Four ways to give a great gift

It’s hard for me to think about any kind of gifting without mentioning John Ruhlin. Now, one may have at some point been able to boil John down to one of many knife salesmen - of which we all may have known many high school or college kids who had approached us with similar wares at some point. But not only is he a record-breaker in that realm, he’s established himself as the go-to for strategic gifting. I highly recommend his book, Giftology.

We have to step back and think about the purpose of a gift first. As opposed to a marketing tool, a gift should be an artifact. The goal of an artifact is for something to create a mutual history. The gift should represent the value of the relationship. The gift should be not only an investment from a dollars perspective but an investment from a thoughtfulness perspective. The purpose of the gift is to make them feel as if they are important.  As they use it in the following days, weeks, months, and years to come, it's a tangible trigger that reminds them of you, of that time, the emotion in that relationship. With all the noise these days, when you give what we call an artifact (not a gift), you're the most top-of-mind person in that person's world. More than anything, it's a reminder of the relationship and the power and the specialness of that relationship, so that's what we think of when we think of a gift in a business scenario.

Focus on the recipient. A gift by its very nature should be recipient-focused. We shop with our own eyes; we give for their own eyes. A gift is not an advertisement, meaning it should not have your logo or branding on it. When you try to turn it into an advertisement, you're actually making the gift icky. The other person reads between the lines subconsciously and they're thinking, "Really, you're trying to disguise this marketing ploy as a gift?"

Failure is OK. If you are going to hand select a gift and spend hours, if not days or weeks, on every single gift, you're going to miss sometimes. People think I must be the perfect gift-giver. Talk to my wife. I suck sometimes. In all honesty, I'm trying to hit eight or nine out of 10.

And don’t try for a perfect record, especially when you’re gifting at scale. With a list of 100 people, what does everyone on that list have in common? Well, a lot of people have spouses, a lot of people like to eat food and wine, so we try to tie into things that are common among humanity. Most are surprised that knives have continued to be so popular.  I know that if somebody is married, their spouses oftentimes are not included in any gift. Their assistant is usually treated like a pawn, not like a peer.

I try to take care of someone’s inner circle 80 percent of the time if I can, because the bar is so low. Personalize the gift and maximize the number of people you reach. If you can make them say, "Wow, this is so thoughtful," you will have created a deeper connection with them.