Guidelines For Launching A Loyalty Rewards Program

This Blog has spoken in lengths about how important it has become for businesses to have a Loyalty Rewards program in place and how it serves as a powerful marketing tool.

Sometime the biggest bottleneck a business faces is having no idea how to launch their Customer Loyalty programme. In this post we have shared few tips to help deal with this issue and get started:

Start with what you already have:
Every business has a set of customers who are loyal to them. Pull out a list of these regular customers and start your loyalty program with them. If you have a mailing list in place, it would help you a great deal. Your regular customers are already familiar with your products and services and by introducing them to the rewards program 1st, you make them feel special. This increases chances of them responding to your offers and deals.

Design fewer options:
Loyalty programmes with too many options for customers to choose from will unnecessarily complicate its structure. Design a customer rewards program with fewer options and easy to follow process.

Make the sign up process easy:
After you have grabbed your customer’s attention, signing them up will be the next obvious step. Keep this step as simple as possible. You don’t want to get your customers all the way here and watch them drop the idea just because the sign up process was too complicated to follow.

Keep earning & redeeming a simple process
Remember, one of the goals of a rewards programme is to keep your customers engaged. This again calls for a simple to follow rewards program. Often customers drop out of loyalty programmes due to their tedious structure. Keeping it easy to earn points, track points and redeem points, encourage customers to stick to the plan and to your brand.

Don’t lose focus from your final goal:
The ultimate reason why you need a customer rewards program is because it’s a powerful strategy to make your customers choose your products and services over your competitor’s. That said, every aspect of a rewards programme needs to be measured and analyzed to make sure it is accomplishing all its goals.

Hope this was helpful. Please feel free to share your tips, tricks and strategies with us.

Customer loyalty programme

Customer rewards program

Photo Credit: Google Images

The Secrets of a Successful Customer Loyalty Program

Loyalty rewards have become a regular practice with businesses big and small. Majority of business owners now understand the value of having a good successful customer loyalty program in place. If you have figured it right the benefits can be significant, however, you are also at a risk of incurring losses if you get it wrong. Here are two tips to help you set up a successful loyalty program.

Give customers a head start :
When giving away loyalty cards it’s always a good idea to give your customers few points extra and make sure they know that they are a few points closer to the goal right at the beginning. This way, the customers know that they don’t have to start from scratch which encourages them to stick around. One important thing to keep in mind here is to let your customers know why they are getting a head start point. For example, you can let them know that you appreciate new sign ups and thus the extra points.

Set Clear Goals For Customers:
Let your customers have a clear idea of how many points they need to collect in order to get rewards. Having clear goals helps your customers know what they need to do to reap rewards. The benefits of this are 2 folds. First the customers are encouraged to stick along without getting distracted by your competitors. Second, having a goal lets your customers know how much more they need to spend to make enough points for rewards, thereby, supporting sales.

So if you are planning to put together a customer loyalty program for your business remember to consider these 2 points mentioned here. Good Luck!

Customer loyalty programs

Customer loyalty scheme

Customer Rewards Program – Tips From Experts

With increasing popularity of customer reward programs, today’s customers have become habituated to seeing rewards in countless forms. Businesses big and small over the time have realized the value of a well-designed loyalty programme and it has now become a competitive necessity in certain industries. Here’s how to keep your best buyers loyal.

If you have a business which needs a loyalty programme set up then the following tips from customer loyalty experts can be a good place to start.

 

Is it the Right Strategy for You?

First thing to figure out is whether or not it makes sense for your business to start a customer loyalty programme. A business that deals with customers on an occasional basis, such as a repair service or legal services etc may not be able to have enough return customers to put together a loyalty program in place. In such cases instead for loyalty you can reward your clients for referrals.

What Rewards to Offer?

The type of reward to offer will vary from industry to industry. According to experts limiting your rewards program to just discounts is a bad idea. Discounts don’t leave a lasting impact on customers’ memories. A physical prize like a weekend getaway on the other hand does.

Michael Hemsey, president of Kobie Marketing says that you need to figure out which customers are most important for your business and design customer reward programs that cultivates those customers.

Let your Customers know about your loyalty programme:

Experts say companies need to spread the word about rewards by using all sources and channels of communication such as social media, newsletters & website updates.

Keep it Simple for your Customers:

Keep the entire process of earning points, tracking points & exchanging them for rewards as simple as possible. Claiming rewards should be a simple and hassle free process. When the customer is being rewarded, make sure they know about it.

Embrace Social Media:

Almost everyone owns a smart phone and is active on social media. Konsewicz, a strategic consultant for Maritz Loyalty says that the hospitality industry has really embraced social media as means to identify loyal customers. Rewards are offered to loyal ones through FourSquare, the social media platform that lets users check in at locations with their mobile devices.

Study & Use Your Loyalty Data:

Loyalty programs can help you collect important purchasing information on the buying behavior of the customer base that can help effectively plan and design customer loyalty programmes. Chris Cottle, vice president of marketing and products at Allegiance says, the data from rewards programs is a rich gold mine that’s often times untapped. Supermarkets use this information to know which promotional messages to send you. Travel companies use it to know which deals you might be interested in.

Hope these tips from the industry experts were helpful.

Rewards card
Customer rewards programs
Customer loyalty programme