Loyalty Blogs

With increasing competition in the retail market, business owners are struggling to attract and retain their customers cost-effectively. Driven by new and smart digital technologies, customers today expect an enhanced shopping experience with hyper-personalized interactions. To make a difference & stand out from competing brands, marketers must think & act differently.

Sending personalized communications and rewards enable marketing teams to attain higher rates of customer loyalty. Geo-location tracking is one of the latest trends that can do wonders in improving loyalty program strategy and building stronger customer relationships. Let’s check out how the Loyalty Program Platform aligned with the geo-tracking feature can help your business grow with a higher loyalty.

Type of Channels for Tracking Members’ Location

The ability to track the location of the member helps to add a valuable layer of data to members’ profiles helping businesses to understand members’ habits, interests, lifestyles, etc. Here are some of the ways to collect & track location from the members.

· Geofencing

Here, the program operator sets a virtual boundary around a particular location, along with a specific offer. This means that the offer is triggered only when a member comes within the boundary.

· Geotargeting

Here, the program operator aims to segment members based on the location data that are stored within their profiles and helps to target them in a specific order, which is best for driving the desired behavior.

· Wi-Fi Tracking

Using Wi-Fi platforms to capture personal detail of customers, send targeted and real-time offers/promotions to an individual based on the specific location they are at, and track the movement of both members and non-members at stores.

· Beacons

Another way to collect location data of customers is through beacons which are quite similar to WiFi tracking but beacons are best for more localized engagement. The key aspect is to send coupons & offers to consumers through an app using a nearby Bluetooth-enabled device that picks up the signal.

Why do Loyalty Programs Need Geolocation Systems To Grow?

With the rising popularity of geolocation tracking, loyalty programs enabled with geolocation features enable members to get location-specific information & offers. Geolocation tracking feature helps to capture user location data (after permission is enabled from users)where data collected is used to promote targeting marketing communications based on a wide range of criteria. The ability to track the location of the member helps to add a valuable layer of data to members’ profiles helping businesses to understand members’ habits, interests, lifestyles, etc.

Geotracking is important for your Customer Loyalty Software as it enables companies to send targeted offers and promotions to program members specifically when they are within a specific location. This approach is quite effective as compared to a traditional program where members are bombarded constantly.

Using geolocation, businesses can wait for a better opportunity when the member is close for instance, sending communications when they are within a shopping mall is more useful to encourage them to purchase. This leads to a situation where customers can take advantage of offers as they are relevant, which eventually helps in increasing the overall satisfaction with the loyalty program.

Main Use Cases of Using Geolocation Tracking

With the increasing demand for mobile app-based loyalty programs, customers now expect instant and real-time gratification! Using geolocation tracking, personalized mobile communications are possible where customers will receive a push notification with a special offer on formal wear based on their purchase history. Now is the time for brand-customer loyalty communications on mobile apps instead of physical loyalty cards.

Here are some of the ways of using geolocation data-

· Location-Based Targeting

This approach is helpful to engage customers who are in or near your retail destination in real-time with relevant content like offers & special recommendations that will enhance their shopping experience.

· Personalized Communications

Based on customers’ interests & preferences, businesses can make use of geolocation data to complement the data collected earlier on customers’ shopping history, which is helpful to target customers that are interested in particular product types.

· Conditional Messaging

This works perfectly for the situation when customers are out of town or even out of the country, you can use their geolocation data to change your messaging patterns about any upcoming events or sales in physical outlets.

· Review Marketing Investments

It is crucial to check if the marketing investments you are putting into your business are working as expected or not. Even if customers don’t use your loyalty barcode while making transactions, ensure that you use your geolocation data to check if the purchase made was from the marketing done in shopping center visits.

Final Takeaways

We know that successful retailers are the ones that make the right use of geo-location data by collecting them from multiple sources and touchpoints to extract insights helping them understand and engage customers at the right time and in the right place. Mobile apps are the most important digital touch point for the shopping journey of every customer.

If you are planning to integrate geolocation into your customer loyalty program, now is the best time to help you increase customer engagement, satisfaction & sales. Novus is an all-in-one Loyalty Management Software that enabled small businesses as well as enterprises to grow their business with custom loyalty solutions. Connect with our experts & book a demo of Novus Loyalty to see how we can add value to your business.