Loyalty programmes; The key to success

Loyalty programmes; The key to success 24 mei 2018

Would you like to structurally attract new customers and increase your revenue? In our blog, discover how a loyalty programme can realise these things and how at the same time you can recruit new brand ambassadors.

A loyalty programme ensures a direct bond with customers, a meaningful relationship with your clients and a higher revenue. Currently, it is getting increasingly more difficult to collect data and communicate with your customer. A loyalty programme will not only increase purchases and interaction, it will also collect a high value of customer information and other valuable content. A loyalty programme on average increases around 2 – 3 % extra revenue. The best loyalty programme is a mix of soft and hard collectable items, in which products and services are offered that can be both cheap or expensive and potentially with a discount.  The less loyalty programmes are around in your branch, the bigger the impact of your programme will be.

We are currently in an era in which both price and comfort are playing an increasingly bigger role. A company will first have the urge to focus on a short-term collecting programme with also short-term results. However, a loyalty programme offers significant benefits in the long run. How to fill in a programme depends on the type of product that you’re offering and the level of competition on the market.

The programme that is being used the most right now is a permanent stand-alone programme, in which a business founds the programme themselves. This is done to improve the connection clients have with the company, as well as staying top of mind. Besides these benefits, a cross-sell and upsell are being generated, increasing the threshold for participants to go to a different company. These permanent loyalty programmes are usually pared with a customer card. These cards are either physical or digital (apps, for example). It is important to ensure what the need of your target group is and to base choices keeping them in mind. Companies can also chose for a combination of these two, in which both are linked with the use of an online registration.

In the previous years, the amount of loyalty programmes has significantly increased. These programmes have shown that in reality, a long-running programme achieves higher results than programmes focused on the short term. With the use of a long-term programme, an emotional connection is built with the client, the company will stay top of mind and that will result in a higher revenue.

By implementing a system that ranks your clients, you will offer your most loyal customer the best service. This system means you separate your clients in different service levels, such as bronze, silver and gold. In this way, you will motivate your customers even more to remain loyal to your brand and potentially level up. However, pay attention to the fact that golden customers will expect and deserve a better service.

Another benefit is that loyal customers will freely advertise your brand by talking about it. Therefore, by using a long-term loyalty programme, you will transform your client into actual, loyal brand ambassadors.

Are you feeling inspired after reading our blog? Or have you become interested in the possibilities and results that will come with implementing a loyalty programme? Feel free to contact us! We would be pleased to help you come up with what programme would be most effective for your company or brand.

·         This article has been realized with the usage of the research, articles and peer-reviewed literature from the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, the SRM and the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.