Gift
cards to be the Holiday bright spot
Computers & BusinessWorld News
Carlos Torres
Miami
Florida
This holiday season
consumers will spend more than $35 billion on gift cards,
according to
Archstone Consulting.
Retailers
have primed gift card sales with creative marketing. Cards can
be purchased at locations other than where they are to be
redeemed, such as when iTunes gift cards are sold at pharmacy
counters.
"Retailers
are innovative in their use of gift cards, making them double as
DVDs and CDs and offering them in bags, boxes and tins," said
Jeffrey Grau, eMarketer senior analyst.

Mr. Grau noted that
The
Home Depot this holiday season plans to offer a plastic gift
card with how-to home improvement videos.
In 2006, one-quarter of gift
cards were purchased online, according to a study conducted by
The Marketing Workshop
for
Comdata.

Archstone
pointed out that growing gift card usage does not necessarily
translate into holiday sales growth, since revenue cannot
generally be recognized until the cards are redeemed.
The
company predicted that holiday retail sales would increase 3% in
2007, marking the slowest growth rate in retail holiday sales in
the past five years.
“Retailers
will see limited growth in holiday spending, resulting in a
‘season of discounts’ that will reward savvy shoppers,” said
Dave Sievers, retail and consumer products practice leader at
Archstone, in a statement.
“While this
tactic will drive shoppers to the stores, it won’t allow
retailers to overcome the adverse economic factors that will
affect sales, including the downturn in housing and a tightening
credit market,” Mr. Sievers said.
The
eMarketer US
Online Holiday Shopping Preview
report will be published in November 2007. Please
click here
to be notified when it is released.

Consumers who
watched TV online said it was convenient and helped them avoid
commercials.
Online video
of all types is unlikely to bite into US TV viewing time,
according to Paul Verna, senior analyst at eMarketer.
"Rather than
a wholesale shift in viewership from TV to the new-media
channels, both media will actually grow in the next several
years," Mr. Verna said. "Internet video will entrench itself in
the content mainstream, right alongside TV, albeit not in such
pervasive numbers."
According to eMarketer
projections, by 2011 there will be 200 million broadband
Internet users.
Of them, 183 million, or 91%, will watch online videos.
For
marketers, online video and TV viewing can be even more
complementary.
A March 2007
comScore
analysis of TV and online video viewing habits concluded that
the Internet’s primetime block occurs between 5 p.m. and 8 p.m.
on weekdays. This segues neatly into the standard TV primetime
schedule of 8 p.m. to 11 p.m., offering marketers an opportunity
to tailor their messages accordingly.
“Marketers
have a great opportunity to leverage Internet video in
conjunction with their traditional TV buy and essentially double
their 'primetime' commercial airing hours,” said Erin Hunter,
executive vice president of media and entertainment solutions at
comScore, in a statement.
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