A loyalty program with benefits isn’t a new concept. Retailers and businesses have been using it for many years. In such programs, incentives, such as discounts and rewards, are offered to retain customers and keep them loyal to your brand/business.
And that’s just the start of it. There are countless other benefits of starting a loyalty program for your business. Let’s look at our top 4 picks:
Top 4 Benefits of Starting a Loyalty Program
Here are the top 4 reasons every business should start a loyalty program:
1. Makes Your Customers Loyal to Your Business
As the name implies, a loyalty program makes your customers loyal to your brand or business. If you start offering incentives for quality products that satisfy your target market, retaining customers will become an effortless task. And retaining a customer is always more difficult than acquiring a new one.
But once you master the art of keeping customers loyal to your brand, you can expect repeated revenue. It’s a well-known fact that businesses that put more effort into retaining existing customers tend to be more successful than those that focus on acquiring new ones.
If you were to look at your customer base, only 25% are new customers, while the rest (75%) are repeat customers. The figures are pretty self-explanatory as to how your business can benefit from a loyalty program because discounts and rewards attract most buyers today.
2. Lead to Better Customer Engagement
Customers that opt for loyalty programs for businesses want to become a part of a closed community. So, encouraging them to purchase products doesn’t require as much convincing as it does with new customers. You only need to listen to their demands and fulfill them to keep them as a part of your customer base.
This leads to better customer engagement. And that means these customers are more likely to interact with your business on social media. Moreover, they are more encouraged to buy from you and share the same benefits with others. Plus, they also add more value to your business than customers that aren’t part of the loyalty program.
In short, better customer engagement increases the chances of growth for your business.
3. You Can Offer a Better Customer Experience
In the business world, everything revolves around customer experience. And of the benefits of starting a loyalty program is that you can improve that experience using valuable data.
For instance, if a customer that isn’t part of the loyalty program makes an online purchase, you won’t have much data about their buying behavior, preferences, etc. Of course, you can send out promotional emails and messages for related products, but that’s not enough to personalize the customer experience.
However, when a customer from a loyalty program makes a purchase, you get more quality and quantity of data. This gives you a better context, allowing you to use marketing tactics that offer a more personalized touch for customers. Eventually, it will lead to more purchases.
4. Increased Brand Advocacy from Customers
Customers that become a part of the loyalty program usually do so because they are impressed with your products and customer service. But it doesn’t stop there. The same customers tend to market your business for you by advocating it to their peers.
So, you can expect your loyal customers to spread the word about your business in their family and friends circles. This way, your potential customer network will increase automatically. And as you probably know, advocacy from customers is the most influential form of marketing.
The Bottom Line
So, to sum up, there are many benefits of starting a loyalty program for your business. For starters, it helps you retain existing customers, builds loyalty, and improves the customer experience. Moreover, you can also benefit from indirect marketing through advocacy from loyal customers. Plus, it leads to better engagement on your social media platforms.
You could say that loyalty programs for businesses boost revenue, creating opportunities for your business to grow.
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At Brookes College, we offer a retail management diploma that will allow you to become more informed about the latest marketing solutions. Whether it is customer service, sales, or marketing, our students can become well-versed in every aspect of retail management. Call us at +1 403-800-6613 to learn more about our programs.