Amazon Makes It Easy To Collectively Gift Your Friends On Facebook

Parties just aren't what they used to be, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. In the digital world, celebrations are often much broader, with friends from all over the world chiming in to wish someone well on their special day. As social networks and the like aim to bring in additional revenue, sites like Facebook are also encouraging folks to gift their friends digitally. And now, Amazon's getting into the action with a twist. The company today introduced Amazon Birthday Gift, a new way for customers to surprise friends on their birthdays by joining together to send Amazon.com Gift Cards with birthday messages on Facebook. Once a single friend starts a gift, any of the recipient’s Facebook friends can contribute – and many individual contributions can add up to a big gift.

“Birthdays have always been social occasions, and sites like Facebook now make it possible for anyone around the world to send birthday wishes to friends – with Amazon Birthday Gift, those many individual messages can become a big gift,” said Steve Shure, Amazon vice president, traffic. “Whether it’s your best friend or your old high school teammate, Amazon Birthday Gift lets you join a social gift that will grow as more friends participate, which makes giving and receiving birthday messages on Facebook even more fun.”

Amazon Birthday Gift makes social gift giving easy by allowing a single friend to start a gift by adding a $1, $5, $10 or $25 Amazon.com Gift Card to a birthday message, which won’t appear on the recipient’s Facebook Timeline until his or her birthday. Once a gift is started, any other friends can join in by also contributing Amazon.com Gift Cards. As more friends participate, the recipient’s Amazon Birthday Gift continues to grow. Then, on the recipient’s birthday, the many individual birthday messages will appear on his or her Timeline along with links to claim the gift – surprising the recipient with much more than just the traditional birthday messages, and letting the recipient get exactly what he or she wants from millions of items on Amazon.

Customers can learn more and start giving today at www.amazon.com/birthdaygift from their computer, tablet or mobile devices and, for a limited time, users of Amazon Birthday Gift may be eligible for a $3 Amazon.com credit. We're guessing this type of gift-giving will grow; a system like this would be ideal for graduations and weddings, for instance.