One of the many facets of Retail Marketing is offering discounts of various types. In order to stay in business, every company wants to have customer loyalty. One of the many ways to achieve this, is to make use of Loyalty cards which will provide your customers with an incentive to continue to be your customer. These loyalty cards are known by several different names, depending on where the customer happens to reside.

In the United States, these cards are known either as an advantage card, rewards card, discount card, or a club card. Most people in the United Kingdom refer to it as a loyalty card, and Canadians might call them rewards cards, or points cards.

These cards usually have a barcode, or magnetic strip, which is scanned. Some of them are chip cards which contain micro chips that transmit the required data. Most of these come with a smaller size that are intended to fit on a keyring, making it even easier for the person to use the card and receive their discount as a loyal customer.

These loyalty programs can be set up by the company with different types of discounting. For instance, the card might offer a 10% discount after the customer has spent a specified amount of money. This helps the company establish whether the customer is there for the discount, or will actually be a returning client.

A bookstore vendor might set up a loyalty program that requires the customer to purchase a certain number of books before their discounting card takes effect. Many book lovers would appreciate this type of thank you from the company they purchase from. Other businesses might require a two for the price of one offer where an additional discount is provided at a certain purchase amount.

Many times airlines offer some type of loyalty card which involves frequent flyer miles. In this case, the more miles a person travels with that airline, the more miles they accrue and the result is so much discount on their next flight, even free. For people who spend much of their life flying to distance places, this could help them decide to pick an airline and stay with it.

Other businesses that can offer these type of programs, is motel and lodging establishments, where a person continues to be loyal to that company they will continue to get better rates on their hotel rooms, and accommodations. Gasoline companies are another place where people are always wanting to save money, and by offering them a rewards program to join, it could help keep the customers coming back to that establishment, instead of going to the one across the street.

As discount methods go, the loyalty one provides the best for both consumer and the business to be able to increase their revenue. Any type of discount that a company might want to offer can be set up on one of these reward programs. In Retail Marketing, this offers the best of both worlds for establishing customer branding and their repeat business.

Author Bio: Creating Reward program since 1981, we’ll design a Customer loyalty strategy to meet your goals, surpass your customers’ expectations, and inspire long-term loyalty and growth.

Category: Marketing
Keywords: marketing, sales, business, merchandising, product launch, customer service, purchases, management