Loyalty Rewards: A Guide to Choosing the Perfect Incentives for Your Customers.

In today’s competitive market, where customers are bombarded 24/7 with brand deals & targeted promotions, customer loyalty becomes the backbone of your business. Loyalty rewards are what turn one-time shoppers into repeat customers, and repeat customers into your brand advocates.

A well-designed loyalty program can be a powerful tool in achieving this goal. But with so many possible rewards and incentives to choose from, how do you select those that resonate the most with your customers and business goals?

In this post, we explain in detail each of LoyLap’s loyalty rewards to help you identify those that best  suit your needs. So whether you own a coffee shop, fashion brand, nail salon, or spa - we've got one for each business type.

Choosing the Right Loyalty Rewards for your Business

Stamp Loyalty for Free Items:

A digital version of the classic punch loyalty card, designed for low-priced items with high purchase frequency. Each purchase earns the customer a stamp, and upon reaching a certain threshold, the customer redeems their stamps for free items such as coffee, tea, cookies, or even a milkshake.

This approach not only adds an element of excitement to the customer experience but also keeps users  engaged and eager to return to collect more stamps. The anticipation of unlocking a reward creates a positive association with the business, encouraging frequent visits and a stronger sense of loyalty to the brand. You can choose between establishing the same reward for everyone or giving your customers the option to choose which reward they want from a list of  predetermined options.

Perfect for: coffee shops, nail salons, waxing & laser studios, fast food restaurants, bookstores, or any type of business that offers a low-priced product or service and relies on the same group of customers returning regularly.

Credit Back:

One of the most effective ways to boost customer loyalty is by offering credit-back rewards. This system allows customers to earn a percentage of their purchase amount as credit back, which is perceived as a genuine sign of gratitude that reinforces the relationship between the customer and the business. While  incentivising future purchases,  customers will feel more tempted to return to the business to spend their collected credit.

Perfect for: premium specialty food stores, hair salons, spas, and fashion brands that want to incentivize monthly recurring purchases. 

Personalized Product and Basket-Level Discounts:

Offering discounts on products or services can serve as a potent motivator for customers, particularly when tailored to their individual preferences. By integrating purchasing history and customer preferences, businesses can customise discounts on items or services that customers frequently choose or those that complement their preferences. Such a personalised approach not only fosters a sense of being valued among  your customers but also increases the likelihood of making additional,  high-priced  purchases.

Perfect for: All businesses! Whether you want to reward a customer with a deal on a lunch menu combo, or a discount on end-of-season clothing items or spa services - by analysing customer preferences and spending habits, you can offer targeted discounts on items and packages regardless of your business type.

Top-up Bonuses:

Top-up bonuses work as an effective strategy to encourage customers to load funds to their account for spend at your business. There are three ways it can be done:

1. The merchant’s custom listing on the LoyLap app
2. The merchant’s custom listing on Member.LoyLap.com
3. The merchant’s custom branded app

By encouraging customers to top-up their account, merchants can increase  purchase frequency as customers will be more motivated to use their remaining balance as they’ve already made a commitment to spend that money, leading individuals to actively seek opportunities to spend further.  With this influx of cash, merchants can allocate resources to upgrade equipment, enhance the shop's ambiance, introduce new menu items or  invest in other aspects to improve  business operations and the customer experience.

Want another reason to choose Top-up bonuses? LoyLap users who top-up funds spend 16% more than those who pay with card or cash. With this data in mind, you can be sure that offering this type of reward won't only help you increase customer engagement and loyalty, but also boost the average spending of your customers, ultimately increasing your overall revenue.

Perfect for: coffee shops, quick service restaurants (QSR), or any other business type with low-priced products looking to increase order frequency, customer retention, and regular visits to their physical store.

Birthday Rewards:

Although this type of reward is only given to customers once per year, acknowledging a patron’s birthday with personalised treats fosters a sense of care and appreciation. Whether it's a free product, discount, or special gift, birthday surprises can leave a positive lasting impression that will help you drive more purchases in the future.

Perfect for: All businesses!

Roles:

Another way businesses can reward their customers is by creating recurring discounts for a specific group of customers. With the option to create and assign roles from the LoyLap Dashboard, you can target students, staff members, customers working for specific businesses nearby, or even friends and family.

By doing so, you can group part of your customer base into a category that you can later use as part of your segmentation parameters to offer them a special recurring discount or a limited-time deal using Campaigns by LoyLap.

Perfect for: coffee shops, nail salons, fast food establishments, or any other businesses that have identified specific customer groups that visit their store such as students, seniors, employees from nearby companies, or even members of gyms or clubs.

Loyalty Programs Boosted by Advanced Analytics: The Key to Merchant Retention 

In addition to providing Loyalty Rewards, LoyLap also equips you with advanced analytics to better analyse your current customer loyalty strategies. With the ability to track rewards, redemptions, usage, customers who top-up funds, and current and past users, you can analyse the effectiveness of your rewards to make changes such as the percentage amount of credit-back or top-up bonus, type of rewards, or the amount of collected stamps. Small changes like these can drastically improve customer interactions with your loyalty program  resulting in more repeat purchases and increased profits.

Need a hand setting up the loyalty reward that best  suits your needs? 

Take a look at our support article to find a quick guide with detailed instructions.