Importance of Corporate Travel Incentive Program
Incentive awards signal recognition of good performance from employees, which leads to more of the same behavior in the future. A well-planned incentive travel program connects business objectives to personal motivations and aspirations. Eligible program participants are motivated to achieve their objectives for the benefit of both the company and themselves. With challenging but achievable goals, incentive planners must design program that are more meaningful, motivating, and memorable.
The incentive program must be carefully planned so that participants can enjoy activities from start to finish and return to work with high motivation and productivity.
What basically is a corporate travel incentive programme?
Every employee deserves to be recognized by the company for their efforts. Offering cash incentives to employees, on the other hand, appears to be a thing of the past.
A business travel incentive programme is a type of incentive structure in which top-performing employees or teams are given all-inclusive paid trips as a token of appreciation for their efforts.
An effective business travel incentive program adds a personal touch to employee rewards, providing employees with memories to last a lifetime. It is a one-of-a-kind way to show your appreciation to your employees.
How can a company create an effective business travel incentive program?
Businesses can benefit from keeping employees motivated while they work because they are more likely to be constructive and produce a higher work output. Many businesses use incentive program to motivate their employees to complete tasks in exchange for rewards and recognition.
The following are the steps you can take when developing and implementing an employee incentive program:
1. Include the appropriate individuals
Before you start planning an incentive program, meet with the people who will help you strategize and implement it. Members of the management team and volunteers from the finance and HR departments are frequently included. You can work together to make decisions about why the company wants to implement the program and how much money the company can allot for incentives.
2. Set program objectives
Set parameters with the team for what goals the company wants employees to achieve in order to qualify for the incentives. Create simple, specific, and measurable goals, such as increased sales or improved attendance. Choose up to three goals for employees to strive for after discussing the options.
3. Determine the incentive audience
Consider who you want to reward so you can decide who will participate in your programme. For example, if you set a goal of “increase sales by 10%,” only members of the sales team will benefit from it. Establishing your target audience can help you determine the types of incentives that will motivate them to achieve your goals.
4. Increase participant participation
Before deciding on programme rewards, ask some participants what would motivate them the most. You can also solicit their feedback on potential rules or steps involved in achieving the goals. This can increase employee engagement and overall interest and involvement in the programme.
5. Assess the incentive program’s success
Take time after the program has ended to assess its effectiveness. Determine whether it met the program’s objectives. Based on the data, you can determine whether the program motivated employees to participate and work toward your desired goal. Assessing various elements can assist your team in developing parameters for the next incentive program and deciding which components to include.
What perks do corporate travel incentive programmes offer?
Corporate travel incentive program are inexpensive ways to reward top performers. They help the company by promoting revenue growth, customer acquisition, and sales growth.
1. Improves motivation and cooperation
Travel incentives are a fantastic way to show your appreciation for your employees and give them well-deserved credit for their efforts. They can inspire and foster idea-sharing as others seek to emulate the success of top performers, in addition to increasing employee motivation. As teams work together to win the prize, impressive incentives can improve communication and collaboration.
2. Excellent incentives lead to increased job satisfaction and employee retention
Having goals to strive for and being recognized for our efforts is critical to our sense of purpose. It can make our work less repetitive and increase our satisfaction with our role within a company. Linking targets to a fantastic prize is a tangible way to show appreciation for your employees’ efforts and is a perk they will be reluctant to give up.
3. Envy-inducing benefits make it easier to recruit qualified candidates
When looking for a new job, savvy candidates will carefully consider the advantages of choosing your company over a competitor. There are numerous opportunities for a potential candidate to evaluate your organization’s company culture in the age of social media and sites like Glassdoor. Sharing inspiring images from your corporate travel incentives is a sure way to attract qualified candidates.
4. It provides you with a competitive advantage
Managers now have a new way to assess the productivity of their teams thanks to an incentive travel program. Perhaps a team will meet their goal earlier than last year to ensure their spot on the getaway, generating a slew of new statistics to impress current and prospective clients alike. A company that is ambitious is always appealing. Seeing your team’s desire for success is contagious, and it may tip the scales in your favor.
Why is incentive travel such an important part of running a successful business?
Incentive travel is a tool for stimulating employees with an activity designed and planned to motivate and reward employees who have met certain company goals. Its goal is to strengthen the team and foster a unique environment in order to boost both the team’s and the company’s performance.
- Healthy Competition Incentives instils a sense of healthy competition in employees. In order to earn their incentive, they strive to work harder and better.
- Travel is an extremely cost-effective incentive. In fact, it is far superior to providing monetary incentives. Incentive travel can boost an employee’s ego while also saving employers money.
- Goal Achievement and Performance Enhancement is a great way to meet your sales goals and one of the most effective ways to improve your company’s performance. It helps to boost employee morale, encouraging them to work harder in order to meet their goals.
- Loyalty and dedication make your employees happy when you reward them. This would increase their dedication and loyalty to the company. This results in lower employee turnover as well as a better and more positive business environment.
- Incentive travel tends to strengthen team relationships. When a group travels together, they share their experiences and memories. This facilitates their bonding. This also provides a good forum for people to discuss business issues in a relaxed setting. They
- can understand each other from a completely different perspective, which will help them work better together in the future.
- Travel provides a significant stress relief for your employees. Some time away from work will help them to relax and re-energize. It will also assist them in increasing their creativity and productivity when they return to work.
- Going on vacation can help an employee’s physical and mental health. This translates to a healthier employee who will take fewer sick days. This would result in increased productivity and profits for your company.
Perfect Loyalty Program for Channel Partners Checklist
Every company must cultivate brand loyalty among their channel partners (distributors and all kinds of resellers). Loyal channel partners are not only a source of recurring revenue for you, but they also act as brand advocates. Channel partners can act as a reliable grapevine with positive word-of-mouth marketing to end customers.
Excellent channel partner loyalty programs are those that provide both transactional and emotional value. To consistently improve channel partner performance, an effective loyalty program should be able to provide meaningful rewards at each milestone.
And, if you want to have a loyalty program or channel incentive for your partners or distributors, as long as it is done correctly, your program will be successful in retaining and rewarding top distributors while maintaining stable revenue streams.
A Checklist for a Successful Channel Incentive Program
One of the most effective loyalty programs for companies that rely on supply chain distribution is channel incentive. It is designed to motivate and reward employees of manufacturers and vendors, such as distributors, resellers, and dealers, for their efforts.
Most large consumer goods manufacturers rely on these partners to sell their products in fact, 76% of industrial marketers sell their goods to the end consumer via an intermediary.
A checklist of things you can do to create an excellent and effective channel incentive program for your own business
To begin, you must select the type of channel program that will be most beneficial to your company. This will give you a better idea of how to reward your partner, the rewards, the mechanism, and so on.
There are two major goals of channel loyalty programs that you should consider pursuing:
- The breadth goal is to broaden the channel to increase the total number of products sold. The goal is to broaden your channels and bring on more partners.
- The depth goal is to increase market share in existing channel partners to avoid channel partner turnover. As a result, unlike the previous goal, the idea here is to get the best results from your current channel partners.
When considering implementing a loyalty program, it is critical to identify qualified channel partners who can help you grow your business. To find qualified partners, consider gathering the following information from them:
– Are they well-versed in your products?
– Do they know enough about the service or product you offer?
– Their level of dedication to your product
– The average number of items sold per month or year
– Current interactions with your competitors
Once you have a better understanding of your partners, consider how you can increase their value in your ecosystem. Determine how much incremental profit you want to see for each partner because “one size does not fit all.”
A wholesaler, for example, maybe more interested in a flat tariff scheme or bulk order discounts.
Better selling tools, such as customized marketing promotion for younger people, shop branding, and so on, will be appreciated by a retailer.
Following the type of channel partners, you desire; you should assess their training requirements. You must, however, first answer the following questions:
- Are your partners providing comparable products or services to yours?
- Do they have their marketing and communication plans?
- Do they review their sales figures regularly?
- Do they review their sales figures regularly?
If most of the answers are no, you should reinforce training or conduct a product knowledge quiz as a way for them to earn points and better understand your products.
- Your objectives must be clear to ensure the success of your loyalty program. These should be SMART objectives (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound).
- You can also think about which KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) to highlight to better measure the goals of your program. An example can be:
- Rate of registration: The number of new partners who join your distribution chain. They are critical for generating new revenue sources, particularly for the breadth goal mindset.
How to calculate the lifetime value of a channel partner?
Channel partner lifetime value = average order value multiplied by the number of iterations per year multiplied by the average retention time (years)
The retention rate of your channel partners is important. The formula for calculating it would be:
RR = (CE-CN)/CS * 100
CE – At the end of the period, the number of channel partners
CN – The total number of channel partners acquired during the period
CS – The number of channel partners at the beginning of the period
1. lifetime value of a channel partner
The redemption rate is calculated as the number of coupons redeemed divided by the number of coupons issued. The data will paint a complete picture of how important the program is to your partner.
2. Repeat purchase rate
This metric is critical for determining consumer loyalty. You can also estimate your sales volume.
This metric is calculated using the following formula:
The repeat purchasing rate is calculated as the number of channel partners who have shopped more than once divided by the total number of channel partners.
3. Net promoter score
This metric computes your clients’ satisfaction with your company. You must create some key questions using a 0-10 scale. Ask your partners those questions, and once you have their responses, sort them into the following groups:
Promoters: Partners who are extremely likely to recommend your products.
Passives: Partners who are pleased but will not recommend your products.
Detractors: Dissatisfied partners who could harm your company’s reputation.
Working with a loyalty platform is critical, particularly if you have a medium to large enterprise with thousands of partners across the country.
- Communication is an essential part of any channel loyalty program. Our recommendations are as follows:
- Create a unified and proactive communication strategy: what messages do you want to communicate to your partners and how frequently do you want to communicate with them?
- Segment your partners: By segmenting your partners, you can tailor your communication to make your message more relevant.
- Direct communication: To build a stronger relationship, it is also necessary to communicate directly or online.
How to Find the right time for a channel partner loyalty program?
Running a channel partner program can be a faster way to capture new customers and expand the brand footprint. However, there are other benefits of a channel partner program that you need to consider. The first of these is retention. According to a 2015 study by Aberdeen Group, channel partners have a 17% higher customer retention rate than non-channel partners.
You should also consider the costs of acquisition versus retention. A customer you acquire through a channel partner is likely to offer a higher LTV than a direct customer.
With the constant proliferation of new marketing channels, it’s essential to work with partners in a collaborative way. Striking that balance between business growth and rewarding the channel partners can be challenging.
What is a channel partner loyalty program?
A channel partner loyalty program is a program designed to encourage loyalty among a company’s channel partners. Channel partners are companies or individuals that help promote and sell a company’s products or services.
Loyalty programs are a way to thank channel partners for their help and to incentivize them to continue working with the company. Typically, channel partner loyalty programs offer rewards points that can be redeemed for discounts, merchandise, or other prizes.
The goal of a channel partner loyalty program is to motivate partners to sell more of a company’s products or services, and to help build long-term relationships with its channel partners. By offering rewards and benefits, the program helps partners feel valued and appreciated, and encourages them to continue doing business with the company.
Why you need a channel partner loyalty program?
There are many reasons why you need a channel partner loyalty program. For one, it helps to build trust and loyalty among your channel partners. This, in turn, leads to improved communication and collaboration between you and your partners.
Additionally, a loyalty program can help to increase sales and grow your business. Channel partners who feel appreciated and valued are more likely to sell more of your products and services.
Finally, a loyalty program can help to improve your brand image and reputation. By offering rewards and incentives to your channel partners, you are showing that you value their business and are willing to invest in their success.
How to build a successful channel partner loyalty program?
A channel partner loyalty program can be a great way to build long-term relationships with your partners and keep them driving for growth. Here are a few tips for building a successful program:
1. Define your goals
What do you hope to accomplish with your program? More sales, more repeat business, more referrals? Make your objectives clear from the start.
2. Choose the right partners
Not all partners are created equal. Look for partners that share your values and are committed to your success.
3. Offer incentives that matter
Your partners are motivated by different things, so offer a variety of incentives that will appeal to different partners.
4. Communicate regularly
Keep your partners updated on your program and let them know how they can participate and benefit.
5. Be flexible
As your program grows, be open to making changes and adjustments based on feedback from your partners.
How to execute your channel partner loyalty program?
There are a few key things to keep in mind when executing a channel partner loyalty program:
1. Keep it simple
The program should be easy to understand and easy to join.
2. Make it valuable
The program should offer partners something that they value, such as exclusive access to new products, early access to promotions, or increased margins.
3. Promote it
Make sure your partners are aware of the program and what they need to do to participate. Use email, social media, and face-to-face interactions to get the word out.
4. Be responsive
Be quick to answer any questions partners have about the program. This will make them feel appreciated and supported.
5. Celebrate successes
Be quick to answer any questions partners have about the program. This will make them feel appreciated and supported.
When partners reach certain milestones, make sure to celebrate their achievements. This will keep them motivated and engaged in the program.
Become the Pivot for Channel Partners
A channel partner loyalty program must solidify your partnerships, make them last longer, and reduce churn.
Building a channel partner loyalty program is not an easy task. There are several factors to consider before starting a program, and each channel partner and program will be different.
A loyalty program is not just a program that gives your customers rewards when they purchase your products. It’s more than that, it is a way to enhance your relationship and build trust with your customers.
Loyalty programs are a great way for companies to reward their customers for their continued patronage. Customers are usually enticed to participate in a loyalty program by the prospect of earning points, miles, or other types of rewards that can be redeemed for tangible prizes. These programs usually come with a set of rules that govern how and when rewards can be redeemed. The rules can vary from one loyalty program to the next and understanding those rules will help you determine the best time to launch a loyalty program.
How to choose the right loyalty partner for your brand?
Successful businesses have loyal customers and repeat orders.
Loyalty programs assist businesses to strengthen their ties with their customers and a good loyalty partner can help you do just that.
Loyalty marketing has evolved significantly in recent years. Many brands have recognized the value of transforming cookie-cutter offers and programmatic rewards into personalized, engaging experiences. In other words, humanizing the brand-consumer engagement.
The recent digital push has made it mandatory for businesses to develop omnichannel engagement programs. However, marketers need to engage expert agencies for faster adoption of custom loyalty programs.
However, choosing the right loyalty partner for your brand’s personality and consumer segments is critical for the success of not only the program but also the business.
What exactly is a Loyalty Partner?
A loyalty program is a complex and massive undertaking for which most businesses lack the necessary resources, experience, and expertise. This is where a loyal partner can help. A loyalty partner will:
- Create and implement your loyalty strategy
- Provide the necessary resources and technological requirements
- Lead the data collection through the loyalty program
- Redemption procedures that work in tandem with the company’s CRM
Loyalty partner is a catch-all term. Depending on your marketing budget, business objectives, range of business, audience type, and campaign size, you could work with a loyalty agency or a loyalty platform partner.
Why Is Choosing the Right Loyalty Partner the Most Important Step?
Your decision will have a significant impact on some of the most critical aspects of your business. The following are the most important aspects that it will have an impact on.
1. Impact on Campaign Success
The direct impact of your partner selection will have an impact on the success of your campaign. An experienced loyalty platform partner, such as RewardPort, will design the program with your brand guidelines, business goals, and target group psyche in mind. A lack of research, experience, and expertise can hurt the performance of your loyalty strategy and the brand image.
2. Customer Experience
The primary goal of a loyalty program is to significantly improve the customer experience. A strong brand and customer relationship are built on a positive customer experience. A loyalty program that is tailored to a specific demographic will have a high level of engagement. A program that fails to appeal to the audience, on the other hand, will have a negative impact.
3. Customer Retention Rate
An experienced loyalty partner understands how to retain customers through an engaging loyalty program. Consistent engagement and profitable value exchange between brand and customers can successfully retain customers over time. An expert partner designs the program for long-term engagement and significantly increase customer lifetime value.
4. The Effect on Customer Referral Rate
Customers who are satisfied and happy have a positive influence on their network of friends and family. A profitable and engaging loyalty program combined with a referral program can attract more customers and increase the acquisition rate. This is a win-win situation for both the brand and its customers.
5. Influence on Brand Value
Customer experience, perceived brand image, and customer satisfaction all have an impact on the monetary value of the overall brand, also referred to as brand value. A simple yet effective loyalty program will increase customer satisfaction, retention rate, brand image, and revenue, whereas a poorly designed and executed program significantly reduce brand value.
What Should you Look for in a Loyalty Platform Partner?
Hiring your ideal loyalty partner needs a little due diligence after the brand introspection. You want to be certain that the partner can forward your loyalty strategy and help you implement the brand vision.
For a structured process have a checklist for the following factors while assessing the partners:
1. Strategic Collaboration
Look for a mutually beneficial partnership. A solution provider may have limited responsibilities, whereas a strategic partner can have shared responsibilities. The loyalty partner usually has a broader responsibility for the success of the loyalty program ensuring better KPI achievement.
Loyalty providers must act as partners, not just solutions. Loyalty programs are industry and business model specific. This means that the provider’s team should be able to leverage their expertise to create a successful program that is tailored to your needs.
Marketer-friendly solutions are easy to launch, manage, and troubleshoot independently, but may require additional guidance. A dedicated Customer Success Manager (CSM) provides
ongoing support and data-driven strategies to ensure that your business goals are met as your brand evolves.
2. Program customization and agility
The relationship between brands and customers is constantly evolving, and your loyalty program should reflect this. Choose a loyalty provider that offers customizable, module-based solutions. You can keep your programs agile and flexible without sacrificing startup speed.
Marketer-friendly solutions make it easy to design, launch, and optimize programs as your business grows. No code, web development, or website redesign required. Test strategies or launch new campaigns quickly and effectively.
3. Provider of Complete Solutions
Similarly, you require a loyalty partner who takes a comprehensive approach. A loyalty program has an impact on many aspects of a business, from marketing to management. As a result, a loyalty partner who takes on full responsibility for a loyalty program comes highly recommended. This will not only relieve you of the burden, but will also ensure smooth execution, increased efficiency, and better results.
4. Capabilities for Data Mining
Loyalty programs are the most effective way to collect zero and first-party data. Look for a loyalty partner with the technological capabilities to efficiently mine data from your loyalty programs. Your loyalty partner must also be able to integrate CRM data with loyalty program data. This will provide you with comprehensive and rich customer data, which will significantly improve your marketing and business strategies.
5. Solutions Provided
Loyalty programs have progressed significantly. Loyalty strategies must now include dynamic elements in order to better gauge the pulse of the audience and provide quantifiable deliverables. Personalization, individualized experiences, gamification, and other features offered by loyalty partners are more suitable for modern-day businesses. Technology is constantly evolving, and you require a partner who keeps up with the times and routinely uses technology to amplify your loyalty program
6. Prior Experience
Experience brings with it a level of finesse and expertise that is unrivalled. Look for partners with extensive experience. The success of a loyalty program is dependent on several nuances that an experienced partner will never overlook or undervalue. Agencies or platforms that have executed several programs over the years understand the nitty-gritty and the importance of the undertaking and can provide solutions that will ensure a higher ROI.
The appropriate loyalty partner will not only further your brand’s vision for consumer retention, but also add value to the brand itself. The retention campaign results can reveal a lot about the product and service usage patterns and where it can absolutely delight your consumers. Thus, helping the brand with insights about product or service and communication improvements.
How To Engage Customers with a Scratch & Win Campaign
Whether it’s a real card that leaves a mess of glittering residue all over the place or a digital scratch card, people adore them both. For the possibility of winning a reward, consumers all around the world spend billions on lotteries and games. Ingenious marketing strategies and promotional tools may also be employed with scratch-and-win cards to engage customers.
Loyalty scratch cards are a terrific place to start if you want to improve your customers’ overall experience, something that about 72% of businesses consider their priority. Customer enjoyment, excitement, and value are all superbly cultivated through scratch card marketing.
If they can access their rewards information on their smartphone, 97 per cent of millennials say they are more inclined to participate in a loyalty program. A Forrester study discovered that customer loyalty is significantly influenced by emotional connection rather than the convenience of use or efficiency.
How Do Scratch Cards Work?
Online as a digital scratch card or in loyalty reward smartphone applications like the Stamp Me Loyalty App, scratch and win can be played on paper and plastic cards.
Simple is the idea. Each card includes a panel that conceals information; to expose the reward, the user (scratcher) merely rubs or scratches the panel or sequence of panels.
The entire card may need to be scratched off in rare circumstances. Only a portion of the panels should be scratched off to disclose a prize in other circumstances, such as a quiz. The card is invalidated if the scratcher unintentionally scratches the wrong areas. No pressure!
Scratch and win campaigns have been a popular consumer engagement strategy for brands across the world. The following points are the key takeaways from some of the most successful campaigns:
1. Keep the Campaign Simple
Strong calls to action are a feature of successful marketing. Make it apparent to your participants what they may win “on the spot” because today’s shoppers are all about quick satisfaction.
The most effective advertisements have a compelling, entertaining concept.
In this case, Sushi Sushi, a restaurant offering Japanese cuisine, rewards participants by giving them the chance to win prizes including free items, certificates for reduced products, and even a trip for two to Tokyo.
2. Provide Enticing Rewards and Prizes
The best campaigns include a variety of incentives to pique the interest of as many people as possible. More individuals will be interested in your Scratch & Win the further you spread your net. They may range from the possibility of winning small prizes, all the way up to a variety of token awards.
To maximize user engagement, effective promotions will provide each participant with an equal opportunity to win the grand prize.
As a master of rapid rewards, McDonald’s restaurants frequently engage their patrons with “peel and win” promotions and Global Monopoly campaigns.
3. Market Your Program
Your Scratch and Win campaign needs promotion like any other marketing campaign. Inform your customers before and at the time of purchase. This entails generating marketing materials for both off and in-store displays (both printed and digital).
Customers are more likely to participate in “scratch and win” if it is easy for them to get started. It should be simple and quick to start playing your “Scratch & Win” contest. So, be sure to include this on your advertising displays.
4. Make Redemption Quick and Simple
Making the redemption process of the reward benefits quick and easy will improve the trust in the brand and help you achieve higher traffic for your campaign. This advice also applies to winning prizes.
The winner might immediately claim their reward. As an alternative, for greater prize values, provide a simple redemption mechanism for winners.
5. Follow the Rules and Regulations
Some scratch-and-win promotions can need licenses and clearance from the government, depending on state rules. The permits will specify the conditions of the promotion, win percentages, scheduling, and other elements.
6. Continue to Engage Your Customers
To interact with your consumer in new ways, use your “Scratch & Win” offer as a launching pad. Why not design the campaign, if it is a component of your customer loyalty app so that it gathers useful information about the client’s preferences and spending patterns, for instance?
The need that customers to enter the draw for a broader, ongoing competition may be one of the requirements for their participation in the Scratch & Win prizes.
All the strategies have the potential to maintain consumer interest in your business after the “Scratch & Win” campaign has ended.
7. Keep it Safe & Secure
The last thing you want is an excessive number of rewards being claimed since this would quickly reduce your profit margins.
To combat fraud and verify that everyone taking part is doing so voluntarily. Including special codes and verification procedures in your “Scratch & Win” promotion will help make it safe for genuine customers.
‘Scratch and win’ is one of the best strategies to start a hype around your product, service or brand. You can back your campaign with other long-term engagement strategies like rewards points to keep the customers you have acquired already.
How to Achieve Customer Delight and Satisfaction?
A great customer experience must be purposefully created if you want to keep customers and spread good word of mouth.
Customer satisfaction goes beyond simply answering support tickets and offering the bare minimum of services to convince them to buy your goods. You’ll have to perform above expectations. The good news is that this leads to more client loyalty, more peer-to-peer recommendations, and less customer churn.
Who is in charge of satisfying clients and prospects?
Let’s zoom out and look at the concept through the inbound technique to better understand who is in charge of ensuring that customers are delighted.
Attract, engage, and delight customers are the three main elements of the inbound process. The inbound experience is fundamentally a customer-focused mode of operation. It’s not only about closing deals; it’s about efficiently assisting individuals in overcoming their issues and obstacles.
Every team contributes to the inbound process. The “attract” stage, which attracts clients to your firm, is driven by your marketing and customer service departments. The lead is subsequently “engaged” by the marketing and sales teams, who encourage conversion. The flywheel is completed by the sales and service teams by providing the customer with a wonderful purchase and first-rate customer service
Customer Delight vs. Customer Satisfaction
Exceeding clients’ expectations is the process of creating a lasting, good experience around your brand, product, or service. Simply exceeding customers’ expectations will result in customer satisfaction.
Use these tactics to Captivate your customers
1. Become more responsive
The modern consumer is not a patient person. They don’t want to wait, whether they are a prospective consumer with a query about your offerings or an established client in need of assistance.
There are a few techniques to react quicker:
- Utilize chatbots (that can pass the customer on to a human agent if needed)
- Set up autoresponder emails to inform clients when a response will be provided.
- Make sure that salesmen and customer service representatives can easily access customer information.
- Get everyone on the same page so you don’t have to spend time transferring information between teams.
2. Be dependable across all channels
Customers anticipate consistently superior service across a wide range of channels. Additionally, it feels broken when the experience varies from one channel to another. It is simpler to remain consistent if efforts are made to break down data and service silos.
3. Be Unexpected
You must leave a lasting impression on your consumers if you want your business to stand out from rivals. Even though your main objective is to address the customer’s issue, you can make a lasting impression by going above and beyond for your clients. Customers expect to have their requirements met, but they are genuinely surprised when your team goes above and beyond for them.
4. Encourage your staff to delight your clients
Giving your support workers the freedom to make their own decisions so that they can wow your clients is known as empowerment. Additionally, it calls for well-trained staff members who can spot opportunities to provide outstanding service, alter consumer perception, and ultimately make customers happy.
What are Brand Strategies to Increase Engagement?
Brand engagement refers to customer loyalty and attachment to brands. Consumer engagement, which increases business sales, is at the heart of marketing strategy.
Customers who are highly engaged are more likely to make larger purchases. Furthermore, highly engaged customers are more likely to share information about your company and products through their social networks. Their devotion generates word-of-mouth advertising, which is a surefire winner for any company looking to increase sales.
Brands make the right decision when they prioritize value creation over revenue generation. As a result, customers are completely satisfied because they are getting the best deal possible.
Brand Engagement vs. Brand Awareness
Both phrases are part of the foundational ideas of brand marketing. Brand engagement strategy suggests that any brand should pursue a number of goals in order to be successful. They consist of brand equity, advocacy, brand engagement, brand loyalty, brand identity, and brand image.
When developing your marketing strategy, brand recognition comes first. It calls for marketing initiatives designed to increase brand recognition. The ability of prospective customers to distinguish your brand from rivals and remember your items is essential. In other words, your brand should be the first to occur to people’s minds when they have a need for a product they haven’t used before. To do this, brands heavily invest in advertising on a variety of platforms.
Increase brand engagement as soon as you’ve raised brand recognition. In order to make a purchase, they must be intrigued by your business. So, allow them to communicate with you through a variety of methods and make them know that you value their feedback. More sales will result from a stronger relationship with your audience and more brand engagement.
How to Increase Customer Engagement?
You’ve probably noticed that major brands and businesses encourage their customers to leave product reviews on their official social media pages.
Customers can always share their opinions and experiences through testimonials. This is a critical component of a successful customer interaction strategy. If your services are good, encouraging consumer feedback will help your brand’s positive reputation spread organically and interpersonally.
Practice the Four-I Strategy
- Involvement: Make your audience an active participant in your campaign to increase engagement with your brand. To help clients feel more connected to your brand, your business should promote various benefits and rewards programs.
- Influence: People look for advice from celebrities and influencers they respect and want to imitate, especially in the social media age. Work with the people who your potential consumers most admire to sway them.
- Interaction: Two must dance the tango! In this case, the adage is entirely appropriate. Brands and customers must interact for any business to succeed. Additionally, contact will increase customer and brand trust.
- Intimacy: Engage in direct communication with, and outreach to, customers at various levels and via a variety of channels. By doing this, you’ll be able to understand what your customers are thinking and meet their wants.
Consider the Value of Mobile Apps
The online brand marketing strategies that businesses use have drastically changed as a result of the rise of smartphones.
Top businesses and brands not only have expert websites but also have mobile applications that are easy to use.
Customers may use these applications to get a bird’s-eye perspective of all the goods they can buy, give reviews, rate the goods, and ask inquiries. There are many of applications that also compare pricing for a certain goods.
Post high-quality material on social media for digital marketing
More international firms are using social media and search engine optimization to strengthen their bonds with current customers. You should first create top-notch interactive content if you want to encourage your users or consumers. Strong content will spread more often on social media and among friends, enhancing the reputation of your brand.
Why engagement matters?
There are more channels for communicating with customers than ever before. This means that businesses have several options for attracting and retaining customers. It also implies that competitors have access to the same opportunities.
Brands must actively work to connect and interact with consumers at every opportunity in order to increase consumer engagement. Be consistent with all of your consumer engagement strategies. Create great end-to-end customer experiences from the first interaction all the way through the brand journey by crafting messages that are consistent with the brand and relevant to the target audience.
Provide customers with a consistent and great experience, and you’ll gain their involvement, loyalty, and trust.
How Does Gamification Increase User Engagement
Incentives and reward schemes may be approached in a novel way with gamification. Gamification can enhance consumer engagement and improves relationships.
Gamification strategies are being accommodated by businesses all around the world in their online training program for staff members. Gamification has proven to be a successful strategy for engaging users and getting them excited about your brand, goods, and services. This helps to build stronger relationships with customers and entices them to use your products and services repeatedly.
How Does Gamification Work?
Gamification is often known as the integration of game aspects into company plans. Marketing initiatives like consumer incentives often produce superb results for the user and the brand with gamification strategies.
The concept is that clients and staff would participate in a game-like activity, where they accumulate points through purchases or other desired actions. If they achieve a specific level or objective, they receive incentives like discounts or free items.
Brands now have even more opportunities to include gamification into their outreach initiatives as a result of rising digital engagement. Customers can become involved via the business’ website or through an app, for instance. The use of gamification by companies to engage consumers on social media is another common trend nowadays.
How Does Gamification Increase Engagement?
Customers are growing more skeptical of internet advertising as a result of either being hesitant to divulge too much personal information or having doubts about the promises being made by a business. Customers will like the enjoyable alternative that gamification offers, where they will experience a revitalizing feeling of creativity.
Gamification is a tool that brands may employ in many innovative ways to engage users or customers in interesting activities. Gamification simplifies the connection between action and reward for the users. Customers are more likely to purchase a product or engage in an activity for a clear reward.
When an incentive or reward is included as an outcome, the final product becomes more enticing. Gamification can be incredibly successful at keeping customers engaged because it appeals to their need for accomplishment and competitiveness.
Customers that take part in gamification feel more powerful and in control than they would if they were being fed into a brand’s marketing plan. They also understand how important it is to the brand that they are satisfied since the business went the extra mile to provide a superior experience.
Advantages of Gamification
Gamification allows users to advance through several “levels” of the activities depending on their effort and actions. Incentivized activities can include purchase, review, personal feedback, social sharing, etc. Users can experience a sense of satisfaction after completing these tasks and gaining the prize points.
Adding gamification to client engagement initiatives has several key advantages, including:
- Increasing user interest and involvement
- Boost awareness of your brand
- provide the business with useful client data
- Boost client retention
- Maintain relationships with consumers
- Use incentives to reinforce a behavior
Simply said, gamification raises user engagement by providing clients with distinctive and enjoyable methods to engage with their preferred companies.
Gamification In Action
What evidence is there that gamification is effective? Major corporations like Starbucks and Dominos are just two examples of the many businesses that are using similar strategies, and the outcomes have been good.
By using the Starbucks mobile app, Starbucks incorporates gamification into its rewards program. Two Stars are awarded for every $1 paid when a consumer uses the app or a registered Starbucks Card to pay for their order. Customers receive free things when they hit milestones like 25 or 50 Stars. This arrangement is an excellent illustration of how a business can utilize gamification to keep people interested in its applications and goods.
Another excellent example is Domino’s Pizza. A “Slot Machine” option was added to their mobile app a few years ago, allowing customers to shake their phone to have their pizza toppings automatically selected if they were unsure of what they wanted. Customers are more likely to want to share a novelty-driven gamification feature like this with their friends and family.
The way people engage with companies is continuously changing thanks to gamification. Improved mobile app design and AI-driven marketing methods are just two examples of the new technologies being offered that further strengthen these approaches.
How Gamification Improves Customer Engagement and Retention
Many different components of a business, such as customers, users, workers, and technology, one of the most difficult challenges for organizations today is customer engagement. It is critical to employ effective consumer interaction strategies. Customer engagement methods have a direct impact on the company’s overall profitability and ability to generate money because they affect apps and other digital products.
If a company’s users are highly engaged, it can increase brand awareness and loyalty while lowering customer acquisition costs and improving customer satisfaction and retention. As a result, employing the best customer engagement techniques will reduce a company’s churn rate, increase the number of active users and time spent using your app, and promote user growth via recommendations and word-of-mouth.
A Successful Strategy for Marketing
Gamification can be used in marketing by providing interactive and satisfying solutions that can be integrated into your website, app, or email campaigns. Gamification instils a sense of competitiveness in customers, motivating them to strive for goals and rewards.
Relational Interaction
To increase client acquisition and retention, gamification can be used. Gamification should give users the chance to share their rewards, accomplishments, and “plots” with friends or other users. A company will have more opportunity to attract new consumers and incur reduced customer acquisition costs if it has social connections with its customers.
Use games to teach your audience
For instance, John Findlay, cofounder of Launch fire, says, “Imagine you’re a bank that’s wanting to gain new customers.” “Develop a [free] online game that pushes users to build a financial empire by making wise investment decisions, rather than providing commercials that boast about how your bank [or financial service business] is different.”
“Nest branded messaging and pertinent advice within the game so players learn more about your offerings as they play” is a strategy to increase engagement. Offer some sort of “prize,” such as free checking for a year or a $100 savings bond for “winning” the game, to further boost interest and persuade players to register an account.
Using an entertaining, educational game, advertise a new good or service
Cite the example of a sports retailer using a racing-style game to advertise new running shoes. “In the game, they might give suggestions on the best footwear for long distance running. Then, players might use the instruction to “run faster,” score more points, and win the game.
Comprehensive business planning
If you only take into account one component of your organization, it is quite difficult to build a meaningful engagement through gamification. Using data on consumer traffic patterns and purchasing patterns to integrate behavioral economics into website or mobile app testing would enable businesses to take a comprehensive approach to company planning and will benefit businesses in the long term.
What Brand Engagement Would Look Like Post This Pandemic
Let’s just agree to the fact that the road ahead for most of the brands, big or small, is punctuated by the novel Coronavirus. And everybody is hustling to find new ways to engage with their customers during this pandemic and get their businesses back on track. Zara owner closing down on 16% of its global outlets and investing in online platforms is one such example.
One of my favorite quotes is from Abraham Lincoln. He said, “Things may come to those who wait, but only the things left by those who hustle.” So my dear marketers, hold on to that perseverance for a little longer, and keep hustling, because perseverance with the right technique will help you reap the benefits.
Here are some simple quick tips about brand engagement that will help you gain just the right velocity for your brand during these tough times:
1. Get your online presence right, if you haven’t already
Online marketing is expected to play a bigger role in the longer run. Pay attention to mobile first approach for your websites and apps, as an average Indian is spending around 4 hours a day on their smartphones. Your customers, in all likelihood, would choose a brand that provides a better user experience.
Inditex, parent company of Zara and Massimo Dutti among other brands, is investing $1billion over the next three years to improve their online presence and an additional $1.7 billion on upgrading its stores to become more integrated with its online platform by deploying advanced technology solutions.
“According to research conducted by Qualtrics, when it comes to brand communications, Indians are more interested in the operational impact of COVID-19 compared to sales and promotional marketing.”
2. Keep your business information up to date
Update your customers about your operating hours. You may also want to update your address on Google. When updating your customers about the measures of cleanliness, sanitization and precautions you are taking, try not to overwhelm them with unnecessary information. They are probably already flooded with a lot of information. Try to provide them with helpful information only.
3. Set clear guidelines as per World Health Organization (WHO) protocol
Make sure that your customers, especially existing ones, know about the safety measures your brand has undertaken so that they don’t shy away from engaging with you. Target new customers with the help of precise targeting techniques. Organize free webinars to solve their queries. Host virtual events with your channel partners.
4. Use multichannel to communicate with them
Now is the time to go that extra mile with the communication strategies. Be creative yet relevant with your message. Use relevant influencers to reach your target audience.
“The top three messages respondents wanted to hear were how the business is responding to the crisis (75 per cent), the impact on the distribution (48 per cent), and information on products and services (48 per cent).”
5. Reward customers who regularly interact with your brand
Regardless of whether the customer made a purchase or just interacted with your brand, try rewarding them with some bonuses in the form of loyalty points or just a personalized message saying ‘thank you’ and offering them a discount coupon on their next purchase. This will indeed be a delighting experience for them.
6. Be Sensitive
The last thing you want when engaging with your customers is to sound salsey. Nobody is interested to know the reasons to buy your product. But they may be looking for solutions to their problems. Try selling solutions and not products. Provide them with ‘at-home brand user experience’. Try spreading some joy. This will help build a long term relationship with them.
RewardPort specializes in loyalty marketing programs, corporate loyalty card, dealer incentive programs, dealer loyalty, channel incentive, distributor incentive program, B2B loyalty programs, customer loyalty cards & marketing partner programs. Get a free consultation today.
Top Sales Promotion Trends To Emerge Post Coronavirus
Any form of promotion during Covid is quite a sensitive matter. There is a very fine line between notifying your customers and annoying them. If you are planning to get in touch with your customers, then you must know that by the time your communication reaches them they must be already annoyed to the core with hundreds of emails lying unopened in their mailboxes with subjects on Covid.
So before you initiate the promotions, you might want to check out the sales promotions trends that would emerge during this pandemic.
The language of all the promotional communication ought to be sensitive and empathic. If the customers find you lacking compassion they won’t bother to engage, let alone buy your brand. Maintaining that human touch during campaigns has become more important now than ever. When informing your customers about your processes and policies during Covid, brands need to show that they are being responsible.
Creativity and joyful communication is going to play a big role during sales promotion campaigns.
With customers getting bored, locked in their houses, brands can make use of this opportunity by spreading some joy among their customers with the help of creative and engaging campaigns. This will not just help in better and easier conversions but also give a good brand recall value.
With most of the media houses and studios shut, use of social media influencers would be a great idea at this point in time. According to a survey conducted by Hammer Kopf Consumer Surveys, amid the lockdown, in India, there has been 87% increase in social media usage. Brands should utilize this trend and hire relevant and authentic influencers for the sales promotion campaigns.
Offer discounts and promotions.
BOGO (Buy one Get one) is here to stay. The purchasing power of the consumers has been immensely affected. Also it has been observed that the consumers who can afford to buy are delaying purchases. A slashed price would motivate the consumers to make the purchase without further procrastination. Along with price cuts, there can be all forms of BOGO offers.
Free samples of products or online trials of services is a great way to launch a new brand during Covid. When giving out samples, make sure that the consumers know about the safety policies that your brand is following like contactless deliveries, best practices of hygiene and so on.
Offer discounts and promotions.
BOGO (Buy one Get one) is here to stay. The purchasing power of the consumers has been immensely affected. Also it has been observed that the consumers who can afford to buy are delaying purchases. A slashed price would motivate the consumers to make the purchase without further procrastination. Along with price cuts, there can be all forms of BOGO offers.
Free samples of products or online trials of services is a great way to launch a new brand during Covid. When giving out samples, make sure that the consumers know about the safety policies that your brand is following like contactless deliveries, best practices of hygiene and so on.
Apply Targeted Promotions.
Something that your consumer needed earlier may not be required now. It is important to understand their needs and accordingly craft the promotion strategies. According to a Harvard Business study, regardless of which group consumers belong to, they prioritize consumption by sorting products and services into four categories:
- Essentials: are necessary for survival or perceived as central to well-being.
- Treats: are indulgences whose immediate purchase is considered justifiable.
- Postponables: are needed or desired items whose purchase can be reasonably put off.
- Expendables: are perceived as unnecessary or unjustifiable.
It is important for brands to classify their products or service and bundle it appropriately to have a successful campaign with a desired outcome. For example: Bundling an essential item with a treat can become quite a desired combination for a customer.
Giving out ‘At-Home reward’ coupons or gift vouchers is another unique way of sales promotion during this pandemic. Now that everybody is at home, brands should switch to rewards that can be redeemed at home, online. For example, they can give away reward coupons for online streaming channels, food delivery apps, online learning platforms, fitness apps, e-commerce websites and so on.
RewardPort specializes in loyalty marketing programs, corporate loyalty card, dealer incentive programs, dealer loyalty, channel incentive, distributor incentive program, B2B loyalty programs, customer loyalty cards & marketing partner programs. Get a free consultation today.
How Covid 19 has changed the channel incentive strategies
The Novel Coronavirus has impacted almost everything, right from people’s lives to businesses to economies. According to the IMF, the global economy is expected to shrink by over 3 per cent in 2020 – the steepest slowdown since the Great Depression of the 1930s. These are indeed unusual times. Despite all this, there are brands who have accepted the events and taken it all in their stride. These brands are doing amazingly well with their channel strategies too.
Let’s look at what changes are recommended to be done in your channel incentive strategies due to this pandemic, and how you can benefit from them.
- Your channel partners, customers and employees are most likely distressed.
- Don’t let their morale go down.
- Create an ecosystem to uplift them.
- Try to meet their needs.
- Guide them about the safe and best practices that can be implemented to ease the operations.
- Let them know that the brand is with them in this together.
- Hold joint webinars, virtual events to motivate them.
Brands should consider suspending all non critical events and sticking with only the necessary ones, through digital medium, preferably.
“According to research conducted by Qualtrics, nearly 70 per cent of people in India believe it is important for brands to take care of their employees and customers and they should not take advantage of the crisis to maximise profits.”
Keeping short term targets is a good strategy during this crisis. Brands should work in conjunction with their teams and partners to understand their priorities, both core and short term functions. These should not be imposed on them instead should be suggested by them. These functions should be easily achievable. The completion of such functions will itself enable a sense of achievement among all the involved members.
Sticking to channel incentive strategies based on performance would not be such a good plan for now
Brands would need to be flexible, and sensitive towards their channel partners and employees. Also they should not limit the benefits to only performers, this is the time to be inclusive and empathic towards everybody.
Design tailored initiatives for small and medium sized partners
These initiatives could contain solutions such as digital assets, guidelines for safe engagements, tutorials to educate them some digital techniques and suchlike. Brands who are doing so are being praised for passing the initiatives to their channel partners and employees, and needless to say are winning minds and hearts.
Maintain regular communication with the partners and the employees
The study by Qualtrics suggests that Indians want brands to communicate with them. Around 50 per cent of the respondents said their trust in the brands they regularly engaged with has increased. The sound of the communication should not be tone-deaf but empathic.
Drive positive engagements and seek continuous feedback
The engagement practices have changed now. There are rewards which can be used at home, aka At-home Rewards. Rewards like Digital Entertainment vouchers, online learning vouchers, online shopping vouchers, and so on are getting quite hit now.
RewardPort specializes in loyalty marketing programs, corporate loyalty card, dealer incentive programs, dealer loyalty, channel incentive, distributor incentive program, B2B loyalty programs, customer loyalty cards & marketing partner programs. Get a free consultation today.