How To Stand Out From Your Competitors
Differentiation allows you to provide superior value to your customers, creating a win-win scenario that can increase the overall profitability and viability of your business. Companies invest a lot of time and money in differentiation – from product to service to price to customer experience.
When it comes to customer loyalty programs, do brands go to great lengths to differentiate their loyalty programs from those of their competitors?
It was already hard to retain customers before the pandemic, and it’s even harder now. So how will companies survive in these unprecedented times?
Standing out from the competitors is one of the biggest challenges businesses and marketers continue to face.
This article will explore how differentiation in your loyalty program will increase customer engagement.
Differentiation is the key
Differentiation at the product level is probably the most visible differentiation, but it is short-lived because it is remarkably easy to duplicate any product. And of course, with so many options, consumers have the option of choosing your competitors in terms of price and selection.
So how can you differentiate yourself and stand out from your competitors?
Loyalty programs are often similar, requiring your customers to complete transactions over time in order to earn rewards later.
In today’s age of instant gratification, people don’t want to wait for rewards or they’re rarely interested in offers like “buy X products and get one free.” And this is where companies make the mistake of making their loyalty program generic and boring.
In fact, this is the case with most customer loyalty programs. Yet it is these loyalty programs, when designed to stand out from the competition, that can work wonders.
Focus on experiential benefits
Build an emotional connection with your customers and provide a unique experience. Win through customer experience, quality, and value orientation, offer your members an attractive value proposition that is reinforced at every touchpoint.
Effective customer retention strategies all start with one thing – an exceptional customer experience. In the crowded brand marketing landscape, experience has never been more important.
Create experiential benefits for your customers. These are great ways to build deeper engagement, offer exclusivity, and grant customers lifelong memories that create a lasting bond with your brand.
Experiences leave a lot of room for creativity. The category can include things like event passes, tickets, free lunches, party invites, hotel stays – the sky is the limit! Brands can get creative here by creating a value proposition with a smart transaction benefit.
Make your customers feel special by offering relevant and attractive benefits in your loyalty program. This way, they will regularly engage with your brand and be encouraged to become your brand advocates.
This differentiation by providing experiential benefits that are unique to your customers is a great way to increase your customer loyalty.
Customer loyalty programs should be designed to create loyalty in the truest sense of the word by providing competitive differentiation and not just making customers wait for discounts and coupons. Customers tend to find brands that can trigger emotions in them.
Brands should understand that without any differentiation, customers will have no reason to commit or stay loyal to your brand. For long-term brand loyalty and retention, you need to make your customers feel special or risk losing them at any time.
Customers with an emotional connection to a brand tend to have 300+% higher Customer Lifetime Value, stay loyal to a brand for an average of 5 years, and are also much more likely to recommend brands to others.
Work on customer loyalty
Does your brand give them a reason to engage with you?
It has already been discussed that pure product or price differentiation will not set your brand apart from the competition. However, if your brand can make a difference in your customers’ lives through a compelling and engaging customer loyalty program, it could be a game-changer.
An appealing value proposition that shows your customers that you truly care about them, and a balance between transactional benefits and experiential benefits will create a real connection and propel your brand to success.
Understand that emotional customer engagement is critical.
Why not curate a compelling story that you tell and that customers can connect with?
With Poket, you can launch a loyalty program of your choice, creating many transactional and experiential rewards for your brand engagement with your customers.
