Have you seen The Customer Experience Factbook?

In this 180+ page report, you'll find all the information and support you need to build a profitable, effective CX Improvement Program that spans every part of your business. You'll be able to implement and manage meaningful and profitable change, and grow your bottom line despite a slowing economy.

Get it on Amazon (Kindle/Print)

Companies still doubt the effectiveness of loyalty

The study, entitled 'Facing the Challenges of Building Loyalty and Retention: The New Strategic Imperative', surveyed more than 150 customer loyalty and retention executives in both B2B and B2C companies, and examined current trends in loyalty programmes.

Two-thirds of survey participants said they already had a department or functional area dedicated to customer loyalty and retention, and an additional 13% said they had plans to add one. However, less than one in four considered their loyalty and retention efforts "very effective", while 44% deemed their programmes "somewhat effective".

The study suggested one possible explanation for this apparent dissatisfaction: the top priority of customer loyalty and retention programmes was to get customers to spend more (47%), while reducing churn and developing customers into brand evangelists were a distant second and third. But a report from the CMO Council suggests that more than half of loyalty programme members are considering defecting, feeling bombarded by spam and irrelevant offers. So B2C companies may be making a mistake in prioritising increasing customer spending over customer retention and brand evangelism.

"Loyalty is no longer about the programme, but should be focused on behaviour," said Mark Johnson, CEO for Loyalty 360. "Brands that focus on loyalty as a way to create sustainable behavioural change in their brand advocates are those that will drive the financial imperatives needed for loyalty programme success."

Effective retention and loyalty strategies aren't about keeping customers at all costs. But, despite this, only half of respondents reported having formal customer lifecycle or voice-of-the-customer (VoC) programmes. Among those with a defined customer lifecycle, the biggest percentage (40%) believed that lifecycle begins after the sale. These companies are missing an opportunity to plant the seeds of loyalty earlier in the buying cycle - while customers are still considering all their purchase options.

"Businesses that define their customer lifecycles and then align loyalty and retention efforts accordingly tend to garner more success,'" explained Wilson Raj, global customer intelligence director for SAS. "But there is still more opportunity for companies to integrate loyalty data with other customer data to adopt a more holistic approach in building brand evangelists."

And, while email remains the dominant for listening to customers (84%) and responding to customers (88%), social media has now become the second most frequent method for responding to customers. The traditional call centre, despite being alive and well, is no longer the key lifeline to the customer.

With this in mind, a surprisingly low 36% of respondents reported high or moderate integration of loyalty data with other customer data. Even fewer (30%) reported moderate-to-high use of customer data to inform loyalty campaigns. This suggests that many loyalty programmes are literally detached from the overall customer experience and lifecycle.

"Without a holistic view of the customer to guide loyalty programmes, it's easy to see why so many are marginally effective. It also lends insight to why many members don't perceive much value from their memberships," concluded Johnson.

Have you seen The Customer Experience Factbook?

In this 180+ page report, you'll find all the information and support you need to build a profitable, effective CX Improvement Program that spans every part of your business.

You'll be able to implement and manage meaningful and profitable change, and grow your bottom line despite a slowing economy. Grab this goldmine of easily adaptable and up-to-date strategies, walk-throughs, trends, technologies, research, suppliers and partners, plus all the supporting arguments you need to build a solid CX strategy.

While most marketers could list maybe a dozen key points for improving their brand's Customer Experience (CX), the researchers and writers at The Marketing Factbook have identified FORTY main 'CX Keys' which will help you drive your customers to new levels of delight, loyalty, advocacy and profitability.

The areas in which customers have direct contact with your organization are perhaps the most obvious places in which CX improvements can be made, and this report addresses all 24 of these 'Direct CX Keys', applicable to offline and online businesses alike.

At the same time there are many other areas that indirectly affect CX (such as the supply chain, policies and processes) in which every business can make simple but far-reaching improvements. This report guides you through the problems and solutions for all 16 of these 'Indirect CX Keys', many of which are often forgotten or under-played even in the best CX strategies.

Get it on Amazon (Kindle/Print)