During the peak of the holiday season, shoppers step out to buy clothes, gifts, and online websites for themselves or presents for their families. Gift cards are one of the most preferred options if they are giving it to their friends because of the convenience it offers.

Gift cards have a win-win written all over them. Merchants love it because it can drive new customers to their stores when people gift their friends who might be completely unaware of the retailer. So they will be bringing in new customers apart from the fact that these new customers will also be using their products. Without a doubt, it results in more revenue and increased spending, sometimes more than the card’s value.

In this article, we would like to take a look at the average gift card shopper.

Owing to its convenience and ease of use, gift card shoppers are not restricted to a particular segment. They come from different varieties of segments and have their own reasons for buying gift cards. Retailers should know that they should find out buyer personas for their gift cards and market them accordingly. For narrowing down their target audience and writing buyer personas, they should collect details of their existing customers, conduct interviews and surveys to get a clearer idea. You should find out a minimum of three buyer personas for your product.

Knowing your buyer persona will help with your targeting, marketing messages, and it will even guide you with the right offering for customers. Based on Incomm’s ‘Consumer Pulse: Gift Cards’ report, here are some interesting stats. Please note that the study also includes the first two quarters of 2020. The study was based on a comprehensive analysis of the gift card consumers.

The study reports on the following attitudes, demographics, behavior, etc.:

• The age bracket of the gift card shoppers
• The income levels of the gift card shoppers
• Urban, Sub-urban or Rural area
• The education levels of the gift card shopper

According to this report, the typical gift card shopper is a ‘married female without children at home.’

The gift card spenders are divided in the following ways:

• Millennials- 37%
• Gen X- 28%
• Baby Boomers- 25%

It is no surprise that millennials form the vast majority of the group that spends money on gift cards. But the fact that Gen X and Baby Boomers share more than 25% each is an interesting statistic. These numbers imply that people of all age groups are comfortable with purchasing gift cards.

The process of choosing gifts for loved ones is a mentally tiring one. Tiring because of the pressure associated with finding the right gift. It is much easier when you can hand over a gift card of the recipient’s favorite retailer. This is precisely why gift cards are much in demand.

The convenience that a gift card offers for people of all age groups is another reason for its popularity. If you don’t want to carry a physical gift card, you can house it in your mobile phones, and all you need to do is show your code to redeem your gift card.

Income levels

There is an almost equitable distribution amongst shoppers of all income levels when it comes to using gift cards. Here are the numbers for you:

• Middle- 35%
• Low- 33%
• High- 32%

If you look at it, there is hardly any difference among the three. The average gift card shopper can be coming from any income stream. While this broadens the target market, the discovery that people of all income levels using gift cards extensively will allow retailers to create offerings for all of them.

The gift card shoppers are more likely to be from suburban areas (50%). 20% of them are from rural areas, and the remaining 30% are from urban areas. It is a matter of surprise that among gift card shoppers, only 3 in 10 people are from urban areas while many of us would have assumed a completely different number. 63% of the gift card shoppers are homeowners.

The education levels of the gift card shoppers also have a bearing on how gift cards are purchased. People with a higher level of education hold a 14% of the gift card market according to the report, while those with a middle level and lower level constitute 64% and 23%, respectively.

If there is one thing that one can infer from the study, it is the fact that gift card shoppers come in various sizes and shapes. When the product you sell is of value to the audience, and you take the help of technology and choose the right gift card software, you will be in a position to attract a huge number of customers who will keep coming back for more.