Posts Tagged ‘web’
Last Minute Gift-Giving AKA Hooray for Technology!
Thursday, December 22nd, 2011It’s that time of the year again. You’ve got a long list of friends and relatives you need to buy gifts for and you’ve left holiday shopping to the last minute. And by “last minute,” I mean you’re too late for overnight shipping and you can’t (or simply refuse to) brave the hordes of other last-minute shoppers at the mall.
Lucky for you, it’s not 1983. Nope, it’s 2011 and there are options for online gift-giving aplenty! Hooray for technology! Here are just a few ideas:
- Event Tickets. I’m a big fan of giving the gift of experiences — doing stuff is so much better than accumulating stuff. One of Seattle’s music and arts festivals (and a #client), Bumbershoot, is having a great holiday sale on their tickets for the 2012 festival. Gifting tickets for concerts, beer festivals, film festivals (like the Seattle International Film Festival) and other events in the future also buys you time (just include a message in your holiday card that tickets for the event are in the mail, ready for them to print at home, or available for will call pick-up on event day).
- Lessons. Like concerts and festivals, the gift of learning is something that friends and family aren’t going to redeem until the new year. So get online and get them enrolled in lessons in wine tasting, belly dancing, guitar, stand-up comedy, yoga, tai chi, writing, home brewing, pottery, cooking, salsa dancing, trapeze, photography, or even hula hooping. They’ll have something exciting to look forward to long after they’re bored with their other gifts.
- eBooks, Apps, Music, Movies. Nothing says instant gratification like downloading an ebook, app, movie or album. Check out Barnes & Noble’s NOOK Books, Amazon’s Kindle books, and the Google eBookstore for the bookworms on your list. The iTunes Gift Card is an easy choice for gifting iPhone/iPad apps, movies, TV shows, audiobooks and, of course, music. Giving the gift of an app for Android and BlackBerry isn’t quite as simple but there are workarounds for that too.
- Online Piggy Bank. Help someone start an online savings account or contribute to an existing one at Smarty Pig. You can search for people using their Facebook or Twitter account, or their contact info. You might just find that a friend is already saving up for a vacation, a new bike, or a laptop and you can chip in to help them reach his or her savings goal sooner!
- Memberships and Subscriptions. From ad-free streaming music and television to free shipping, being an online VIP is about memberships and subscriptions. Netflix, Pandora One, Hulu, Rdio are great choices for media. Give the shopper in your life the gift of free shipping at stores like Toys R Us, PetSmart, Calvin Klein and many others with ShopRunner. Amazon Prime memberships, unfortunately, are not so easy to gift for now so you may have to wait ‘til next year.
- Domain Name. There is nothing cooler for the geek in your life than his or her own domain. Register one at Green Geeks, iPage, or FatCow. Don’t forget to check your spelling, and have a friend sanity check the URL (See “Who Retweets Me” for an example of a not-so-stellar domain name).
- Gifting a gift. The best gift of all is a gift for someone less fortunate given in your friend’s or family member’s name. Several fantastic organizations have made this easier than ever. TisBest and Charity Gift Certificates offer charity gift cards redeemable to 250+ charity partners, including ChildFund, Habitat for Humanity, Doctors Without Borders, the ASPCA, and many others. With Heifer International, you can gift a goat, sheep, or even a camel to families worldwide suffering from hunger, poverty, and environmental degradation.
Happy (online) holiday gift-giving!
