The average consumer belongs to 13 loyalty programs, but is only active in about 7. SMS messages can help ensure that your loyalty program is one that your customers love, instead of one they sign up for and never return to. Text messaging gives companies the power to increase engagement in loyalty programs.

Loyalty programs are incredibly valuable to businesses:

• Loyal customers spend 67% more than new ones through repeat purchases, larger cart sizes, and frequent upsells.
• Customers who belong to loyalty programs generate between 12 and 18% more incremental revenue growth per year than those who do not participate.
• 81% of consumers agree that a loyalty program makes them more likely to continue doing business with brand.

But a basic rewards programs that lack personalization won’t cut it anymore.

• 77% of loyalty programs based purely on “transactional behaviors” (like earning points from purchases) typically fail within two years of launch.
• 87% of loyalty program members are interested in having details of their activity and behavior monitored in order to receive personalized rewards.
• A customer who is “highly-engaged” will purchase 90% more often and spend 60% more per transaction.

Customers want loyalty programs to make them feel like they are cared for and get personal attention, as well as save them time. And they don’t want to have to spend a lot of effort to get it. Your customers want you to make it easy to engage with loyalty programs—and with your brand.

In fact, 75% of consumers said they’d be likely to increase participation in a loyalty program if they could access it easily from their smartphone. The top answer when asked their preferred method for accessing rewards program information is via a link in a text message. That’s 25% higher than those who said through a mobile app.

Their top two communications preferences for loyalty program information are emails and text messages. Given the poor performance of emails, it’s obviously time to add messaging as a channel to drive participation and engagement for your loyalty programs.

SMS Messages and That Personal Touch

Text messaging is in demand by loyalty program members, but they want personalized messages and programs, not mass messages designed for everyone that meet no one’s specific needs. Follow these steps and you’ll be quickly on your way to better customer engagement.

Identify Customers Who Prefer Text:

When your customers sign up for your loyalty program, offer them a selection of channels to choose from.

You can also email them with an offer to opt-in to text message updates for their loyalty rewards information by texting a keyword to your short code. Or post a keyword and short code on your loyalty program page to encourage them to pro-actively opt-in for messaging.

Create Your Message Strategy:

Determine which information should be sent within an SMS message, and when inserting a link to loyalty program information is the better option.

Here are some Ideas for information to include in your SMS messages:

• Welcome them as new loyalty program members
• Monthly notifications of their rewards status
• Confirmations as they earn more points or rewards, or reach a new tier
• Notices of upcoming reward expiration dates with prompts to use them
• Keyword surveys to gauge affinity toward a specific feature of your program

SMS messages with links could include:

• Notices of their monthly rewards statement with a link to view
• New rewards they may be interested in with a link to more information
• Updated terms and conditions with a link to the policy web page
• Confirmation of a reward redemption with a link to track their order

One point to note. Visuals attract 6600% more than words, so think about using MMS messages with images and videos to deepen engagement in your loyalty programs.

You can create all these messages in templates, then automate them so they are scheduled, or sent when certain Salesforce statuses change. Additionally, your agent can easily send a 1:1 text confirming any confirmations about rewards.

Consider Blending Channels to Increase Engagement:

Since email and text messaging are the two most preferred channels for loyalty program engagement, blending their use can be a boon for participation.

Let’s say you send an email with details of their monthly status in the program. A few days later you see that a percentage of your members haven’t opened the email. Pull a list of those customers and send them a message that suggests they check their email to see their rewards standing.Since  SMS messages have a nearly perfect open and read rate, this approach can keep your loyalty program emails from languishing in your customers’ inboxes.

Give Your Loyalty Program Members What They Want

Simple messaging platforms, like Converse, make using SMS messaging for loyalty marketing simple and effective. As interest in messaging continues to grow with consumers, you don’t want to be left behind.

It’s never been easier to use SMS messages to build better relationships and program participation. Reach out if you want to learn how you can increase engagement and learn more about your customers!