. But after using gifting for years across multiple teams, in-house at a gifting company, and now building strategy inside Reachdesk...I finally figured out how to turn it into something Finance actually loves. Here’s the play: ➜ Gifting starts with a trigger. We don’t send gifts because it’s Tuesday. We send when someone hits a moment that matters. → Visited pricing page → Attended a webinar → Asked a smart question on a demo → Just signed a renewal Everything is tied to action. No more “just because” sends. ➜ Every gift has a follow-up baked in. If you’re not pairing the gift with a follow-up, you’re not running a program. You’re running a guessing game. The sequence is simple: Signal → Gift → Follow-up (within 24 hours) And the follow-up is never a hard sell. It’s just keeping the energy warm. ➜ We treat gifting like a channel. Not a line item. Every other GTM play has reporting. So should this one. We track: → Redemptions → Response rates → Meetings booked → Pipeline created → Revenue closed When you show that data, Finance stops asking “Why are we sending cupcakes?” And starts saying “Can we do more of this?” ➜ We budget like grown-ups. Each team has a gifting budget. It’s not a free-for-all. → CS has one for renewals, onboarding, escalations → Sales has one for outbound, demos, multi-threading → Marketing has one for events, campaigns, nurture No surprises. No fights. Just clarity. When gifting works, it feels like magic. But behind the scenes? It runs like a machine. That’s how you scale it. That’s how you keep it funded. That’s how you turn it from a “nice touch” into a revenue lever.

We turned gifting into a powerful growth driver When most brands think of gifting in B2B, they default to branded mugs, pens, or water bottles. Nice gestures, but forgettable. We decided to ditch the knickknacks. Instead, we focused on experiences. • A surfing lesson. • Dinner at a Michelin-starred restaurant. • A falconry class. • A live lobster dinner. • Tickets to the playoffs for their favorite sport. The result? Stronger relationships, more referrals, and amplified brand love. Here are four areas where gifting experiences has worked magic for us: 1. Partners-in-the-making. Sending gifts to up-and-coming partners shows the kind of brand you are. It reinforces your values and sparks strong word-of-mouth advocacy 2. Influencers. Influencers already talk about your product’s benefits. Elevate that relationship by gifting an unforgettable experience. Not only will they rave about your product, but they’ll share your incredible company culture with their audience—for free. 3. Top customers. Most brands ignore their most loyal customers when they could be turning them into powerful evangelists. A thoughtful experience can make them lifelong advocates. 4. Podcast hosts. Getting on a podcast is only step one. Sending a gift afterward transforms a one-off interview into a long-term, mutually beneficial relationship. Take care of your ecosystem, and it will take care of you.