Could a loyalty program be so valuable that it becomes a part of your customers’ daily lives?
When it offers benefits that members want to use every day, it certainly can. People value anything that they choose to do on a regular basis.
Members of premium loyalty programs receive benefits so relevant and impactful that they are willing to pay for them and gain immediate access to them 24/7. These programs give the best that the brand has to offer all the time.
They target a brand’s most loyal and engaged customers and, in turn, they shop more and spend more on each occasion. It’s no wonder these programs can become ingrained in their customers’ routines.
A Premium Loyalty Program Has a Profound Effect
The effect that a premium loyalty program has on its members is profound.
To see how a premium loyalty program can influence the daily lives of its members, look no further than Amazon’s incredibly successful Prime program.
For example, Prime members spend nearly five times the amount of non-Prime members. That’s because it offers members the benefits they want, whenever they want to use them.
That leads to heightened customer engagement levels and the program becoming embedded in members’ daily lives. Even when Prime members aren’t using the rational benefits like fast and free shipping, they’re regularly using other benefits like video and streaming music.
When a company truly listens to its customers it can identify their pain points. Following through by providing the exact benefits they desire leads to elevated engagement and purchase levels will follow.
If the benefits are good enough, members will even pay an annual fee to access them. Naturally, they want to take advantage of their investment. That’s why premium loyalty programs become a part of the fabric of their daily lives.
See what makes consumers willing to pay for loyalty.
Fee Plays a Role
Premium loyalty programs charge members an annual fee to access a lengthy list of sought after benefits.
Here’s everything you need to know about premium loyalty at a high level.
While some consumers might shy away from having to pay to join a loyalty program, those who do are motivated by a strong, emotional connection to the brand.
These types of customer relationships are exactly what brand officials seek.
Because members make the choice to pay to become members of these programs says a lot about their interest in the brand and their levels of engagement.
By raising their hands to pay an annual fee to join a premium loyalty program, members offer brands expanded levels of engagement, advocacy, and spend. But, perhaps even more importantly, they integrate the program into their lives.
Traditional Loyalty Programs Don’t Cut It
Traditional loyalty programs don’t elicit the same emotion in their members as premium loyalty programs do. Consumers belong to an average of 13.4 loyalty programs, but are active in only 6.7.
These stats reflect a lack of differentiation among traditional loyalty programs. Consumers collect, apparently, too many loyalty cards and ignore at least half of them. That’s because there’s no barrier to entry with free loyalty programs.
When it comes to creating actual loyalty, however, these programs don’t entice consumers like paid loyalty programs do. They require transactions up front for rewards that come farther down the road.
They also fail to generate frequent engagement levels. As a result, members can easily fall out of touch with their traditional loyalty program cards.
Premium Loyalty Gives Customers a Practical Reason
Conversely, being a member of a premium loyalty program gives you a practical reason to make it a part of your daily life.
The benefits are immediate and always accessible. They are attractive and relevant.
Since these programs target a brand’s best customers, these programs make a brand’s best customers exponentially more valuable. With a premium loyalty program, your previous most valuable customers now become so engaged to the point where they become true advocates.
In this advocacy role, these customers also serve as de facto brand ambassadors. By using and engaging with the program to such a degree, often on a daily basis, they become brand evangelists.
When your top customers not only engage and spend at very high levels with your brand, but also share your message, the value they represent is almost immeasurable.
If the 80/20 theory is true (80 percent of your sales come from your top 20 percent of customers), then a premium loyalty program can greatly enhance your brand.
Making Premium Loyalty a Part of Their Lives
For something to play a role in someone’s life, it needs to fit some pretty awesome criteria.
A compelling premium loyalty program can play a role in your customers’ lives because it offers the benefits they most want from a brand. These benefits are always accessible and make engaging with the brand easy and inviting.
When a loyalty program offers an array of desired benefits, its members think about them so much that they wind up playing a role in their lives. The program becomes second nature and crosses the minds of members daily as much as watching TV or checking social media.
Premium Loyalty Provides Customer Insights
Gaining customer insights is an ongoing goal for brands.
For brands that offer premium loyalty programs, listening to customers is an endless task to identify any pain points that can be addressed in the form of benefits. When these benefits are added to the program, it gives customers more reasons to enroll and makes it a valuable element of their daily lives.
Members of a premium loyalty program are more amenable to supplying data to brands because of their levels of heightened engagement.
This also strengthens the reciprocal relationship between brand and member.
Customer insights are incredibly valuable for brands that have premium loyalty programs. These brands actively create and maintain two-way relationships with customers.
Offer Members Something That Can Become Part of Their Daily Routines
Anything that is enjoyable and rewarding and plays a role in your daily life can be considered an essential.
A premium loyalty program can have an impact so profound on people that it becomes an essential part of their daily lives.
What can you offer your customers to become a part of their daily routine?
ebbo
ebbo helps brands achieve their customer loyalty goals with full-service, end-to-end solutions and also creates original educational content straight from the experts to help loyalty marketers stay on the cutting edge of customer engagement.
