Let’s face it, building customer loyalty is harder than ever.

 
We are all consumers and it’s hard to be strictly loyal and purchase through only a few brands.
 
It is easy to be swayed by alternative brands due to factors such as pricing, products and promotions but equally by different purchasing decisions based on the environment, the landscape and your current life stage.
 
But for marketers, customer loyalty is out there. It just needs to be thought about another way and nurtured differently.

First start with ‘who’

 
And that starts with your definition.
 
What do you define as a loyal customer for your brand? Is that based on frequency of purchase, the amount spent, or how long they have been a customer? Each can produce a different style of loyal customer whichever way you slice the data, and no way is right or wrong, it’s what you define for your business.
 
But when was the last time that definition was updated? Was it created in the last couple of years during the cost-of-living crisis? Or was it 5+ years ago, before covid and buying behaviours were very different?
 
Continually understanding the way your customers behave and make purchasing decisions can help you keep on the front foot of understanding who are your loyal customers, which are the most important, which are the most profitable and essentially how do you grow more of these.

Everybody has favourites

 
Part of that shift in growing loyalty is starting with the concept of ‘how can you become one of your customers’ favourite brands?’.
 
By being one of their favourite brands you’ll naturally get higher engagement and more peer advocacy, which in turn will lend them more to choosing your brand in those key purchasing decisions.
 
A way to do this is to keep up to date with current consumer engagement trends as these show the general direction of things that are starting to influence customer decisions.
 
For 2024 there are four key trends that have been defined as areas which will help drive customer loyalty. These are:

• Gamification
• Experiential rewards
• Transactional value
• Zero party data

 
Whether these are factors that can be embedded in your loyalty program, or generally the way you communicate and engage key segments, by considering at least one of these trends, that will help you move the dial on becoming one of your customers ‘favourite brands’.

Loyalty Trends 1: Gamification

 
Everybody likes a little bit of fun and this loyalty trend for 2024 is just that. Infusing elements of fun and competition into your customers experience.
 
Whether that be encouraging customers to play games, enter quizzes, complete challenges or performing certain actions, that can also lead to collecting points, badges, or ranking on leaderboards, all of which are small light-hearted ways to make it entertaining for your customers.
 
By embedding game-like elements into the ways that your customers interact with your brand can build far greater engagement as it taps into the psychology of motivation and reward, making engaging with a brand more compelling and satisfying.
 
And if you hit those criteria, you’re also far more likely to be remembered, and talked about, which can be the positive output of being a ‘favourite’ brand.

Loyalty Trends 2: Experiential rewards

 
According to the 2024 Global Consumer Trends Index created with Econsultancy, 77% of customers say their favourite brands are ones that surprise them with rewards they don’t expect.
 
So to stand out, instead of solely offering transactional rewards like discounts or cashback, brands should think outside the box with more experiential rewards.
 
Whether that’s early access to sales, VIP customer service or a once in a lifetime experience such as activities or celebrity meet and greets.
 
Anything that will be seen as offering exclusive experiences will really help you build emotional connections with customers and stand out by offering a different level of customer experience.

Loyalty Trends 3: Transactional value

 
Even though experiential rewards are on the rise, with the cost-of-living crisis still impacting consumer spending, loyalty can still be driven through offering customers a way to save money.
 
If you can help them in the current landscape with more value for money, they will remember that and start to grow affinity to your brand.
 
However, transactional deals, discounts or offers should never really be offered to everyone. That makes them feel less special. Use them selectively and creativity to create a sense of exclusivity for valuable customers and prioritising best offers for the most loyal.

Loyalty Trends 4: Zero party data

 
Finally with 3rd party cookies gradually disappearing there is a huge opportunity to use loyalty programs to collect more quality and actionable data directly from your customers – which is zero party data.
 
It can also be made part of a fun experience through surveys, quizzes or games. All of these scenarios can creatively be used to collect preferences, understand purchasing habits and engagement patterns without your customer thinking they are filling in a boring preference centre form.
 
But importantly they should not be used to just collect masses of data unnecessarily, but used cleverly to glean the insights and preferences that you can use to provide that customer a far better, personalised and therefore relevant experience with your brand.
 
And those customers who receive marketing communications that make sense to them are far more likely to keep engaging and returning back to your brand.
 
Often businesses can get sucked into the focus of solely driving new customers.
 
While acquisition is important as part of your marketing strategy, it is far more valuable to nurture and grow your current customer base and by implementing some of these loyalty tactics you’ll see that impact show through an increase to your customer lifetime value.
 
 

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