Customer loyalty program management is requires skill, creativity and empathy.
One may have a good loyalty program, but with the changing needs of the market and increasing competition, one has to constantly improve marketing processes in place to sustain business and grow.
The role of a loyalty program is to engage customers in a way that generates value for them as well for the business.
One thing to remember is to not drive away your loyal customers by pelting them with one product offer or another. Understand what they want and when they want it, and try to offer them that.
Here are a few ways businesses can use to set their loyalty programs apart from those of their competitors:
Analysis of customer loyalty
To support all of the above, one can use analysis of customer loyalty data. Collection of data can be done at Point of Sale or other contact points.
Data can be used to reward the right thing to the right people, and to promote the right products to the right segment at the right time.
Loyalty Program Management gets easier with the availability of customer data and analysis.
Your data is of no use if you do not utilize it optimally to change your offering to get the maximum customer satisfaction.
With analysis of data, you can ensure that your resources are utilized optimally and you get the desired sales returns.
Personalized product recommendations
You can understand what each customer purchases, and recommend complimentary products to them. This can be done with the help of sales data collected through your loyalty program software.
If you spend effort and money on promoting general products to all customers, then a lot of of your effort will go waste.
You need to go deeper and understand what each customer wants, and target product recommendations to individual clients as per their distinct preferences. This will improve your conversion rate.
Promote at the right time
Like you target specific products to specific customers, similarly, you have to time your promotions right.
If you highlight a product when customers have no need of it, then it’s a waste of your effort and money. Use data analysis to know which customer purchases what products at what time.
This will give you insight into the right time for promoting a product or a category in a day, month and year.
The time to promote a product is right when customers are more receptive to the promotions and prefer buying such products.
Deliver value in everything
Always remember to deliver value every time you connect with your customers. Value could be delivered in terms of a discount offer, a valuable piece of information or article, an e-book, and other benefits.
You can also ask customers about their preferences, as that makes them feel special and understood. This delivery of satisfaction is of great value, too.
Once your customers are used to receiving value from you, they feel more confident about doing business with you. They also become more open to the promotions you offer, and hence gets you optimal results on the marketing actions you take.
Personalized rewards
Customers feel special when their preferences are taken into consideration while giving them rewards. They feel heard when you give them something they desire.
If you offer something that holds no value to your clients, then your reward system will not be successful in attracting customers.
In another case, a good loyalty reward system may be desirable to one segment of customers, but might be unattractive for others.
To ensure that you retain maximum customers, you can identify various customer segments in your target market and create different reward systems for each segment.
You can even customize rewards further to offer what individual customers prefer.
This will encourage customers to come back to you for business again and again, as they will feel confident that you understand their requirements.
Some companies give one item of the same of lower value free on two purchased items by loyal customers. This allows customers to pick any items they desire and get rewarded with something they prefer.
Loyalty program management is not tricky if it’s done with empathy towards customers. The focus of all your loyalty policies should be your customers and what they want. Only then you will be able to offer something of value to customers to bring them back again and again to do business with you.
To make a good loyalty program better you need to shift the spotlight from selling products to what your customers desire.