For the past 2 years, when I have re-qualified for Platinum Status, I have received a $25 SPG Gift Certificate.  A nice little gift.  I can't complaint.

But this year it seems that things are very different.  Mommypoints explains this well here.

If you are GOLD, you can get 25% off an award redemption.
If you are PLATINUM, you can get 35% off an award redemption.

The other options arent really worth much in my opinion (getting double points for a month).

What's the best way to use this?  Find somewhere expensive that you would like to stay for 5 nights.
For example:

St. Regis Aspen, Colorado.  1 Night costs 35k points or $909 in Jan 2014.  5 Nights would cost $3,636 normally (5th night is free) or 140k Starpoints (35k x 4) with the 5th night free, or in total 28k per night for 5 nights.  With this promotion, you can take 35% off, so instead of 140k, you pay 91k starpoints, or just 18,200 points per night.  This is an extreme example because its still quite a lot of points and I would never spend them like because they are too valuable to me.

A better use would be to find a good hotel (not a St Regis) where the points per night is about half of the St Regis or less to use this promotion with and you will have a much better deal.