One of my great annoyances is the stack of cards that I feel compelled to carry around in my purse: loyalty/reward cards, identification cards, specialty store credit cards, etc. There are true perks that come from using these things -- gas discounts, coupons for great savings at stores, reward dollars that come later in the mail, etc. -- so I haul them around, but they irritate me.
And then there is Walgreens, who now offers a similar rewards program to many others, but allows you to punch you phone number into the keypad at the register instead of carrying around yet another card. What a great idea. It's not some obscure number like my Eddie Bauer Friends Card, rather something I actually know.
Not long ago, it was one phone per family, so it made using the phone number more difficult (actually, more rewarding for the customer since many family members would contribute to one reward -- so the companies didn't embrace that idea). But now many people have one phone number per person. Those numbers are portable so they stay with the customer longer (forever?), again making them more convenient to use for electronic tracking purposes.
Think of how you can allow your customers to use cell phone numbers for multiple purposes. Physical cards are so "yesterday." If you have anything to do with customer programs, try to implement some electronic tracking system rather than handing out another card for your patrons to carry. That in itself should earn you some loyalty points!
-- beth triplett
leadershipdots.blogspot.com
@leadershipdots
leadershipdots@gmail.com
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