The Revenue Impact of Gifting

This week, HockeyStack released one of their amazing Labs reports on The State of Gifting, and as expected it didn’t disappoint. As a contributor to the research, as well as being a proud provider and customer of HockeyStack, the measurable impact of gifting is a topic that is very close to our hearts.

In this article, we wanted to spotlight some of the insights from that report, as well as adding some of our own internal customer data, to build on what the HockeyStack team have put together in their report.

Join me August 9th as I dive into this new data on "The True ROI of Gifting" with Canberk Beker, Head of Growth at HockeyStack and Liam Moroney CEO & Co-Founder at Storybook Marketing.

Key Findings

The overarching findings in the report talked about the impact that gifting has on inbound and marketing results, but what really stood out to us was just how much that impact occurs all the way across the journey.

According to the HockeyStack report, the data on integrating gifting into outbound sales efforts yields compelling results from the first outbound moment:

• Outbound gifting boosts meeting rates +3.08x.
• Outbound gifting increases win rates +1.84x.
• Gifting campaigns reduce the cost of MQLs by -43%
• Gifting campaign SQLs result in larger deals that close 29% faster.
• In currently open deals, gifting after the first call leads to a massive improvement in second call rates +6.31x.

Impact of Gifting on Deal Cycles

3x Increased Meeting Rates

From a dataset of 390M emails, the report found that outbound emails including a gift exhibited a 3x higher meeting rate than those without them. 

Considering the effort and tech that goes into increasing open rates alone, tripling the amount of meetings by incorporating a gifting strategy is truly transformative for teams. This is especially powerful as the industry is only seeing declining rates in outbound performance in recent years.

6x Improvement in Second Call Rates 

As any sales rep knows, getting someone to take a call and see what you do is one thing, but turning that into an ongoing engagement is where the deal is make or break. Which is why it’s so exciting to see the impact of gifting in strengthening that engagement. 

Where gifting was included, there was a staggering 6.3x improvement in second call rates compared to those without, truly demonstrating how much a thoughtful gifting experience can build a sales relationship right from the start.

1.84x Increased Win Rates

Of those outbound deals that originated with gifting, the win rate was dramatically increased too, showing a 1.84x improvement over efforts where outbound didn’t include any gifts.

As perfectly stated in the report:

“This data shows that offering gifts actually doesn't make people have a meeting with you just for the gift, but it actually improves the close rate as well.”

13% Bigger Deals Closing 29% Faster

Deals including gifting correlated with an impressive deal size increase of 13%, which drives up the impact even further. But they weren’t just bigger deals — they also closed 29% faster than those without gifting.

This is huge news for sales leaders, because it’s much easier to hit targets by increasing the sizes of deals in your pipeline than by sourcing new ones entirely.

Overall, the report data painted a phenomenal picture of the impact that gifting can have. But, even for those accounts in the report, what’s missing is the difference between good gifting strategy and bad, and the even more impressive gains that can come with a best-in-class approach.

-43% MQL Cost

‍An interesting note from the HockeyStack report was that MQL:SQL conversion rates went down 9% when gifting was involved.

Like all mis-targeted spray&pray marketing tactics, injudiciously “gifting” transactionally to buy leads may lead to a higher than average unqualified MQL rate, but that becomes insignificant when compared to other aspects of gifting (like SQLs that result in +13% larger deals that close 29% faster).

Companies like PatientPop that take a more targeted approach see huge returns:

• 7-Figure pipeline generated consistently each month
• Broke demos booked record in the first month
• 292% on YTD ROI (the most important number)

Sendoso Customer Insights

The one area that wasn’t addressed in the report was a critical one: return on investment (ROI).

As the report mentioned, the sample of companies spent a meaningful amount of their budget on gifting, and any marketing leader knows how hard justifying that spend to Finance can be, especially if it hasn’t been a part of the program before. 

So what does this spend and return typically look like?

To answer this question, we looked across the Sendoso customer base to identify some key criteria that would add the final piece of the story. Since our platform integrates right into the CRM data, we’re able  to take those gifting campaigns all the way down to a closed/won view. 

Campaign Cost

In order to get a true ROI picture, we need to start with the costs that went into the campaigns. According to our data, the average total campaign budget was around $13,866, with the average individual campaign running at $6,612.

The average campaign sent 132 gifts, which means an average gift cost of about $50, and a typical opportunity would see about 3 total gifts.

Gifting is much less expensive than many initially believe, especially when you consider that we will easily spend $150 per lead, compared to the same amount being applied to strengthen an opportunity.

59X Pipeline Impact

Out of this campaign spend, the average Sendoso customer delivered an Influenced Pipeline of $820,906, which equates to a staggering 59x ROI, looking at pipeline to campaign spend.

Going back to the HockeyStack data, with a 13% increase in deal size, a 29% increase in time to close, and the crucial 1.84x improved win rate, this is the type of pipeline influence that has material value to the business.

But, let’s go farther than just pipeline:

15X Revenue Impact

In our data, the average closed/won pipeline influenced by gifting is $209,967, which brings the final ROI from spend to revenue to an amazing 15x. 

With other channels (like Google ads shown above) seeing a 8.49x ROI, it might make sense to transfer that budget over to gifting, where some companies see up to a 40x ROI.

When you put the whole story together, there’s no question that gifting is a revenue generating effort.

26% Win Rate

When comparing our data on SQL:Closed-won deals, we wanted to see it side-by-side with HockeyStack's data on the same from other channels, specifically Google Ads and LinkedIn Ads.

With those two advertising channels often commanding the lion's share of marketing budgets, it was interesting to see that gifting DOUBLES the win rate of LinkedIn ads and significantly outperforms Google Ads:

Conclusion

In an age where there is more pressure than ever to run efficient and effective marketing programs, it’s all too easy to look at programs through a very narrow view of lowest costs per leads, MQLs, and meetings. 

But, as good marketers know, this efficiency pursuit often causes us to cut out the very things that can win the deal. Gifting is exactly one of those tactics.

What can feel like an additive element to a campaign, like gifts as part of outbound, are anything extra cost. They are performance multipliers because they are relationship multipliers.

And that impact can take place from the very first interaction in getting the meeting, and continues to deliver impact throughout the sales process - all the way to revenue.

Sometimes the biggest efficiencies come from what you add into your strategy, and not what you take away. So, if you’re looking to increase the outputs of your efforts with gifting - let’s chat.