Small gifts also boost business
A study by the University of Zurich shows that when a sales representative brings a small gift for a client, the client's willingness to buy increases significantly—especially when the recipient is the boss himself.
A gift can express gratitude about a good business relationship or be used in a calculating and manipulative way. It is rarely clear where the dividing line is. Many industries and companies have guidelines regarding the size and value of gifts that employees may accept. Such limits are based on the assumption that smaller gifts are harmless, while valuable gifts create conflicts of interest for recipients and influence their decisions. A box of chocolates? - That's fine. A box seat at the Formula One race? - Rather not.
Even small gifts influence behavior
Michel Maréchal and Christian Thöni from the Universities of Zurich and Lausanne investigated whether small gifts in business relationships actually have no influence on the behavior of the recipients in a controlled field experiment in pharmacies and drugstores. Sales representatives gave some of their customers six tubes of toothpaste worth a total of about 10 Swiss francs at the beginning of the sales talk. The seemingly insignificant souvenir resulted in the value of the ordered goods almost doubling on average.
Effect depends on the relationship
However, the gifts were only effective if the business relationship had already existed beforehand, i.e. the giver and recipient already knew each other. If, on the other hand, the gift was presented at the first contact, it tended to have the opposite effect: the order value tended to be lower in this case than if no gift was involved at all. "Showing up with a gift right at the beginning of a business relationship may seem calculating and is therefore counterproductive," UZH professor Michel Maréchal comments on the result. "However, if a contact already exists, the customer may also perceive the attention as a thank you and as an expression that the relationship is valued."
Biggest impact with the boss
So handing out small gifts can be a profitable strategy for sales representatives. Especially if they are presented personally to the boss. If the gift went directly to the branch manager in the field experiment, the value of the order increased more than fourfold: from an average of 61 francs to 271 francs. With the normal employee, on the other hand, it had no effect. This makes sense insofar as store managers generally have greater decision-making authority and can place larger orders without consultation. "But since they usually also bear the business risk, it is surprising that they were willing to order so much merchandise," Christian Thöni of the University of Lausanne points out. According to the two authors of the study, the effect could be additionally reinforced if employees have decision-making authority but at the same time do not bear any risk.
Do limit values make sense at all?
The findings of Maréchal and Thöni provide new fuel in the discussion about the amount and sense of limits for gifts in business relationships. "Our study shows that the nature of the relationship between business partners plays an important role and that even small attentions are interpreted as personal favors for which people then reciprocate," Maréchal summarizes. "These effects still flow too little into the discussion about regulations and industry guidelines to curb corruption."
