Rise.ai, which offers AI-driven customer re-engagement solutions such as digital gift cards, sampled 1,528 US stores that use the company’s re-engagement solution. Rise.ai analysed digital gift card sales in 2019 and 2020 and calculated the number of digital gift cards sold as well as initial income from digital gift cards.

The number of digital gift cards sold in the sampled US stores in the fourth quarter of 2020 rose by 110% compared to the fourth quarter in the year before. On an annualised basis, the number increased by 98% in 2020 compared to 2019. The average cost of digital gift cards in the US rose by 8%, from $74.77 in 2019 to $81 in 2020.

The US survey was part of a Rise.ai’s Q4 global digital gift card survey, which examined 2,351 stores in 85 countries across North and South America, Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia. Globally, initial income from digital gift cards in Q4/2020 soared by 181% compared to Q4/2019, while the number of digital gift cards sold rose by 103% compared to Q4/2019.

According to Yair Miron, CEO and Founder of Rise.ai: “Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the e-commerce market in general and the digital gift card sector in particular broke records already in the second quarter. This year Q4, traditionally the strongest quarter, was even more robust and the best quarter in the history of digital gift cards.

"In 2020, holiday shipping cutoff dates were earlier compared to previous years, due to the impact of the US elections and COVID-19 on global supply chains. As a result, people took advantage of digital gift cards for last-minute shopping. Another driver of the demand for digital gift cards was that fewer families met in person due to social distancing.”

Miron continued: “We have strong reason to believe that the demand for digital gift cards grew this year over and above the natural growth that could have been expected due to COVID-19. Our analysis shows that digital gift card sales from April 2020 to December 2020 accounted for more than 60% of the total sales during 2019 and 2020 combined.”

In 2019 Rise.ai enabled merchants to generate $150m in revenue and handled more than $1bn in store credit. The startup was established in 2015 and already serves more than 3,500 digital stores, with over 80% of them in North America. Rise.ai is active in more than 100 countries around the world.

Rise.ai was selected last summer by both Facebook and Google to assist small and medium size businesses to sell more through digital gift cards on the Google My Business, Facebook, and Instagram platforms.