Gift with Purchase Marketing Campaigns Drive Sales & Connect Customers

The best things in life are free.

And there’s no doubt about the power of a free gift in retail. In a recent study, 90% of shoppers said they're more likely to buy from a retailer again after receiving a gift.

How Does Gift with Purchase Marketing Work?

Gift with purchase promotions (also known as buy X, get Y) is simple: when you buy something, you get something in return. The challenge for marketers is that the gift needs to be perceived as valuable and relevant to the shopper to achieve the best results.

Let’s look at how brands and retailers might approach a GWP marketing campaign.

1. A retailer gifts customers with an in-store voucher when they spend $30 on a single shop.
2. A brand gives customers a free bar of their best-selling chocolate flavor with every purchase of their new flavor.
3. A coffee brand partners with a retailer to gift customers their new coffee blend when they buy a cup from the retailer’s brand.
4. Monster Energy partners with Apex Legends and gives away codes for in-game content with drink purchases. They work together to create associations between brands based on the mutual interests and behaviors of their target audience. This is called cross-portfolio engagement.
5. A cosmetics brand gives away a free mini mascara with every purchase and enters customers into a sweepstake to win a personalized make-up tutorial. This is called a layered promotion.

GWP Promotion Participation

There are lots of ways a customer can redeem their gift. It’s important to make the criteria for getting and redeeming a free gift easy.

• Scan a receipt to win. A customer scans their receipt which is then validated using receipt processing software.
• Email. The brand or retailer sends a gift voucher or redemption code directly to a customer’s email address.
• At home or in-store. The customer gets the gift delivered to their home or collects it in-store.
• Microsite. There’s a dedicated microsite for the campaign. A customer can visit the microsite to redeem their gift.
• MMS. A customer receives an SMS or WhatsApp message with a code or digital voucher to use in-store on online.
• Loyalty app. Gifts appear in the brand’s loyalty app. If a customer doesn’t already have the app, this redemption option might encourage them to download it.

Your Approach to Gift with Purchase Marketing

Your GWP marketing approach will depend on your goals. If you want to increase brand awareness, an instant-win campaign could work well for you. If you have a new product to launch, go for a campaign that incentivizes shoppers to try it. If customer acquisition is your goal, partner with a relevant retailer or brand to build trust and awareness.

Whatever your goals are, there are four simple rules to follow to help make your campaign a success.

1. Make it Clear

It should be easy to understand what the prize is, what someone needs to do to be eligible for it, and how they can redeem it.

2. Make it Relevant

Think about your customer persona and what gift would appeal to them. Remember that it needs to have a perceived value to attract interest, so choose a gift that's likely to achieve results.

3. Promote it Effectively

Share the GWP promotion on relevant channels to broaden your reach and build as much interest as possible. On social media, consider creating a hashtag for it and encouraging followers to share it.

4. Use Gift with Purchase to Collect Valuable Purchase and Behavioral Data

GWP campaigns can give you huge amounts of first-party customer data. Take receipt scanning as an example, where a customer sends a photo of their receipt to redeem their gift. Using receipt processing software, you can:

• See customer baskets to find out what people are buying with your products
• How much of your product they’re buying
• Time of purchase
• Basket size

This helps you understand your customers, and lets you build up a portfolio of your customers. You can use this to consolidate and inform future marketing activity.

Free Gift with Purchase Examples

See below to find gift-with-purchase (GWP) examples or explore our consumer sales promotion case studies to get more ideas!

McDonald’s

Possibly one of the longest-running GWP promotions, McDonald’s has given children a free gift with purchase for every Happy Meal since 1979. And, they’ve partnered with the likes of Star Wars, Hot Wheels, and My Little Pony to deliver gifts that genuinely speak to the interests of their youngest audience – cementing the brand in their minds ready for when they’re paying customers.

Mattel

Mattel was looking to promote their WWE 2K partnership and drive sales of their John Cena products at Walmart in-store and online. They needed a way to validate consumers' purchases and reward them with in-game content.

Snipp developed a purchase-based program GWP program where consumers who purchased any qualifying Mattel John Cena products at Walmart in-store or online could go to the program microsite and upload their receipt to get an exclusive in-game content skin for WWE 2K.

Danone

Danone was looking to run an exciting scale promotion over the holidays to drive sales and volume at Sobeys and Safeway. They wanted to reward shoppers with a relevant reward to get incremental displays at Sobeys & Safeway.

Leveraging Snipp's receipt validation technology, Danone developed a gift with purchase program where consumers who purchased qualifying Danone products in a single transaction could upload their receipts and register on the program microsite to get a $10 Gift Card.

Kellogg's

Kellogg’s wanted to maintain strong consumption for in-home breakfast occasions as consumer mobility increases post-Covid. They wanted to deliver high value, high utility offers that increase in-store presence and incentive to purchase at a higher price

Leveraging Snipp's receipt validation technology, Kellogg's created an exciting GWP promotion tying back to their objectives where consumers who purchased any (2) specially marked Kellogg's Cereal products could get a FREE product coupon, as well as a donation of $2 to help fight hunger.

Lego

LEGO was looking to drive sales and grow their relationship with Walmart while celebrating LEGO's 90th anniversary!

Leveraging Snipp's receipt verification platform, LEGO launched an exciting gift with purchase program where consumers who spent $50 or more on any qualifying LEGO products at Walmart (in-store or online) could upload their receipts to get a FREE LEGO 90th Anniversary Mini Castle! Snipp implemented a widget on the client's site. Consumers could submit their receipt by texting in the keyword LEGO90, via email to lego90offer@snippmedia.com or online.

Ready to Retail Your Gift with Purchase Freebie?

If you haven’t included gift-with-purchase programs in your marketing strategy before, consider them alongside other contests, sweepstakes, and promotions. In FMCG especially, there’s a lot to gain from stopping to give customers something they value for free.

Get in touch with Snipp today to get started.