Gift Certificates

Gift Certificates are a great marketing strategy to increase sales through your site. You can choose one of our many design templates for your Gift Certificate or even upload your own template to create a unique design for your site.

In this article, you will learn how...

• How Gift Certificates are issued in DecoNetwork
• How Gift Certificates Affect Commissions
• How to Create a Gift Certificate
• To set up the gift certificate
• Create Gift Certificates via CSV Import
• Exporting gift certificate details to CSV
• Gift Certificate Settings (including setting gift certificate availability in affiliate stores)
• Edit a Gift Certificate

How Gift Certificates are issued in DecoNetwork:

There are three ways gift certificates are issued in DecoNetwork. The first is via the Administrative configuration pages of your store. Here, a Fulfillment Center can create and send a gift certificate. Secondly, a batch of gift certificate codes can be imported into DecoNetwork by a Fulfillment Center, and the codes can be distributed by means external to DecoNetwork. Lastly, a customer may purchase a gift certificate on the affiliate website. Enabling gift certificates for purchase and setting up their value is also set up in the Administrative configuration pages. Instructions for all methods are discussed below.

How Gift Certificates Affect Commissions:

• When a gift certificate is redeemed during checkout, the gift certificate is taken as a payment method, like a credit card. It does not affect the commission of any sales going through a site.
• Commissions are not paid on the purchase of a gift certificate. This prevents a double payment of commissions at both the purchase of the certificate and the redemption of the certificate.

How to Create a Gift Certificate:

1. Log into your DecoNetwork website.
2. Browse to Admin > Marketing > Gift Certificates > Gift Certificates.

   The Gift Certificates page will be displayed.

   If you have not created any gift certificates, you will be prompted to 'Add Gift Certificates'.

   

   If there are existing gift certificates, they will be listed in the main work area. You can edit or delete gift certificates by pressing their respective buttons. To create a new gift certificate, click on the Add Gift Certificates button in the top bar.

   When adding a new gift certificate or editing an existing gift certificate you have the following settings:

   

   To set up the gift certificate:

   1. Enter in the sender's name.
   2. Enter the recipient's name.
   3. Check Send email to send the gift certificate via email to the recipient. Turning this option on reveals a text box to enter the recipient's email address.
   4. Personalize the message in the Message box.
   5. Set the Value of the gift certificate.
   6. The certificate will remain valid for the number of months specified in the Valid for box.
   7. Click on the Select Store button to choose a store where the gift certificate will be applicable.

      The Select Site popup will be displayed.

      
   8. Click on Select beside the store you wish to assign the gift certificate to.

      You can search for a particular store by owner name, owner phone number, owner login, URL, and/or owner email.

      If you have selected the wrong store, you can open the Select Site popup again and click on the Clear Store Selection button.

      When a store is selected, the gift certificate will show branding for the selected store and the email sent to the customer will contain a link to the affiliate store.

3. When you are done, click Save.

Create Gift Certificates via CSV Import

Prerequisites

• This feature requires a user-made CSV with one column containing a unique gift certificate code on each line. To ensure correct formatting it is recommended you use a spreadsheet tool.

This process will create a series of gift certificates with the code for each certificate based on input from an imported CSV. Each line of the CSV is to contain one column, which contains the gift certificate code. One gift certificate will be generated for each line. Each line must contain a unique code or the CSV import will fail.

1. Browse to Admin > Marketing > Gift Certificates and click the CSV Import button.
   
2. The gift certificate codes imported in the CSV will set up the gift certificate with the following properties:
   • Value sets the monetary value of the gift certificate in the default Fulfillment Center currency.
   • Valid From, Valid To set the dates during which the gift certificate can be redeemed.
   • Click Choose File to select the CSV to import.
     

   The gift certificates that are created will appear in the Gift Certificates screen for review and editing.

Exporting gift certificate details to CSV

Details of all gift certificates can be exported to CSV file for analysis in external applications by the following method.

1. Click CSV Export.
   

   A CSV file containing the details will be saved to your computer.

Gift Certificate Settings (including setting gift certificate availability in affiliate stores)

The following settings change the default behavior of gift certificates that are purchased through a store.

1. Browse to Admin > Marketing > Gift Certificates > Gift Certificate Settings.
   

   The Gift Certificate Settings page will be displayed with the General tab selected.

   

   Click the image to enlarge.

2. Configure the General settings.

   Details

   • Gift Certificates drop-down box has options that determine which, if any, affiliate stores may show gift certificates as products available for purchase.
   • Allow stores to customize certificates lets you choose to allow or prevent affiliate stores from making design changes to the certificates.
     • Stores use these settings:
     • Allow stores to customize:
   • Only allow 1 gift certificate per order prevents users from entering multiple certificate codes against a purchase. Consider adding this to the terms and conditions, if enabled.
   • Expires set the period of validity for the certificate in months from the date of purchase.
   • Description sets information about gift certificates that is displayed on the gift certificate purchase page in the same way a normal product may have its description set.
   • Terms and Conditions sets the T&C's for the use of the gift certificate.

   Denominations

   Denominations allow you to set the values of gift certificates available for sale.

   • Clicking Add Denomination creates a gift certificate with a new value, and clicking Delete will remove that value gift certificate from sale.
3. Click the Design tab to customize the gift certificate design.

   Click the image to enlarge.

   This page lets you make design changes to the gift certificate, including font type, color, and background image.

4. Click on Change Font to choose a new font for the gift certificate.
   
5. Click on the color swatch to choose a new Font color for the gift certificate.
   
6. Click Upload Template to upload your own unique design.
7. When you are done, click Save.

Edit a Gift Certificate

1. Browse to Admin > Marketing > Gift Certificates > Gift Certificates.
   

   The Gift Certificates page will be displayed showing the list of existing gift certificates.

   

   Click the image to enlarge.

2. Click the Edit button beside the gift certificate you want to edit.

   The Update Certificate page will be displayed.

   

   Click the image to enlarge.

3. Edit the settings.
   • From Name: edit the sender's name.
   • From Email: edit the sender's email address.
   • To Name: edit the recipient's name.
   • To Email: edit the recipient's email address.
   • Message: edit the message to be displayed on the gift certificate.
   • Value: edit the monetary value of the gift certificate.
   • Valid From: select a new start date for the period during which the gift certificate can be redeemed.
   • Valid To: select a new end date for the period during which the gift certificate can be redeemed.
   • Store: click on the Select Store button to choose a store where the gift certificate will be applicable.
4. When you are done, click Save.