No Time, No Problem: How to Still Send a Thoughtful Holiday Gift

It’s that time of year when meetings start ending with that sweetest of business jargon “let’s circle back to this in January.”

Your Slack is a ghost town, your inbox is a blizzard of OOO messages.

And then it hits you. You never sent employee gifts.

Don’t panic, you’ve still got options. Even better news? You can still send something way more thoughtful than an Amazon gift card.

The shipping window has closed. Now what?

By this point in December, most of the traditional gifting routes are closed. Branded merchandise won’t arrive in time and even local holiday baskets are likely to be backordered and delayed.

But missing shipping deadlines doesn’t have to mean you miss the chance to show your employees your appreciation.

In fact, this is an opportunity to rethink what makes a gift feel valuable in the first place. Frankly, most people don’t need another coffee mug sitting on their desk. And even if you got them a nice fleece, they probably don’t want to wear it out on the town with your logo emblazoned across the front of it.

Digital gifting is no longer a backup plan. It’s the best way to give something fast and meaningful without the stress of supply chain snafus.

Most gift cards feel meh. Yours doesn’t have to!

When you say digital, most people think of gift cards. And in the past, those have been the obvious fallback. They’re fast. They’re easy.

The problem is they’re also easy to get wrong.

A single-store card for, say, a coffee chain you might have heard of or a big-box retailer, kind of feels less like a gift and more like a coupon.

An Amazon gift card, for example, usually just ends up being used to buy paper towels or dog food. Necessary items, for sure. But joyful? Not exactly.

And since these kinds of cards are only good to one place, you risk giving a gift somebody can’t use because they don’t live nearby that store, or they don’t enjoy that retailer’s products.

At that point, your nice holiday gift starts feeling like a chore to spend, rather than a treat.

Giftly takes a different approach to digital gifting. Instead of locking your team into a retailer, you can send your employees money to spend how they want. Simply set the amount, write a nice message, and create a branded digital card for them to open by text or by email.

You can suggest ways for employees to spend their Giftly, like at a local coffee shop, or to contribute to a weekend getaway. But, ultimately, it’s their choice. Which makes it way more useful and fun to get than a single-store card.

Since you can use your own branding for the card and include a personal message, it also feels more personalized and thoughtful than just having payroll tack on a little extra money to your direct deposited paycheck.

And, since it’s a digital gift, you can send it in minutes and your employees will receive it instantly.

Here’s our suggestion for how to pull off a last-minute gifting plan from approvals to hitting send: 

The 72-hour holiday gifting plan

If you’re staring down the final days of December wondering how to pull off a meaningful gift at scale, don’t worry. You’ve definitely got time to deliver something thoughtful and well executed.

We call this the 72-hour holiday miracle. Here’s how it works.

Day 1: Make a list (and check it twice)

Start with the basics. Confirm your budget and get any necessary approvals from accounting and leadership.

Then, pull together your list of recipients. If you’re using Giftly, you can upload a spreadsheet of employees directly into the platform, which sure beats licking hundreds of envelopes.

Day 2: Deck the emails

With your recipients all ready to go, you can now design your card, choose delivery details like when to send, and write a warm, friendly message.

If this is your first time sending a digital gift like this, it can be helpful to draft a quick FAQ email to pair with the gift that pre-empts common questions like where the gift can be spent and when it expires (if you’re using Giftly, the answers are “anywhere” and “never”.)

Then, send a quick test to yourself to make sure everything looks how you want it to.

Day 3: Hit send, cue cheer

Your campaign is all set. All you have to do now is hit send and let your employees know their gifts are waiting for them.

You can post the FAQ to Slack, your company’s intranet, or send it in an email.

All that’s left to do is sit back and enjoy your team’s reactions. Giftly even offers the option for employees to send thank you notes so you can better judge how the gift went over with the team.

Ordering a Giftly in real-time

If you’re really down to the wire, Giftly still has your back.

You can purchase and send a gift in real time. Just enter the recipient’s email, choose the amount, write a quick note, and check out with a credit card.

That’s it. The gift is sent instantly.

This is ideal for 

• Managers who want to personally thank their team before the holiday break
• HR leads who need to cover one or two people who got missed in the bulk send
• Anyone who thought “I’ll do it tomorrow” … until tomorrow turned into the 24th

A thoughtful gift can still happen, even at the literal last minute, with Giftly. 

Don’t let shipping deadlines dampen your holiday spirit

If your goal is to show employees you appreciate them before the holiday break hits, it’s not too late.

That’s exactly what Giftly is built for.

A digital gift done right can be just as personal as something wrapped in ribbon. With Giftly, it can also be on-brand, easy to send, and delightful to receive.

Whether you’re sending to 10 people or 10,000, you can wrap up the year on a high note with your team.

Upload your list. Add a message. Hit send. Whether you’ve got three days or three hours, you can still send a gift that looks and feels like it was planned weeks ago.

Giftly helps you wrap up the year with heart even if you’re down to the wire. Ready to deliver for your employees this holiday season? Let’s talk.