Customer loyalty as a priceless competitive advantage

Please not another plastic card! Companies are already trying to set themselves apart from the competition in many areas. But when it comes to customer loyalty programs, there is still potential - potential that can provide the decisive competitive edge.

For a customer loyalty program to become a competitive advantage, it must be everything. Just not boring. Companies that succeed in building an emotional bridge to their customers are clearly ahead of the game.

Customer loyalty as an exclusive experience

But how do you create this emotional connection? By appealing to customers on an emotional level as well. For your customer loyalty to become a competitive advantage, it must offer your customers an experience, cause a good feeling. This experience can be exclusivity, for example: Offers, benefits that are exclusively available to your regular customers or even limited to a narrower circle of customers. If you manage to give your customers a lifelong memory, you have definitely won: The loyalty of these customers to their company is stable.

Priceless: being someone special

If you take a long-term view of customer loyalty - and everyone generally should - there's another recipe for gaining a competitive advantage. People want to feel special (e.g., through exclusive access, special products, ...). A customer loyalty program must manage to convey exactly this feeling. Standing out from the competitor's customer loyalty program through appearance, selection or price (war) may work well in the short term. In the long term, however, it hardly works at all, because why should you be loyal to something that is interchangeable?

Effort versus benefit

It goes without saying that a customer loyalty program must function perfectly technically in order to be well received. Today, a customer loyalty program also has to be digital to work really well. Every customer weighs up the costs against the benefits. Only if this ratio is right can a customer loyalty program be successful. As a general rule, a simple program guarantees that it will be understood and used by all customers.

Be convinced and convince yourself

And as obvious as it may seem, you, the company's representatives, must be convinced of your customer loyalty program yourself. Because you can only convince others (your customers) if you are convinced yourself. This is important, because customer loyalty programs are not self-perpetuating. To spread the word about your loyalty program and make it a success, you need to actively draw your customers' attention to it. It's a good deal, because these tips cost you nothing and customer loyalty is priceless as a competitive advantage.