Keep designs basic. Novelty gift cards can certainly turn a few heads and look great on display. You can order cards with die-cut shapes and sizes and even battery-operated versions that play music and display flashing lights. However, they can also be difficult to carry around in one’s pocket or wallet. It’s best to offer a colorful, eye-catching design that can still be implemented as a standard sized card.

Branch out. You're not limited to selling gift cards at the point of sale or even in your own stores. You can offer commissions to outside businesses to display and sell your gift cards in their locations. While you pay a bit more out of pocket to give them the ability to activate your gift cards, you can increase your presence without having to buy additional retail space to do so.

No expiration date. While it may cause accounting headaches, resist placing expiration dates on your gift cards. Not only will some customers hesitate to pay for value on a card that can be taken away, this practice is also illegal in many states.

Virtual cards. Online retailers can still offer gift cards. Rather than a physical card, you sell "online certificates" which can be redeemed for goods and services. However, it’s to your advantage to develop actual gift cards to mail customers after the sale. It’s a strong branding and marketing tool to remind customers to do future business with you.

Remember the faithful. One benefit to a loyalty program is to find ways to reward existing customers while recruiting new ones. If you have dedicated customers, they are going to shop with you no matter what. But you can't slight them in favor of winning new business. By rewarding incremental behavior, you can thank your loyal regulars for their continued patronage while offering incentives to new clients to keep coming back.