expert loyalty talks #1

Marketing Insight from Jason Foo

Why you should make the switch from deal loyalty to emotional loyalty

As CEO of BBD Perfect Storm, a creative agency making waves in the industry, Jason Foo’s vast experience in the marketing world has helped businesses across the globe reach exponential heights. His core belief? Success derives from the powerful relationship businesses form with their customers.
As one would expect, emotional loyalty is a major headline in that field. According to Jason, if businesses want to excel, thrive, and see results, a focus on loyalty programs is a must. This means throwing away outdated loyalty programs that purely rely on transactions.

The issue with deal loyalty

For too long, businesses relied on deal loyalty programs. You’ve most likely seen it – the more customers spend on a company, the more points the customer accumulates to receive a discount, free items, and prizes. But this just isn’t enough, as Jason says.
From our customer loyalty research at Stampix (which we’ve compiled in this mini-guide), research shows that 71% of consumers believe that incentives aren’t enough to turn them into loyal customers.
Loyalty programs based on incentives aim to buy customer loyalty. And Jason says it best – if your business offers discounts, another company can offer a better one. That’s the problem with deal loyalty programs in an increasingly competitive market.

The Solution: transforming to emotional loyalty

Jason advises his clients to transform an incentive-based loyalty program into an emotional loyalty program. Instead of buying your customer’s loyalty, develop services that consumers find purpose in. And here are some ways you can achieve emotional loyalty.

1. From Deal Loyalty to Real Loyalty: Deal loyalty involves buying a customer’s loyalty, real loyalty is about building and grounding an authentic relationship with your consumers. Real loyalty ensures that customers will always choose you.

This involves establishing programs and products that your consumers find useful and impactful while delivering an exceptional customer experience. Through real loyalty, your customers form an emotional connection with your brand.

2. Going from loyalty program -> platforms -> ecosystem: What makes Apple, Nike, and Amazon global superstar brands? They take it a step further with their loyalty programs. From these programs, businesses need to expand and establish platforms where they can continue to thoughtfully engage with consumers. This further builds and solidifies the emotional loyalty customers have to your business.

Once the platform has been created, it then comes to creating an ecosystem around your enterprise. This involves creating other products and services beyond the original product that continue to benefit a consumer.

3. Measure Your Customer Loyalty: To understand the effectiveness of your emotional loyalty programs, look at the frequency and recency of purchases. Then study how much your consumers advocate for your business. These referrals are a key indicator of the success of your efforts.

Just remember, loyalty is a two-way street. When you are loyal to your consumers by heightening their customer experience and providing them value through your products, they’ll express their loyalty through sales and referring your business to others. This is the magic and power of emotional loyalty.

This post is part of the #Loyalty Expert Talks, a Stampix original series: 20 minutes live chats with real stories and insights from the world’s finest retention & loyalty marketers.