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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Is Your Website Ready for the Tablet Revolution?

The revolution is here.

When Apple launched the iPad last year, it carved out a new category in the mobile device marketplace. With the release of the iPad 2 and newer challengers like the Motorola Xoom and the Samsung Galaxy now joining the fray, the market continues to heat up as more and more users opt to perform everyday tasks like browsing the Web, sending email, watching videos and playing games on tablet devices rather than their desktops, laptops or netbooks.

In fact, according to a recent study conducted by Nielsen, 35 percent of tablet owners polled said they now use their desktop computer less or not at all while 32 percent of respondents said the same of their laptop. The top five reasons cited for preferring the tablet over a desktop or laptop were portability (31 percent), easier interface (21), start-up speed (15), convenience (12) and size (12).

Additionally, Forrester Research forecasts that tablet sales in the U.S. will continue to climb sharply, from 10.3 million in 2010 to 24.1 million in 2011 to 44 million in 2015. The firm also projects that by 2015, 82 million people in the U.S. will own a tablet, a figure which represents one third of the total online population.

What do these numbers mean for you? With each passing day, the likelihood that consumers will be interacting with your brand via a tablet rather than a desktop or laptop is increasing. As we demonstrated previously, not all brands can or should release a native app, and even if you do, you shouldn’t neglect those users who will be surfing your primary site on a tablet-based browser.

As a result, it’s up to you to make sure that your website evolves to provide these users with a high-quality, hassle-free experience, or else you’ll risk losing them to competitors that do.

Here are nine critical elements you must examine now to make sure your site will continue to serve the needs of your customers and support the growth of your business in the era of the tablet:

Balance of content vs. interface

Tablet screens are much smaller than desktop or laptop screens, yet the primary use of tablets is for consuming content. Therefore, it’s important to make sure that your website’s interface is clean and clutter-free so that you make optimal use of the available real estate and allow your content to take center stage.

Typography

The type on your website must strike a happy medium for tablet users. If it’s too small or condensed, it will be illegible without zooming in. If it’s too big, users will be forced to scroll more than necessary.

You must find the ideal balance of font face, font size, line spacing and line length so that your content is pleasant and comfortable to read at the distance at which a user would naturally hold a tablet.

Color and texture

Color and texture are more than cosmetic niceties. When applied in strategic ways, they can go a long way toward improving the usability of your site for tablet users. For example, a subtle gradient on top of a button can provide a visual cue to users that it is an actionable object.

Keep in mind as well that with tablet users, you’re fighting finger smudges and glare for visibility. Bright background colors and patterns can reduce interference from these elements, while solid black tends to make them more distracting.

Buttons and links

When it comes to the tools your visitors use to travel around your website, size matters.

For tablet users, the clicking and scrolling of a mouse are replaced by touching and swiping gestures. As a result, navigation actions are less precise on touchscreens. You must allow a greater margin of error by creating buttons that are the size of a fingertip rather than a cursor.

Also, make sure to allow a little breathing room around your buttons and links, especially those that live in your site’s main navigation. Nothing will frustrate a user faster than being directed to a different page than the one they wanted because your links are crammed together too tightly.

Interface cues

If your website’s interface currently relies heavily on rollover effects, you’re going to be in trouble on a tablet. In the world of the touchscreen, there is no such thing as a hover state. If, for example, you have “previous” and “next” buttons that appear only when the mouse is nearby, those elements will be unavailable to your tablet users.

To create finger-friendly navigation, all elements must be big, bold and obvious. Replace buttons that require users to mouse over them to get a sense of action with style enhancements that draw attention to their “pressability.”

Menus

If your site contains drop-down menus, make sure there are visual cues (such as small up and down arrows) to indicate that the menu is expandable and that the menu remains open on tap.

Alternatively, you might consider streamlining your navigation to eliminate the need for drop-down menus altogether. Instead, you can create a showcase page for each main section of your site that acts as a gateway to the subpages contained within.

Scrolling

Screens on the tablet devices that are currently on the market range from approximately 7 to 10 inches and allow viewing in both vertical and horizontal orientation. As a result, there’s no way to be able to accurately predict what a tablet surfer will see without having to scroll.

The good news here is that tablet device users expect to scroll – not just vertically but horizontally as well. There’s no need to worry about trying to force all your important information to fit “above the fold.” Clean, streamlined design that promotes easy content consumption is the name of the game.

Forms

Many of the most critical interactions between your website and your customers occur through forms, whether it’s subscribing to email updates, requesting more information, logging into a secure account or completing a purchase.

Examine your forms closely to ensure that all fields render clearly. Also, make sure your forms are as streamlined as possible. Trying to complete a long form with many fields on a tablet is cumbersome. While the marketer in you wants to collect as much data as possible from your site visitors, the danger of requiring users to complete too many fields is that they’ll get frustrated and give up, leaving you with no data at all or, even worse, a potential sale lost.

Flash

Apple’s iOS does not – and probably never will – support Flash. Android does support Flash, but the performance of Flash content on Android devices thus far has been less than ideal.

If you have Flash anywhere on your site – whether it’s in the introduction to your site, your navigation menus or video – get rid of it now, or else your tablet users will be plagued with problems. Today there are better, more tablet-friendly options available, such as HTML5 and JavaScript, that can replicate the same effects that once required Flash.

When in doubt, test it out.

The only way to be confident about how well your site performs on a tablet is to put it through the paces on actual tablet devices. While there are some web-based simulators, they aren’t 100 percent reliable since they are ultimately limited by using your desktop browser to render your site.

If you don’t already own a tablet, borrow one or – if all else fails – make a trip to your local retailer and use the display models there.

Be sure to evaluate every element and every page of your site carefully. If possible, recruit other friends, colleagues or family members to do the same, and observe them as they navigate through your site. Because they aren’t as intimately familiar with your site and its nuances as you are, they may uncover stumbling blocks that you might have overlooked.

If you identify any problem areas, seek out the help of a trusted website design firm to address them. While you may have to make an investment in upgrading the infrastructure of your site, it will be money well spent to make sure current and prospective customers can access your site on their device of choice – which is more and more likely to be a tablet.

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The Timelines They Are a-Changin': 7 Tips for Making the Most of the New Facebook Pages

Like it or not, it’s here: the new timeline for Facebook business Pages. And much like any of the wide-sweeping changes that Facebook has introduced in the past, the faster you can get acclimated, the sooner you can start using these new features to your advantage to engage more effectively with your customers. So without further ado, let’s dive right in, shall we?

1. Put your best foot forward.

The first thing that you – and your fans – will notice is the new cover photo. This is your very own Facebook billboard, your opportunity to grab new visitors and entice them to delve deeper into your Page. This is prime real estate, so make sure you use it well. A great photo can make a memorable first impression that helps you attract and keep potential customers; a bad one can turn them away before they ever interact with the rest of your content. Get creative with this space. Feature one truly stunning image that captures the essence of your brand. Showcase your products or services. Give fans a peek behind the scenes of your company. No matter your approach, just make sure you play by the rules: No mention of prices, sales or discounts. No contact information, such as your phone number or website address. And no calls to action, whether it’s to like your Page or buy your product. You’ll also notice that your profile photo persists in the new format. This spot is best used for your logo icon, as it will also be the thumbnail image that appears alongside your posts in your fans’ news feeds.

2. Deliver a call to action.

So Facebook says you can’t include a call to action in your cover photo. You’ll also discover that you can no longer set a default landing tab for your Page. What’s going to here? And what are you to do about it? Relax. You still have plenty of opportunity to capture attention and motivate your fans to take action. Just below your cover photo, you’ll see four featured app slots. Photos will always take the first slot on the left, but you can customize the other three to your liking. These slots are the perfect place to feature a promotional video, link to your company blog or even a store (or donation) app. Much like the cover photo, these app slots will get a lot of eyeballs, so make sure you design them well.

3. Tell your story.

Once you get past your cover photo and apps, you’re into the timeline itself. In some ways, the timeline isn’t so revolutionary. Your most recent update appears at the top and the rest follow in reverse chronological order as you move down the Page, just as they always have. On the right side of the Page, you’ll see the timeline represented in years, starting with the year that your business was established. Here’s where you can really start to have some fun with the new format. Add important events – the date your company was founded, the launch of a new product, awards you’ve won – as milestones in your timeline to create a sense of stepping back in time. The more visually engaging you can make these milestone posts, the better. There are also new ways to filter what’s shown on the Page: Highlights, Friend Activity, Posts by Page and Post by Others. The trickiest part of these new filters is that posts by your fans aren’t as visible. So if interaction with your fans is important to you (and it should be), then you’ll need to be very intentional about engaging with them.

4. Get visual.

Another difference that will quickly become apparent the more you study the new timeline format is that photos and videos are given much greater prominence than any other type of content. Jumping on the bandwagon that has made platforms like Pinterest and Instagram so popular, the timeline focuses on visual storytelling. This is actually a plus, since as we’ve covered previously, one great photo truly can do the work of a thousand words in conveying what it is that your brand stands for. Data from Facebook supports this theory as well, indicating that “posts including a photo album or picture can generate 2X more engagement than other post types.” Use this new format to your favor by posting photo- and video-based content as often as possible.

5. Stick to it.

In order to help extend the longevity of your content, you now have the ability to pin a post to the top of your Page (it will appear just below your status update compose box). While this won’t affect how your update appears in your fans’ news feeds, it will keep this story at the top of your own Page for up to seven days. Pinning a post to the top of your Page is a great way to call attention to a special event, marketing offer or other especially fantastic content. Alternatively, you can also highlight a story so that it spans all the way across both columns of your timeline, making it easier to find as a user scrolls down.

6. Keep an eye on your inbox.

Another major change being introduced in this latest iteration is that Pages now have the ability to receive direct messages from fans. While these messages can only be initiated by a fan, this new feature serves a very useful purpose. Fans can now use Facebook as a way to ask a question or discuss a customer service issue in depth without doing so in the public forum. It’s a win-win for both you and your customers. Just be sure to keep a close watch on your inbox and respond to any messages you receive in a very timely manner. After all, if someone has reached out to you, you want to make sure they feel that their effort is both appreciated and taken seriously.

7. Don’t over-think it.

Finally, even though these changes are significant, there’s no need to feel overwhelmed or intimidated. The fact of the matter is that the majority of your fans will continue to consume the content you’re publishing in the same way they always have: via their personal news feeds. So while a well-designed Page timeline is important – particularly when it comes to winning over new fans – it’s not necessarily going to reinvent the wheel of the interactions you have day in and day out with your existing fans. In an ideal world, they would reward all the time and effort you put into your timeline by congregating on your Page and interacting with it directly. In reality, that’s probably not going happen on a consistent basis. The best approach is to strike a balance between the two. Be innovative in trying out new ideas and approaches on your timeline, but keep the content of your daily posts steady and strong, since you never know just when or where someone will come across it. After all, just as with most things in life, the more things change on Facebook, the more they stay the same.

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