Going the Distance: Four Ways to Build a Better Customer Loyalty Program for Your Brand

It’s easy enough for a customer to join your loyalty program, especially when you’re offering an incentive such as discounts. All your customer has to do is give out some basic information, and voila! They’re in the fold, a brand new loyalty member with your company. From there, it’s happily ever after. You offer the perks; they stand solidly by you, bringing you their continued business. Simple. Or is it? In reality, just how many of those customers are act ively participating in your loyalty program? Do you know? Sure, loyalty program memberships are on the rise according to market research company eMarketer, having jumped 25 percent in the space of just two years. However, that figure may be a bit misleading. The truth is that, while loyalty program sign-ups may be more numerous, active participation in such programs is actually in decline. At the time of the study, the average US household had memberships in 29 loyalty programs; yet consumers were only active in 12 of those. That’s just 41 percent. And even that meager figure represents a drop of 2 percentage points per year over each of the preceding four years, according to a study by loyalty-marketing research company COLLOQUY.

When discounts just aren’t enough

So what’s a brand to do? How can you make your loyalty program worth your customer’s while—as well as your own? After all, gaining a new loyalty member doesn’t mean much if your customer isn’t actively participating in your program. Consider this: Does your customer loyalty program offer members anything different from what your competitors are offering? Chances are your program includes discounts. That’s a given. And what customer doesn’t appreciate a good discount? But when every other company out there is providing this staple benefit in comparable amounts, it becomes less and less likely that customers will remain loyal to any one particular brand. Frankly, it’s all too easy for customers to get lost in a sea of loyalty member discounts. They’re everywhere. In fact, just under half of internet users perceive that all rewards programs are alike, according to a 2015 eMarketer survey. The key to success, then, is to differentiate your business from the crowd. If you can offer your customers something unique and valuable beyond the usual discount, chances are they’ll be more likely to stick with your brand. Here’s some inspiration from companies who get it.

Virgin: Reward more purchases with more benefits.

That’s not to say you need to get rid of discounts entirely. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth. Customers still love a good discount. The goal is to be creative in terms of the loyalty perks you offer. Take the Virgin Atlantic Flying Club, for example. As part of its loyalty program, the airline allows members to earn miles and tier points. Members are inducted at the Club Red tier, from which they can move up to Club Silver and then Club Gold. Here, it’s not just a discount. It’s status. And people respond to feeling important, elite. Still, even where the rewards themselves are concerned, Virgin is motivating loyalty customers with some pretty attractive offers. At the Club Red tier, members earn flight miles and receive discounts on rental cars, airport parking, hotels and holiday flights. But as members rise in tiers, they get even more. At the Club Silver tier, members earn 50 percent more points on flights, access to expedited check-in, and priority standby seating. And once they reach the top, Club Gold members receive double miles, priority boarding and access to exclusive clubhouses where they can get a drink or a massage before their flight. Now that’s some serious incentive to keep coming back for more. Discounts are still part of the equation – but they are designed with innovation and personal value in mind, elevating them to more than just savings.

Amazon Prime: Pay upfront and become a VIP.

What if your customers only had to pay a one-time upfront fee to get a year’s worth of substantial benefits? It may not sound like the smartest business idea at first glance. But take a closer look. Amazon Prime users pay a nominal $99 a year to gain free, two-day shipping on millions of products with no minimum purchase. And that’s just one benefit of going Prime. It’s true that Amazon loses $1-2 billion a year on Prime. This comes as no surprise given the incredible value the program offers. But get this: Amazon makes up for its losses in markedly higher transaction frequency. Specifically, Prime members spend an average of $1,500 a year on Amazon.com, compared with $625 spent by non-Prime users, a ccording to a 2015 report from Consumer Intelligence Research Partners.

Patagonia: Cater to customer values.

Sometimes, the draw for consumers isn’t saving money or getting a great deal. The eco-friendly outdoor clothing company Patagonia figured this out back in 2011, when it partnered with eBay to launch its Common Threads Initiative: a program that allows customers to resell their used Patagonia clothing via the company’s website. Why is this program important to customers? And how does it benefit Patagonia? The company’s brand embraces environmental and social responsibility, so it was only fitting that they create a platform for essentially recycling old clothing rather than merely throwing it away. The Common Threads Initiative helps Patagonia build a memorable brand and fierce loyalty by offering its customers a cause that aligns with deep personal values. OK, so their customers get to make a little money, too. Everybody wins.

American Airlines: Gamify your loyalty program.

If you’re going to offer your customers a loyalty program, why not make it f un? After all, engagement is key to building a strong relationship with your customer. And what better way to achieve that goal than making a game of it. American Airlines had this very thing in mind when it created its AAdvantage Passport Challenge following its merger with USAirways. The goal: find a new way to engage customers as big changes were underway. Using a custom Facebook application, American Airlines created a virtual passport to increase brand awareness while offering members a chance to earn bonus points. Customers earned these rewards through a variety of game-like activities, from answering trivia questions to tracking travel through a personalized dashboard. In the end, participants earned more than 70 percent more stamps than expected – and the airline saw a ROI of more than 500 percent. The takeaway: people like games.

Stand out from the crowd.

Your approach to your customer loyalty program should align with your overall marketing approach. Effective branding is about standing out, not blending it. Being memorable is key. To this end, keep in mind that loyalty programs are no longer a novelty. That means that yesterday’s strategies won’t work moving forward, so look for ways to rise above the noise, setting yourself apart from the cloying drone of countless other cookie-cutter programs.

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Pareto Principle Demystified: Applying The 80/20 Rule in Website Design

Are you spinning your wheels trying to boost traffic to your website? Are you constantly pouring resources into your site in an attempt to make sure that it’s everything your customers could want – adding new features, testing new strategies, redesigning in the name of staying current with the latest trend? What if I told you that the key to improving your website’s performance lies not in doing more but in doing less? If that prospect sounds too good to be true, I assure you that it’s not. Allow me to introduce you to the 80/20 Rule: focus on the 20 percent of things that will fetch you 80 percent of the results.

The 80/20 Rule defined

The 80/20 Rule is often interchangeably known as the Pareto Principle, Juran’s Principle and the Principle of Factor Sparcity. So what exactly is this multi-monikered principle? Let’s turn to Wikipedia for the answer: “The Pareto Principle...states that, for many events, roughly 80 percent of the effects comes from 20 percent of the causes.” The concept was the brainchild of business consultant Joseph M. Juran, and its namesake is Vilfredo Pareto, an Italian economist who observed in 1906 that 80 percent of the land in Italy was owned by 20 percent of the population. Since then, the principle has been applied widely to all aspects of business, whether it’s that 80 percent of a company's profits come from 20 percent of its customers, 80 percent of its sales come from 20 percent of its products or 80 percent of deals are closed by 20 percent of its sales staff. By following this principle, many businesses have realized great gains in profitability by focusing resources on the areas that net the greatest effect and eliminating, ignoring, automating, delegating or retraining the rest.

But how does the Pareto Principle apply to website design?

For the answer to that question, let’s head over to the blog of Tim Ferriss, a well-respected efficiency expert with a well-documented affinity for all things minimalist. Ferriss, a proponent of the 80/20 Rule, once performed a case study and noted that websites optimized using the Pareto Principle have a 20 percent higher conversion rate. Further more, Ferriss observed that in order to effectively implement the Pareto Principle in the design of any given website, only certain changes are required to be made, the majority of which involve the home page itself, since that is where most – if not all – of the site’s most mission-critical information lives. Most of these changes are relatively minor in nature, such as a cleaner call-to-action button, an uncluttered sidebar and so on.

Why should you use Pareto Principle in your web design?

The benefits of applying the Pareto Principle in the design of your website are two-fold for your visitors and for yourself. To begin with, the Pareto Principle means less work for you. Rather than fussing and fretting over how to max out every available square pixel of real estate on the screen with every conceivable feature and copy point, you only have to concentrate on that most important 20 percent that will take care of the remaining 80. Plus, keeping the focus on the most essential aspects of your site website ensures that your visitor’s attention is driven straight to your primary call-to-action elements (in fact, the Pareto Principle can be detrimental if not backed with a crystal-clear call-to-action mechanism). This in turn leads to higher conversion rates and winning over more new fans, subscribers and customers for your brand. From the perspective of visitors to your site, the Pareto Principle guarantees that they can look forward to a clean, streamlined browsing experience with fast page-load times that’s free of distractions and frustrations of any kind, thereby helping to turn turning random first-time visitors into regular users.

Putting Pareto into practice

Now that you’re on board with the Pareto Principle, how do you go about putting it into practice? To begin with, let’s take a literal interpretation of the rule: focus on the 20 percent of the elements that are responsible for the other 80. What is that magical 20 percent of the most vital things in your website? Call-to-action buttons, traffic funnels, images, whitespace, etc., right? In other words, USER EXPERIENCE. Yes, that’s right. The driving motive behind the 80/20 Rule is to provide the best possible user experience. Let’s examine the simple example of social sharing buttons – a nearly ubiquitous presence on every website or blog nowadays. Look at the sharing buttons that are present on your website. When was the last time the MySpace, Friendster or Digg buttons were used? These do not belong in that vital 20 percent. Similarly, let’s focus on another commonplace element of web design – the sidebar. Look at the sidebar elements on your own website or blog. What’s the purpose of having your 15 most recent posts listed there? If you are running a blog, your visitors can easily find your most recent posts on the main page of the blog itself. If you are designing for mobile, the Pareto Principle becomes all the more vital. In general, the elements that are prioritized for a mobile version constitute that 20 percent. If you are able to freely leave out certain sections of your website in its mobile version without negatively impacting its usefulness to your visitors, chances are that those sections do not belong in the most important 20 percent segment of your desktop version, either.

Five simple steps to implement Pareto

1. Identify the primary objective of your website. Is it to sell products, promote your brand or provide a service to the community? 2. Next, make a list of all items on your website that contribute directly to the fulfillment of this goal. For example, if you are selling products, the area where you promote your latest special offer or new arrivals belongs in the 20 percent. Also make a similar list of items that do not directly contribute to the main goal. 3. Eliminate any and all unnecessary elements. Easier said than done, isn’t it? 4. Refine, refine, refine. Make sure the focus of every page and every element on the page remains on that critical 20 percent of items that directly support your main objective. 5. Grab a coffee.

Analysis, prioritization, optimization and simplification

Before you launch into an all-out take-no-prisoners offensive to streamline your website, here are a few additional tips to consider: Analysis: Use tools such as Google Website Optimizer and Analytics to analyze your website’s most frequently used and important elements. Prioritization: Once identified, prioritize that 20 percent of important aspects that are responsible for 80 percent of the results. Optimization: Optimize that 20 percent elements and thereby see a boost in 80 percent of the performance. Simplification: Implement good design principles of minimalism and reductionism to simplify your site’s user experience without sacrificing quality. A final word of caution: Don’t overdo the 80/20 Rule. While you do want to focus on the 20 percent, this does not mean you should outright ignore the other 80 percent of lesser important things. When it comes to user experience, the details matter. Unarguably, the greatest benefit of implementing the Pareto Principle in the design of your website is that it allows you to keep your focus on the content that matters most. So go ahead, and experiment with putting it into practice. After all, what do you have to lose besides the clutter that is holding your site back from reaching its maximum performance potential?

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Eight Steps to Conquering Local Media

Anyone charged with the task of growing a business salivates at the idea of landing in the national media spotlight. The lure of the massive exposure that just one mention on CNN, Good Morning America or Oprah or in the pages of Bloomberg Businessweek or USA Today delivers is the driving force behind many PR campaigns. However, it's important to remember that the cardinal rule of real estate also applies to media relations: location, location, location. Of course your potential customers are tuned in to news from the national players. But these customers also exist as members of their local communities. They live locally, shop locally and do business locally. They also read, listen to and watch local media outlets. No matter the size of your business or the scope of your target market, it's critical to develop a systematic approach to leveraging local media. That's why no matter the size of your business or the scope of your target market, it's critical to develop a systematic approach to leveraging local media outlets to increase awareness, build trust in your brand and boost sales. But if you want to make an impact, you must get strategic. Even at the local level, the competition is stiff for airtime and column inches. Here are the fundamentals of breaking through the clutter and conquering the local media markets where you do business.

1. Do your homework.

Every market offers a wealth of opportunities for media coverage. Make it your mission to uncover all of the outlets available to you in each market and then narrow your hit list according to the demographics of your target market and their media consumption preferences. For print media, you'll want to identify the major daily newspaper as well as smaller suburban weeklies and specialty publications that serve niche audiences like parents, women and retirees. Even the humble neighborhood association newsletter can be a valuable tool for showcasing your expertise or increasing awareness of your services. On the broadcast side, local television news programs are a given, but don't forget about local daily or weekly radio and TV talk shows, which often have strong loyal followings. Morning and afternoon drive shows in particular attract a huge number of listeners during the daily commute. Locally produced call-in and talk radio can also be ideal targets for your promotional efforts, particularly if you can offer an expert to field questions or provide insight on topics of interest.

2. Go grassroots.

In your efforts to canvas the traditional media outlets in a given market, don't forget to also investigate the opportunities that may exist to gain exposure among locally based online communities. In today's digital era, companies have unprecedented access to highly active, motivated and powerful influencers who can use social media platforms to disseminate information through their networks of friends and fans. A successful local social media-driven PR campaign begins with researching the popular websites and blogs that cater to that specific market as well as identifying individuals have a strong following on Facebook or Twitter and whose needs and interests overlap with your offering. Once you've pinpointed the sources that are the best fit in terms of both size and scope of their influence, that's when it's time to put trustcasting to work. You must strive to create authentic relationships with these individuals who hold a position of leadership within their tribes. You must also overcome the burden of proof that your company and your products are worthy of their recommendation. By giving you their endorsement, they're putting their reputation and their credibility on the line. Make it worth their while, and they'll make it worth yours in return. For example, when Just Focus Massage & Wellness in Charlotte, North Carolina, needed to build awareness for their new FocusForward wellness seminar series, they identified popular local lifestyle blogs and approached the owners with the opportunity to attend the series free of charge in exchange for sharing their experience with their readers. For a minimal investment, Just Focus was not only able to gain exposure to a highly targeted audience, they also reaped the benefits of the inherent trust that comes with the word-of-mouth recommendation of an established tribe leader.

3. Get to know the gatekeepers.

It's always a good idea to get to know the talk show hosts and reporters who cover topics of relevance to your products or services. However, it's important to keep in mind that many of these individuals have relatively little control over the stories they report. The real power players in local media are the editors (print), producers (radio) and assignment editors (television) who tell the writers, hosts and reporters where to be and what to talk about. If you can get to know these gatekeepers and how to get in front of them, you'll greatly improve your chances of gaining the coverage you seek.

4. Develop genuinely local angles and events.

It's tempting to distribute the same press release or pitch to every outlet on your hit list, especially if you think your story offers a broad-based appeal. However, going the extra mile to enhance your story with local interest will pay dividends in securing coverage in the markets that matter most to you. For example, let's say you're an HR consulting firm pitching a story on the rising costs of health care. This is a compelling story that might gain coverage simply on the merits of its timeliness. However, you could significantly boost your chances of catching the eye of a local newspaper editor simply by including a few relevant details like how local cost increases compare to the nationwide average or the contact information for one of your consultants who is based in that location and can offer expert insight on how these changes are affecting the job market in that city.

5. Don’t forget the fundamentals.

Give your press release the “Would I read it?” test. In addition to giving local media stories that offer local angles, local impact, local data and local people, you must also make sure you’re obeying the fundamental rules of good storytelling. Give your press release the “Would I read it?” test. Keep it simple and find hooks that tie into universal themes. Time your pitches to correspond with news cycles and seasons. Offer compelling visuals and expert spokespeople. Learn the audience demographics and the hot-button issues for each media outlet you plan to approach, and shape your story accordingly.

6. It’s all in the delivery.

Even the best pitch can fall flat it it’s not delivered in the correct manner and at the appropriate time. An important part of building relationships with media professionals is getting to know how and when they prefer to be contacted. Does he live and die by his Blackberry, or will your e-mail just collect dust in his inbox? Would she like to hear from you, or would a phone call be an annoyance? Timing is everything. You must make sure you’re on the radar when editorial decisions are being made and that you’re not trying to get attention when a reporter is up against a deadline. Make sure you’re on the radar when editorial decisions are being made. While every news organization works differently, there are a few rules of thumb that apply in most cases. Deadlines generally fall in the afternoon for daily print publications and three to four days ahead of publication for weeklies. Radio show producers typically have either weekly or bi-weekly meetings to plan upcoming topics and guests, while assignment editors for local television news broadcasts make their final determinations about where to dispatch camera crews and reporters on a daily basis, usually very early in the morning. It’s important as well to be realistic and bear in mind that there can and will be times that no matter how strong or well-timed your story idea might be, no one will bite based on prior commitments or breaking news. Simply accept this graciously and move on to the next pitch.

7. Don't underestimate the personal touch.

Always remember that there are people on the receiving end of your stories. "Media relations" can be a bit of a misleading term. It implies that you’re sending your press releases and pitches to some nameless, faceless news-generating machine. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth. Always remember that there are people on the receiving end of your stories, so put your best relationship-building skills to work. Call and introduce yourself to local writers, editors, bloggers and producers when you have nothing to actively pitch. If possible, invite them to lunch to discuss their needs and interests as well as how they prefer to receive information, and demonstrate consideration for those preferences when you contact them in the future with story ideas. Do keep in mind that many media outlets have strict policies regarding gifts, so be sure to know and play by the rules.

8. Give ‘em the goods.

Product placement can go a long way in getting free advertising for your company, especially in radio. If you run a bakery, deliver a tray of your most popular treats to the afternoon drive show personalities. Or if you own a day spa, invite the busy mom who hosts the morning show to enjoy a free day of pampering. While there are no guarantees, chances are good that you'll at least get an on-air thank you and maybe even a genuine, glowing review of your products or services. Additionally, radio and TV producers are always looking for prizes for promotional giveaways and sponsors for events. These opportunities tend to cost much less than traditional paid advertising on the same stations but deliver high-impact exposure and referrals.

Let the conquest begin.

Remember: if you want to win the war of PR, you have to win the battles being fought in your own backyard. By employing these time-tested tactics, you can help to ensure that your pitches will stand out from the crowd and establish your company as a trusted source for local media outlets in the markets where you do business.

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