5 Ways to Increase Customer Loyalty

You’re busy, no time for introductions, lets jump right in:

1. Incentives for repeat customers

It is a no brainer, the best and simplest way to create customer loyalty is by giving incentives for repeat customers. This might take the form or a referral discount or reward for a certain number of purchases. The key here is to convey to your customer that there is reward y for them if they come x number of times to your establishment. 

For example: a small independent coffee shop may implement a punch card into their business. While there is a cost to style, and manufacture this punch card, the customer that has it will most likely come again once they have gotten their first punch. This is for two reasons: first, they feel as though by completing a purchase they are gaining extra value; and secondly because they feel like they are accomplishing a task. 

Punch cards have been proven to incentivize customer loyalty by more than 40% and are a simple and cost effective way to get your customers to come back. However, many people often throw out their punch cards if they feel as though they don’t hold enough value. Think of the programs whose rewards are too little for the amount of business required by the clients. 

2. Forming a connection to your clients

Another way of curating customer loyalty is to create a connection with your clients. For this to work, there needs to be a positive connection between business and customer and it could be regarding almost everything. 

Think of a time where you went to an establishment and talked to the owner or employee about something you are both passionate about. This could have been cars, sports, even the weather. If you create a friendly connection with your customers it will incentivize them to come back and do more business with you. 

Most people would rather go to an establishment they have a connection to. Even if they had a positive experience unrelated to the business while they were inside. I will never forget the restaurant, where I had my first date with my long term girlfriend and am very likely to come back, and have!

The downside is that some people might find connections while others will not. Creating connections is not something you can measure either, it is part of the art of business. 

3. Being a part of something greater 

There is no easier way to form customer attraction and loyalty than through a connection of something greater. People that have a lifelong connection to something will flock to those who share that connection. 

Think of a sports bar. You are much more likely to frequent a sports bar who is rooting for the same team, or even sport in some cases. This is why most sports bars tend to display memorabilia of the local team, because more people will relate to it and feel at home.

However, it is not always possible to connect with something greater that lines up with your business. For instance, what could a coffee shop or a mechanic connect to? This would be a tough sell.

4. Forming a community

We briefly spoke about feeling at home in the previous section, the sense of community evokes this key feeling in your customers. While it may not be possible to tap into a greater connection for many businesses, in a lot of cases the best course of action is to create one from the ground up. 

While this may sound like a lot of work, most of the time “community” is formed even if the owner does nothing. This is a double edged sword. A good community will shine a bright light and put a shiny halo on top of your business, while a negative one could stigmatize it and discourage new customers. 

For these reasons, owners should be active in their efforts to create a community in their business. The question you should be asking is: “Will my ideal customer feel at home?” 

5. Being a part of a loyalty program or platform

A lot of businesses who want a quick way to encourage repeat customers have opted for the old fashioned and proven method of punch cards. This has been proven in many studies not only to boost customer retention, but also to influence customers decisions! However, this is becoming more and more obsolete due to people not wishing to clutter their wallets with card stock. 

Another way businesses can retain customers is through the creation of a loyalty platform. These range from paid square POS integrated tools to the creation of an app like Starbucks or Domino’s. These modern approaches fix the problems with the old punch card method, however, they share one tragic flaw in that they don’t effectively incentivize new customer sales. 

This is why we created PunchApp Loyalty Platform. Our platform encourages customer exploration of new businesses along with the rewards they provide. The aim for our program is to bring the business and their customers closer together in such a way that will leave both parties satisfied. Give us a try if you want to increase your customer loyalty!

“We see our customers as invited guests to a party, and we are the hosts. It’s our job every day to make every important aspect of the customer experience a little bit better.” – Jeff Bezos