Electronic gift certificates are the only gift that last minute shoppers can buy and have delivered immediately. Many gift certificate recipients will end up spending more than just the face value of the gift certificate when they visit your site. Here are some gift certificate tips:

• During the holidays, put your offer of gift certificates front and center on your site.

• Integrate the gift certificate into your homepage, the tops of product pages, and all email marketing you send out.

• Run specials on gift certificates through your social media accounts (for example, get a $50 gift certificate for only $40 when you mention a certain promo code ran on Twitter or Facebook).

• Ask regular customers to spread the word of your site and gift certificates - turn them into ambassadors!

• Offer your customers several different options for sending gift certificates to their friends, which can include electronic transmission or a print out that can be mailed in a nice holiday card.

Even if you are in a service industry, a little consideration will likely reveal some ways that you can incorporate gift certificates into holiday marketing.

If you are an MightyMerchant customer, you can go to our Support Center gift certificate page to see how our gift certificates feature works.

Do you have any examples of innovative uses of gift certificates that you have tried? Please share them with us through our HEROweb Facebook page.