Is your gift card programme ready for 2020?

For the past four years, brands and retailers have been working to create marketing strategies for 2020 and beyond, widely considered to be the beginning of a new era in marketing – one which fully embraces the digital possibilities brought about by the so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution.

According to the Deloitte 2020 Retail Trend Survey, the approaches have been centered around Four Key Pillars – Purpose, Customer Experience, Building Ecosystems and Agility. Purpose is defined as an answer to the all-important question “Why does this company exist?” from which all other aspects of the business should flow. In an era of online immediacy, brands must pay particular attention to the customer’s shopping experience – treating them as humans and not simple interactions, while being agile enough to make quick changes and stay on top of market trends. Building proficient ecosystems meanwhile is vital for companies who wish to make full use of big data and the opportunities it presents.