Using Text Message Marketing for Customer Loyalty Programs

September 27, 2018 Posted by Pocketstop in Text Message Marketing - M360 Social Share

In today’s market, when new businesses are emerging with unbelievable speed, maintaining a pool of customers is mandatory for the survival of your brand. It is not just about how good your products or services are, but also about how proficient your marketing strategies are in terms of gaining new customers and keeping the ones you already have. Flooded by new information each day, people sometimes find it easier to migrate from one brand to another, especially if said brand offered nothing more but their services or products. Customers take into consideration all sorts of factors when deciding to give up on a brand, such as proximity to home or the office, straightforwardness in the communication process, cross-platform availability for support (and other services), or customer loyalty programs.

Over the years, customer loyalty programs have undergone a process rather similar to that of text messaging. There was a time when both were seen as solutions from the past, given the increase in social media usage, and the idea that a long-term customer does not represent a necessity as long as there are always new ones coming your way. The truth is that today mobile technology is not only changing the way people interact with businesses, but also considerably improving that interacting. The same thing can be said in relation to customer loyalty programs: they are here to stay, and not only that, they are improving the way customers interact with brands, and the overall dynamics of a wide range of industries.

What Exactly Are Customer Loyalty Programs?

A customer loyalty program serves as a mean of keeping your customers engaged with your brand, interested in your current and future product or services. It also entices them to be openly supportive of your brand, to direct other customers towards your business, and even engage in activities promoted by your business. A loyal customer is a testament to the fact that you are doing all the right things, but until you get to that point, let’s find out more about how you can do the right things in terms of implementing your customer loyalty programs.

Aspects of Customer Loyalty Programs to Consider:

• Deciding upon a medium of implementing the loyalty programs
• Deciding what type of reward are you going to implement
• Keeping behavioral targeting in mind
• Targeting across generations
• Understanding the importance of data analysis, customer profiles, and follow-ups

The reasons for creating a customer loyalty program go beyond offering your customers an incentive for staying loyal to your brand. It can help you obtain regular feedback from all your subscribers, grow your brand organically, but also remain a constant in your customers’ life. People know this. Businesses know this. Which is why loyalty programs are highly abundant nowadays. So how can you stay on top of the game?

Using Text Message Marketing for Customer Loyalty Programs

Choosing a platform that best compliments the needs of your brand and the customer loyalty program you are implementing is key. You need an environment that will help you create a loyal, intimate, and almost instant communication channel with your customers, and that environment can only be mobile. With the rate at which individuals and businesses are going mobile, using text message marketing for customer loyalty programs is the best way to guarantee such an approach. So how does it work?

Custom Tailoring Your Loyalty Programs Using Text Message Marketing

Text messaging is one of the most personal means of communication. That gives you access to a wide array of strategies for personalizing your customer loyalty programs based on the information you have gathered. Knowing things such as interests, location, shopping habits, product preference, wish lists, and other related criteria will help you elaborate segment market lists. These lists are the instruments you need in order to make sure that your incentives go to the people more likely to use them.

‘Thank You’ Messages, Coupon Codes, and Special Offers

Making customers feel appreciated doesn’t have to be strictly about promotions or in-store sales. Sending automated ‘thank you’ notes via text message marketing after a purchase is an excellent way of showing your customers you value their business. Coupon codes and special offers are also best delivered via text message, as they it makes it easier to be redeemed than when on a traditional medium such as paper. When they offer you their phone numbers, customers trust you with their data, sending out monthly special offers to those in your loyalty programs will encourage sign-ups for the loyalty program, but also provide you with repeated business. The great thing about sending coupon codes or special offers via text message is that you can use a keyword or a short code, thus making it so much easier to use.

With modern technologies advancing as they do, you can even create your text message marketing based on opt-in geo-location capabilities, so that you can send a special offer to your customers when they are within a chosen radius of your retail store. The possibilities are endless when it comes to using text message marketing for customer loyalty programs, you can even have in-store incentives, such as placing a keyword or code on the hashtag of certain products, so that customers enrolled in the programs can text them for special offers. Our mobile phones are always with us, why not take advantage of it?

Used in conjunction with a loyalty program, mobile marketing is one of the best strategies used by companies all around the world, regardless of their industries and niches, and you’ve probably seen this, especially in the food or fashion sectors, but they are also wonderful strategies for small businesses. Developing a powerful and loyal client base is the key to any business, big or small, so creating a loyalty program using text message marketing will prove to be a wise decision. Don’t abandon your marketing strategies for attracting new customers, but also don’t forget that existing customers are more likely to make a purchase, especially when loyalty programs are involved.

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