Friends and Loyalty Programs

Friends and Loyalty Programs Friends, Customers, and Rewards Programs

BY HANK MOORE CORPORATE STRATEGIST™

Friends are special. They inspire us, support us, ask us to be more, and encourage us to go further. Friends get close during certain periods of our lives because they are willing to share common experiences together.

Friendships develop out of need or utility, out of pleasure, and for the greater good. Some friendships last many years in our lives. However, most are transitory and depend upon changing circumstances. Some friendships last for seasons.

Here are the kinds of friendships:

• People who work together. • People who come from somewhere else and now find themselves together. • Befriended out of personal respect. • Each has a connection to others and may be assigned together for now. • People engaged in community service. • Friends from other cultures. • Teams put together by others, including mentors and advisors. • New friends. • Old friends. • Neighbors. • Friends reconnected and staying in touch for the long-term. • People achieving good together.

Fate brings friend to friend then leaves the rest to human nature. Here are recommendations to get the best in friendships:

• Associate higher. • Choose friends with similar values. • Choose friends who can stretch, motivate, and encourage you. • Choose friends who have a thirst for knowledge. • Choose friends who are doers and achievers. • Give what you expect to get.

LOYALTY REWARDS PROGRAMS

Loyalty programs engage customers, predict behaviors, and increase sales. They are an important part of high-impact marketing, affect customer service, heighten customer retention, and create business referral generation.

Loyalty is not just about cards and points. It means connecting shoppers to what they need now and in the future.

Loyalty programs allow retailers and hospitality companies to:

• Target and understand who are their customers. • Track customer purchases. • See how regularly customers visit. • Track their return rate. • Pull together touch points through a streamlined system. • Track your business data from a dashboard. • Learn insights into customers’ preferences and buying habits. • Provide special offers to regulars. • Show customers benefits that they get with

“bricks and mortar” stores that they cannot get from online resources. • Some loyalty programs live in customers’ smart phones as applications. Digital loyalty programs are becoming the trend.

Rewards programs can offer birthday and anniversary gifts, discounts, and invitations to exclusive events. They may provide information, classes, hotlines, blogs, and access to insider communities. Some such programs offer special shipping on mail orders and charity tie-ins.

Loyalty reward programs are ideally utilized for restaurants, retail stores, salons, automotive services, florists, beauty suppliers, large retail continued on page 23