Podcast Why Customer Personas Matter in Loyalty Rewards Programs

This interview was conducted by Clark Buckner from TechnologyAdvice.com (they offer a top list of customer loyalty programs, resources for employee teaching games and innovative employee programs, and much more).

In a roundtable discussion of customer loyalty experts, Ashley Tate, Director of Marketing at BigDoor, and Barry Kirk, VP of Loyalty Strategy at Maritz Motivation Solutions, talked with TechnologyAdvice host Clark Buckner about understanding customer personas as the first step to creating a loyalty program, the four-drive model of motivation, and the bare essentials of persona marketing.

 

How deeply does a brand need to understand their customers before creating a loyalty program?

Kirk divulged that if he could wave a magic wand over the marketing land and make one change, it would be to convince people to drop the word “consumer” from their vocabulary. He considers it the most reductionist term coined for people with whom companies are trying to build loyal relationships.

Kirk stressed the importance of understanding a customer within a loyalty context. Companies ought to work to understand that customers are more than just a consumption machine because they’re human beings. Marketers also need to think of themselves as human beings and not just a marketing machine. Hence, marketers ought to interact with customers and build a human relationship with them.

Tate added that even before purchasing a product, customers are often already interested in knowing about a brand. They want to know why these brands exist, so they read about the products and where they came from. Tate seconded Kirk’s answer too: marketers need to understand that customers are not mere numbers that exist for profitability, but that they’re real, actual persons.

 

What is the four-drive model of motivation?

Through a neuroscience perspective, Kirk illustrated the four core drives that biologically connect people with experiences:

  • Drive to acquire: Within loyalty programs, this means acquiring points, status rewards, etc.

  • Drive to defend: People try to defend what they have as strongly as they can.

  • Drive to bond: People want to connect and socialize with other people.

  • Drive to create: People want to add to an experience by putting their own mark on it, or by gaining their own understanding or mental model of it.

Basically, neuroscience suggests that marketers can build relationships with customers that engage those four drivers in a meaningful way, giving them an experience (both online and offline) that they will remember, come back to, and will tell other people about. Instead of thinking of customers as numbers in a database, marketers will begin to understand what customers want and why those wants are important to them.

 

What is value-based segmentation vs. persona marketing?

In today’s world, marketers are still caught up in number-crunching, where they focus more on value-based segmentation. Who spends more? Who buys this product more? It’s all based on numbers and stats. Sadly, there’s not much understanding spent on knowing the person on a more human level.

In a perfect world, marketers would think about persona marketing, which is essential in building a relationship and in eventually creating a more engaging loyalty program. This begins with a deep knowledge of the offered product or service, then knowing what the customers want from said product or service.

More importantly, marketers need to understand that before kicking off any kind of loyalty initiative, they must first be able to create different personas for their possible customers. That can be accomplished by assessing people’s demographic information through questions like:

  • What is their job title or level of seniority?

  • What does their day-to-day life look like?

  • Why do they come to the company or brand’s site?

  • What is the value of using the product?

  • What are the goals they seek from this experience?

  • What experiences do they seek to get from your product or service?

  • How long of a journey do you want your customers to take?

What are some tips on gathering data and validating personas?

Data-gathering is key to validating customer personas. By looking into customer flow, as well as usability, marketers can then consider what’s actually driving their customers’ actions.

At BigDoor, Tate explained how they use heat maps in online experiences, which are different pieces of a “click journey” for the customer, so that when they hit the site the first time, BigDoor sees what they’re clicking on and the different pages they’re visiting.

Another data-gathering tip is implementing customer advice reports, where a new idea is tested in order to get  sought information right from the source, i.e. customers from across the board, including not only loyal customers, but also those who might have bounced from the site, and those who originally purchased a product but decided to discontinue the service.

Kirk also added that creating a value model based on survey methodology can be helpful. Since different people have different values, this helps a marketer determine what’s important to different customer segments. That said, marketers need to be able to distinguish between different value models and identify which value system is predominant among their target customers.

Essentially, Kirk and Tate said that marketers need to understand the importance of really knowing their customers before launching a loyalty program of any kind. Such knowledge avoids wasting valuable resources while creating a great service for their customers. Figure out customers’ lifecycles. What are the key drivers that motivate them to interact with a brand? Gather as much data as necessary, but be sure to follow that with an all-important question: How will that data actually be used to further the loyalty program?

 

As evidenced by this interview, both Maritz Motivation Solutions and BigDoor offer helpful advice and experienced insight into the customer loyalty marketing space. Be sure to download the next podcast round table discussion with them. It’s free and in iTunes now!

 

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