GiftCard Partners Blog

A positive customer experience is something that every company strives for on a daily basis; experience is the main driver for loyalty. Happy customers are loyal customers and loyal customers are brand advocates. Oracle released a global survey of 1,300 senior-level executives from 18 countries that yielded new insights on succeeding in the ‘customer service era.’ Key findings from the survey included:

The value of building customer loyalty shows in your bottom line. You know that attracting new customers is important but still not the crucial part of your loyalty program. It’s just the first step, next comes building customer relationships. It can cost your company 5-7 times more to find new customers than to retain one, so nurturing and engaging consumers once they have chosen your brand is key to big savings and a successful ROI in the long run.

Loyal customer appreciation gifts are a staple of retailer and major brand customer retention and new customer acquisition strategies, but, in tough times, are corporations learning from what the kings of consumerism do? A recent Demandware webinar called “Amazon is Eating Everyone’s Lunch: How to Not Be the Main Course!”, uncovered how Amazon’s customer experience and loyalty program have stolen critical mass shopper market-share, not only by beating all other retailers on price, but also by learning from their customers via surveys and creating a loyalty program that other retailers dream of. What can companies and corporations learn from Amazon? Think about your customer loyalty program. Don’t have one? Create one before your competitors eat your lunch. Think about offering “thank you’s” for repeated purchase of product or services. Declare August or September “Loyalty Month” and offer a
gift card in return for completing a customer satisfaction and learnings survey. Give
gift cards to repeat customers who refer new customers to you.
Are you ensuring that your customers are not only happy, but incented to keep coming back?
Read on in the GCP eBook . 2012
Incentives in the Workplace to discover how companies of all shapes, sizes, and industries use incentives to drive their desired results.

Loyalty360 brings us an interesting concept that loyalty programs are often misconstrued as the final parts of what should be considered the small pieces of their make-up, the points, rewards, and deals. In
Changing Times by Phil Rubin, CEO of rDialgoue speaks with us about what’s really important in loyalty: the building of one-on-one relationships with customers. Most retailers and merchants think of points as so central to their customer loyalty, yet Amazon doesn’t have a standard points program, yet they have one of the most loyal customers in the industry.
How does Amazon do it? And, what can you learn from brands that go beyond points and rewards to engender loyalty and trust? Check out loyalty360’s article
Changing Times and their 360 podcast.

It is a proven and accepted reality in business today that engaged employees increase a company's bottom line. However, new research from Gallup show that engaging B2B customers by establishing an emotional connection based on confidence, integrity, pride and passion is crucial to customer impact. Engaged customers deliver 23% more revenue than average customers in wallet-share, revenue, relationship growth, and profitability. According to the same Gallup research only 13% of B2B customers are fully engaged. Engagement exists when customers go out of their way to favor a relationship over price. This deepens a relationship, and often customers  are rewarded for their loyalty with either a discount for services rendered or other perks from the company providing the service. Treating customer engagement and employee engagement similarly will garner similar outcomes. Reward customers for any business you gain, the way you would an employee. Provide spot rewards, such as a small gift card for small business gained and for a major expansion in business or formation of an industry partnership, provide a broader reward. Creating a 360 degree customer feedback loop provides opportunities for relationship growth. Putting constant work into the companies' relationship is crucial. The time you spend ensuring that your employees are loyal should be equivalent to the time you ensure that your customers and partners are going to continue to drive your business.  
For more information on B2B customer engagement check out this Business News Daily article.