Gaining Customer Engagement Through ASAP App

Dylan Samra, CEO and co-founder of ASAP, is excited about the progression of his company as customer engagement has ramped up significantly.

Based in Sydney, Australia, ASAP is an app that gets you anything you want delivered from, literally, any store within minutes via a proprietary network of personal shoppers.

Loyalty360 caught up with Samra to learn more about this 19-month old company.

Can you talk about the progression of the ASAP app since its inception to now and how it has impacted customer engagement?

Samra: Originally, we started off as an SMS-only service where the customer would text message their delivery request to a number. This had limited customer engagement compared to all the things that an app could do. 
Since we launched the ASAP app, our customer engagements have increased on so many fronts due to the customer having a more visual experience of viewing local stores around them on the app that they could choose to deliver from. 

During that time, can you talk about what behavioral changes you have noticed and how you’ve been able to leverage those insights?

Samra: We’ve noticed that customers are talking much more about ASAP to their friends ever since launching the app. Customers are also more creative in their delivery requests due to the variety of options visually presented on the ASAP app. 

What does customer loyalty mean to your company?

Samra: Customer loyalty to our company doesn’t just mean repeat business. It also means word-of-mourth and a deep emotional connection to our brand. 

How is social media being used differently today than a year ago, and how do you see it changing in the future? 

Samra: If there was one thing to sum up social media’s change in a year, it would be advertising cost. I predict that brands will utilize video advertising in the future of social media.

What new media are you using to drive customer loyalty, or what would you like to try? 

Samra: We are starting to use direct marketing in very innovative ways. It’s all about standing out from the noise. What I would like to try soon is video as I believe it’s the next big thing. 

What trends are you seeing in customer loyalty/marketing?

Samra: I’ve noticed that consumers are caring less about platform loyalty, but more about product loyalty. They don’t care who provides them the product, they just want their specific product. Something that they can claim is a part of them. Personalization is key. Brands are telling stories to get an emotional connection. Today, you have to be real. Not fake. They are all evolving to become more human in their marketing.

What brand do you think has the best customer loyalty and why?

Samra: Amazon, because its entire strategy is around consolidating all of its products’ customer bases into its ultimate Amazon Prime membership. Amazon is creating an all-in-one membership for life.

How do you see CX changing internally (your industry) and externally (all industries)?

Samra: CX in our industry will become more and more personalized through big data. Through AI, our customers will be directly presented with products that they could have delivered, based on their data of previous orders and what they search for. Data will personalize CX in the on demand delivery industry. 

For all industries, I feel that data will also affect them all via personalization. AI will change the world and personalization will be at the forefront of that change. 

Can you define what the phrase “customer journey” means to you/your brand? What does it mean to most brands today? 

Samra: The customer journey in our eyes is the customer from inception of seeing us for the first time all the way to using us while telling their friends about us. It is a step by step process to from A to Z, as Z is the customer in their ultimate form of brand loyalty. 

I think most brands see the customer journey as the lifetime from start to finish of that customer. 

How do you decide when and how to make “investments” in your customer loyalty strategy? How do you define success in this regard?

Samra: We decide to make investments in our customer loyalty strategy all the time. We do this by implementing strategies that relate to going the extra mile.  

I define success in this regard by catching them by surprise with authentic appreciation.​

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