Gift Cards are prepaid cards filled with a specific amount of money that are used by their owner, that is, in order to buy what he wants. People usually buy them and give them to their friends and relatives as an appropriate gift when they are not sure what to buy for them, or they may buy them for themselves to use in transactions. Subsequent purchase.
There are two types of gift cards. They may be cards bearing the logo of major credit cards such as Visa or MasterCard and can be used in any store that accepts this type of card. They may be limited-use cards that can be used in stores owned by the same parent company only, which is what we are talking about in Today’s article.
These cards may also be physical cards or vouchers, or they may be digital gift cards. In the following paragraphs, we will explain to you the importance of these cards and how you can provide them on your WordPress site or your WooCommerce store to use them to purchase your goods or services.
Benefits of gift cards
Gift cards provide you as a website owner and your customers with many benefits, the most important of which are:
- It is a convenient alternative to paying cash or using a credit card
- A convenient way to give a gift to people who are important to you when you don’t know what to give them on their special occasions.
- You can purchase gift cards for yourself to help you manage and track your financial expenses.
- It is considered a simple, easy-to-use method and safer than cash payment.
- As a store owner, gift cards help create a recognizable brand with your name and logo.
- Enables you to make a guaranteed profit from selling gift cards.
- Providing gift cards helps you generate new customers for your store.
- You can offer discounts when customers purchase gift cards to attract them to your store and increase their loyalty to your brand.
The most important free add-ons for selling gift cards
There are several ways in which you can sell gift cards on your website and take advantage of their benefits. In today’s article, we will use the method of selling gift cards by creating a WooCommerce store and using custom add-ons to sell gift cards within this store.
This method is suitable if you have an online store through which you sell physical products or digital services, such as membership sites and training course sites, and you want to provide gift cards to expand your store’s sales.
You can also take advantage of gift card discounts during economic downturns and crisis situations so you can save more money up front.
Here are the most important additions to selling gift cards in the WooCommerce store:
1. PW WooCommerce gift cards
The PW WooCommerce add-on is considered one of the best WooCommerce add-ons for selling gift cards because it is easy to set up and use. All you have to do is specify the required amount, the information of the person who will receive the card, and the message attached to the card during the purchase process, and the gift card will be sent to the recipient’s email.
This add-on is available in a free version and a paid professional version that provides additional features such as the feature of selling physical cards, adding money to the gift card, setting a virtual amount, and other features.
2. Ultimate Gift Cards for WooCommerce
The Ultimate Gift Cards add-on enables you to create and sell gift cards in your online store, send the card to recipients via email, SMS or WhatsApp, and enables you to download and print gift cards.
The addition also provides the ability to manage the gift cards that have been created, such as following up on each gift card individually and knowing the amount added to the card, the amount of spending, the remaining balance, and the expiration date of the card. It also allows you to include the gift card with a QR code for security and to determine the price according to four methods.
- Fixed Price (default price)
- Range Price: Any price that falls within a specific range
- Selected Price: Provides several different price options with specific values.
- User Price: The customer determines the price himself
The add-on also includes a free version and a paid version that provides you with more professional features.
3. YITH WooCommerce gift cards
The YITH WooCommerce add-on helps you create digital gift cards or printable cards, provides the feature of charging them for any amount you want, and also provides the ability to design the card as you want through the design templates it provides.
You can also embed QR codes into the card to increase its security, you can customize it through a flexible and easy-to-use user interface, and you can also download the cards in PDF format and print them if you wish.
The extension also provides the feature to schedule the delivery of gift cards and send them to multiple recipients at the same time, and sends a notification when the recipient receives and uses the gift cards.
The add-on is available in a free version and a paid version that provides additional features.
4. Gift Up! Gift Cards for WordPress and WooCommerce
The Gift Up plugin allows you to create and sell gift cards for your brand on your WordPress site or in your WooCommerce store. It also allows you to sell them on social media platforms if you do not have a website at all.
Through this addition, you can manage everything related to gift cards and choose a variety of card designs. You can also create gift cards with specific expiration dates, and specify any currency you want to charge the card balance in so that customers in any geographical area can use it.
Steps to use the Ultimate Gift Cards add-on to sell gift cards
In this paragraph, we will explain in practical steps how to sell gift cards on your WooCommerce store by using the free version of the Ultimate Gift Cards for WooCommerce add-on.
Using this add-on is easy and dealing with it is very similar to the way of dealing with gift cards provided by Amazon, where the customer must specify his name, the message he wants to appear to the card recipient, the amount or financial value for which he wants to buy the card, and the email address of the person he wants. To give him the card.
In order to use this add-on, you must have an online store built using the WooCommerce add-on, as explained in detail in the following article . Then you must follow the following steps:
1- Log in to your store’s admin control panel and choose Add-ons > Add New and search for the name of the add-on in the search box as shown in the following image, then install and activate the add-on in your online store.
2- After activating the add-on, the add-ons page installed on the site will appear to you, and you will see the add-on appear in the site add-ons list. You can click on the Go Pro button to upgrade the add-on to the paid version, but here we will be satisfied, as we mentioned, with the free version and prepare the add-on according to our requirements.
3- To set up the add-on, click on the Settings link that appears under the add-on name as in the image above. The add-on settings page will appear, consisting of a group of side tabs as follows:
Overview tab
This tab, as shown in the previous image, provides an overview of the extension, and also displays an introductory video explaining how to use it on your site.
General tab
Through this tab, you can control the general settings of the add-on as follows:
- Enable to enable the extension in your WooCommerce store.
- Enable Tax to tax gift cards.
- Enable Listing Shop Page to enable the display of gift cards with the products displayed on the store page. If you activate this option, you will be able to display all of your gift card products on the store page easily with other products.
- Individual Use When you activate this feature, your gift cards will be made for use individually by all customers.
- Free Shipping To provide free shipping on gift cards to all customers.
- Giftcard Coupon Length The length of the coupon characters applied to the gift card coupon.
- Gift card Prefix Defining the gift card prefix I’ll put WPAR here and you can choose any of your own.
- Gift card Expiry After Days The number of days for the gift card to expire, for example, 60 days.
- Minimum Spend and Maximum Spend to set the minimum and maximum amount available for purchase of gift cards by store customers.
- Gift card No of time usage to specify the number of times the gift card can be used
After selecting the settings you want, do not forget to click the Save Changes button at the bottom to enable all features, as follows:
Product
This tab includes three settings for products:
- Exclude Sale Items Select this option to exclude items from sale using gift cards
- Exclude Products Select here the names of the products that you want to disallow from being sold using gift cards
- Exclude Product Category Select here the product categories you want to exclude from sale with gift cards
Email Template
This tab is used to configure custom settings for the email that will reach the card recipient.
- First, you must upload an image of the template’s logo by clicking on the Upload logo button to the left of the Upload Default Logo text field , uploading a suitable image from your computer, from the URL link, or from the media library on your site, selecting the logo display options, then clicking on the Insert button in the article .
- Then you can specify through the following two fields Logo Height (in “px”) and Logo Width (in “px”) the dimensions of the logo (logo width and height) in pixels.
- In the Email Default Event Image field , upload the image of the event or occasion that will be attached by default to the gift card in the same way you uploaded the logo image and include it in the article. I will upload a picture here that says (Congratulations on graduation)
- In the Giftcard Message Length field you can adjust the length of the gift card message.
- In the Default Giftcard Message field , you can write a default message that will be sent to the recipient of the card.
- Finally in the Disclaimer Text field you can write your disclaimer text and save the changes.
Delivery Method
In this tab, select how you want to provide gift cards to recipients:
- Through email Enable Email To Recipient
- Or in the form of an Enable Downloadable card.
Other Settings
- Disable Apply Coupon Fields Enable this option if you don’t want your customer to apply coupons directly to the shopping cart and checkout page.
- Disable Preview Button Enable this option if you want the preview button not to be displayed on the front end of your store.
Gift Card Redeem
Shows store customers how to redeem and reload their gift card.
4- After completing all the settings for the gift cards in your store, you can review your card for your store by going to your site’s control panel and choosing the Gift Cards tab > Template. You will find several ready-made design templates and you will find your own design called Custom Template.
You can preview the shape in which the card will appear. Your gifts by clicking the Preview link , and you can also edit it by clicking the Edit link .
5- Now you must add a new product to your store that represents a gift card. This product is added in a manner similar to adding products usually in WooCommerce.
So, go to the store control panel > and choose Products > Add New > and name the product, for example, a gift card for graduates, and enter the product description, product classification, and product image.
In the Product Data drop-down menu , select Gift Cards and enter the card data (default price and email template) as shown here:
6- After completing, click on the Publish button to add the product to your store. Our gift card product will look like this
7- Now anyone can buy this gift card from your store and send it to whomever he wants by simply going to the store page, selecting the card product, filling out the required data (his personal name, the sender’s email, and the message he wants to appear to the card recipient) and completing the purchase and payment process as usual.
8- An email will be sent to the recipient that includes the card balance, its expiration date, and the name of the sender, and he will be presented with a coupon for the gift card he received. This coupon code will be used while purchasing the product.
9-That’s it! All the person receiving the gift now has to do is go to your store, browse your various products, and if he likes one of the products and wants to buy, he will choose to apply a coupon to the product he wants to buy and enter the coupon code for the gift card he received so that the card balance is used and the price of the product he purchased is deducted. .
Conclusion
Thus, in today’s article, we learned about the concept of gift cards, which are considered a prepaid debit card that contains a pre-determined amount of money that can be used for purchases and which customers can purchase from your store and send to anyone via email or print for use in purchases from your store.
We reviewed the most prominent gift card add-ons that can be installed in your WooCommerce store, which help you create, manage, and sell gift cards and increase your store’s sales, and we learned practically how to use the free Ultimate Gift Cards for WooCommerce add-on, which makes creating gift cards easier and faster.
All you have to do is choose the plugin that suits you and try it in your store. We welcome you to share with us your experience about the plugin that you used in the WordPress Forum.
