Loyalty programs are a mainstay of modern customer relationships. Consumers like them as a way to get discounts, special offers, and recognition. Companies like them as a way to build trust and long-term relationships. Beyond the obvious benefit of increased sales to loyalty program members, companies find those members are more willing to share personal data and more likely to recommend the company to others.
But a successful loyalty program doesn’t just happen. It requires careful planning, meticulous execution, and sound technology. Above all, it requires accurate, orchestrated data flows to capture member information, analyze their behaviors, and deploy the results for effective, personalized treatments. If anything, loyalty program members are even more demanding than other customers about their data: their special relationship with the company is built on the premise that sharing more information will result in special benefits that make the exchange worthwhile. Any hint that the company’s data about them isn’t accurate, complete or secure puts in question the value of this exchange.
The need for complete customer data poses a particular challenge. While loyalty systems ingest transactions, track promotions and rewards, and maintain customer profiles, they generally do not capture data such as website behaviors and service requests. This is where a Customer Data Platform can help, since CDPs are designed to assemble customer information from all sources and share it with other systems. Integrating CDP data with the loyalty system ensures that loyalty interactions are based on timely, complete information, enabling the company to give program members the quality experiences they expect.
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