For Jeffery Savage, CEO of Franklin Savings Bank, launching a new loyalty program six months ago led to promising momentum from a customer engagement/customer experience perspective for 2016.
Franklin Savings Bank, which has seven banks, launched the Buzz Points loyalty program to support local businesses in Central New Hampshire.
Buzz Points rewards customers for shopping locally, provides small business owners with the marketing tools they need to compete against national merchants, and provides a digital experience that enables users to track, manage and redeem points through a web interface or mobile app.
By partnering with Buzz Points, Franklin Savings Bank plans to continue to support its local businesses as well as encourage and incent customers for shopping locally.
Loyalty360 caught up with Savage to talk about the loyalty program’s progression.
How has the loyalty program progressed, when did it launch, and what do membership numbers look like now?
We launched Buzz Points on July 13, 2015 and have experienced excellent growth over the past few months. To date, 27% of our ATM/Debit cardholder base has enrolled in the program and we are seeing, on average, 200 cardholders enroll in the program each month. Needless to say, we are very pleased with our numbers to date!
Given your feedback since the launch, what have you gleaned that you’ve been able to leverage moving forward to offer more value in the program?
Since the launch of Buzz Points, we hired a program coordinator to work with our Preferred Merchants to assist them with developing special offers in an effort to build customer loyalty as well as attract new patrons to their business. While Buzz Points is a turnkey program, we found early on that small business owners do not have the time to fully maximize the value of the program. Therefore, we felt it was important to offer some assistance, so they would see real results to affirm their investment in the program. Our program coordinator meets with our Preferred Merchants regularly to provide updates on how they are doing in the program with regards to e-Reward redemptions as well as performance metrics to track the success of their offers. In addition, this individual will be tasked with identifying local businesses not enrolled in Buzz Points in an effort to get them to join the program.
Banking is often seen as a tough industry to gain true loyalty and advocacy. What is FSB doing in this regard and how is it going?
One of the hallmarks to our success has been the level of service we provide our customers and our continued investment in banking technology. As a community bank with deep ties to the communities we serve, we take pride 
in being able to provide our customers with all the products and services they need to make banking easier and convenient for them. Whether it be a commercial real estate loan, home equity line of credit, or investment advice, we offer it and invest in the technology needed to make banking convenient. Moving forward, our focus will be on attracting millennials, so we can earn their loyalty early on in life with the hope of developing a lasting relationship with them as these individuals will become future home owners, entrepreneurs and investors. We also feel it is important to educate our customers, so they can make informed financial decisions. For example, our wealth management group offers workshops on retirement planning, Medicare, estate planning, as well as long-term care. They have been able to develop new client relationships through their focus on education because people get to see first-hand the knowledge and expertise we have on these topics which will at one point affect them in their life.
What is the key to customer engagement?
The key to customer engagement is being able to enhance a customer’s experience with you. Aside from the level of service we provide, we have also found education to be a driver of customer engagement. People appreciate being able to attend a workshop without any high-pressure sales tactics involved. They also appreciate receiving useful tips and information on topics for which they have an interest. In addition, we feel strongly that having conversations with customers is another way to build engagement. By taking the time to engage in a discussion with them, we have the ability to assess their needs fully, so we can recommend the best product or service.
What does customer loyalty mean to FSB?
Being able to meet the growing needs of your customers is the key to building customer loyalty. In our industry, technology is always changing. We need to continue to keep pace with emerging technology to fuel our customers’ need for easy, convenient banking alternatives. This, along with our ability to make informed decisions quickly, while delivering top-notch customer service, will continue to be our focus moving forward in this competitive environment.