A little data-driven loyalty goes a long way
Retaining existing customers by keeping them satisfied and engaged is far less costly than identifying and appealing to new customers, yet too often retailers let their regulars drift away.
Why do retailers allow that to happen, especially when the costs of customer acquisition are so high?
Many retailers are primarily focused on expanding their customer bases: More customers equal more revenue.
However, if current customers aren’t nurtured, they begin to feel taken for granted.
Once a customer feels unappreciated, the separation from the retailer begins.
For example, stores will offer introductory rates, special financing, free shipping or percent-off savings to new customers — while leaving loyal customers to feel left out in the cold.
Savvy retailers understand that to win against all the competition out there — online as well as brick and mortar — new customers shouldn’t be favored over the current ones.
Loyalty programs can help show “the regulars” just how appreciated they are.
Reward all paying customers.
Cash-paying customers can’t take advantage of certain loyalty programs; some merchants require customers to download an app or link to a credit card in order to get loyalty points.
Retailers are recognizing the problem and are starting to look for solutions.
For example, the AppCard loyalty and personalized marketing platform is a multi-tender solution, which means customers can pay how they want, and still reap member benefits.
In addition, retailers such as Target, which offer rewards through its credit card offerings, are launching a more neutral system in order to reward more customers through its loyalty program.
Being flexible — or payment agnostic —is a smart business strategy, because cash payments make up over a third of all transactions.
Understand how customers want to be rewarded.
Customers enjoy earning — and spending — rewards.
A recent survey of approximately 1,000 online shoppers conducted by Bizrate Insights for Internet Retailer found that 70% of respondents wanted free shipping in exchange for their loyalty.
An impressive 61% also enjoyed receiving reward points they could redeem for discounts.
Unpopular perks: early notification of sales (11%) and exclusive access to products or store events (9%).
Develop personalized loyalty programs.
Successful loyalty programs “speak to” your customers’ tastes.
Shopper identities can be tied with SKU-level purchase information from POS like Retail Pro, and this data is used to automatically deliver personalized offers that see increased conversion rates and provide a better shopper experience, which in turn gains shopper loyalty.
Deep learning uses that historical transaction data in your POS to provide loyalty programs with customer preferences and anticipates a shopper’s next move, delivering recommendations to increase engagement and prevent churn.
AI built into solutions such as AppCard, help you “learn” your customers’ unique buying cycles and anticipate customers’ desires, delivering the right message, to the right customer, at the right time.
Every retailer should understand what its best customers want and design a loyalty program for those shoppers, based on data analysis.
One loyalty program does not fit all customers, so understanding the differences and how to best reach them is imperative to preventing shopper “drift.”
Using insights generated from unified data, you can build a loyalty program and overall retail experience that helps you put shoppers first.
Book your NRF 2019 meeting with us to start the conversation on how you can unify commerce with Retail Pro.
