Exclusive Q&A with Joe Hall Co-founder and CEO at Gift & Go

Thanks for taking the time to chat, Joe. Can you tell us more about the concept of Gift & Go?

Gift & Go is an innovative gifting technology that leverages the power of Amazon Prime to help online casinos quickly, cost-effectively and easily acquire and retain players at scale. It allows player reward managers to access millions of products and a global distribution network to create fully customisable incentive and loyalty campaigns in minutes, but with no stock, no storage and no shipping to worry about. This gives casinos and most importantly, players, the freedom to choose the perfect gift each time, every time.

What are the main benefits that it allows operators to unlock, especially when it comes to acquisition and retention? 

Operators know that in order to attract new players, they must stand out from their rivals and offer something different. Because competition is so fierce, casinos must have incentives and rewards that deliver true value to players and that cannot be matched by the competition. Gift & Go gives operators the platform they need to do this and to really stand out.

Instead of players being offered the same rewards available at other brands, Gift & Go allows operators to ditch these traditional incentives and instead let players select from literally millions of different reward options. This is because our platform harnesses the power of Amazon Prime to give players the freedom to choose for themselves and not from two or three or a small selection of products. We provide real, infinite choice.

They can also instantly customise rewards by size, type, colour, etc with immediate delivery using Amazon’s global distribution network. And it is this unrivalled choice that keeps players playing. Gift & Go supercharges retention because players can see the huge range of rewards available and they want to make multiple selections. Of course, this means they have to keep playing if they are to earn those all-important loyalty points they need to access more products.

Operators are looking at different ways of spicing up their loyalty and rewards schemes with many turning to gamification. What does Gift & Go offer in this regard?

Gamification has become an almost critical aspect of any player reward and incentive experience, and this is something that we have built into Gift & Go from day one. Our platform gives operators a selection of options for every player acquisition and retention campaign they run. This includes everything from sweepstakes and give-aways to fully integrated loyalty programs with multiple tier levels.

We also have a number of Win/Lose gamification themes including Spin to Win, raffles and scratch cards. They’re all highly effective ways for casinos to provide top quality, highly personalised reward experience to their players, while still limiting the number of winners. This gives operators the chance to open up their acquisition and retentions campaigns to a much larger range of demographics, boosting the number of players they win and keep.

We are also working directly with some of our customers to leverage the power of our custom API integrations to create highly bespoke gamification features that allow them to take engagement to the next level and build fan bases unrivalled in their size and loyalty to their brands.

How does Gift & Go align with current gifting trends within the sector that we are seeing across Europe?

Regulations are tightening in markets across Europe, and this is impacting the way that operators reward loyalty and especially when it comes to VIP players. Take the UK as an example; operators are changing the terms of their VIP programmes and shifting budgets. We are now seeing more gifting options at the very highest VIP levels for players who are unaffected and less spend at the lower levels where budgets have been cut.

In Europe, we have many hyper-localised clients who prefer to have a selection of localised gifts for each of the markets they target. We offer Prime shipping in 18 countries inside Europe which our clients are taking advantage of. This includes markets such as Italy, France, Belgium and Spain where we can offer millions of products via Amazon. Over the past 12 months, the most popular gifting products have been consumer electronics, technology and smart home items.

What can we expect from Gift & Go throughout the rest of the year and beyond?

We are going to continue to focus on improving our user interface so that we can deliver the absolute best experience to our customers. We were recently granted Amazon’s highly sought-after P1 Preferred Partner status, making us the only gifting technology provider on their platform. We have also just released a new, truly dynamic product selection experience that integrates seamlessly with core Amazon systems. In addition, we have some truly exciting developments in the pipeline with a number of clients that will see them roll out highly bespoke gaming experiences to their players via our custom API integrations.