In the e-commerce industry, loyalty programs are being used throughout the years to enticing customers. 2020, COVID-19 pandemic has turned the scale in favor of online shopping & the e-commerce industry. In the 3rd decade of the 21st century, more and more traditional businesses are going online. However, with little or no experience, it has been difficult for them to pace the online e-commerce competition. If you are among these then you need to adopt a few different strategies so that the customers can discover your store and make a purchase. A few of such strategies are digital marketing, e-mail marketing, offers & discounts, captivating UI & interactive UX, and loyalty programs. Hire an expert and Best Shopify developer in Jaipur at best Price in the Market.
In today’s e-commerce world, gaining customer loyalty is a very reputed thing. It means that you are not just offering products at reasonable rates but also a great buying experience by which the customers are coming to your store regularly. If you are running an e-commerce store on Shopify, then you can easily implement Loyalty programs on your Shopify store using Shopify apps.
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What Is A Loyalty Program?
In the e-commerce industry, a loyalty program is a customer retention strategy whose purpose is to keep and engage the customers. It will result in more shopping by the customers on your store, frequent purchases, and interaction with your store. An effective loyalty program should be easy to understand, with a visible path to rewards, and provides a fun experience.
Purchasing frequency and high churn rates are the identification factors of an e-commerce store. Many online merchants believe that there is no need for customer loyalty programs and focus on offering just attractive discounts to customers. But these discounts can’t retain customers for a longer time period. Also, if you keep providing then it may result in loss.
There are several different ways by which you can be standalone in your brand loyalty programs:
- Providing intuitive online buying experience
- Incentivized customer profiling, for getting more customers’ data and boosts other marketing activities.
- VIP benefits and experiential rewards, for a better customer lifetime value
- Groups and clubs to build communities
- For mouth publicity, use social media campaigns
Why you should implement a loyalty program for your Shopify store?
There are numerous benefits of a loyalty program in your Shopify e-commerce store. These are the top benefits of loyalty programs for your online business.
Improves Customer retention
Improving customer retention is the first and foremost benefit of a loyalty program. The main motive of a customer loyalty program is to retain customers. That’s why they become one of the best and effective customer retention strategies.
Do you know that customer retention is the biggest obstacle for 60% of online retailers? Loyalty programs help to overcome this obstacle.
Relevant customer data and consumer trends
When a customer registers for a loyalty program its data get recorded in the website database. You can then use this data for omnichannel, offline, and customer segmentation. You can make groups of customers based on their profiling and tailor the offerings.
With a loyalty program, you will get a complete overview of customer behavior, shopping habits, preferences, etc. This data will let the marketing team measure the results of special promotions on the basis of additional purchases, additional channel usage, and decreased time between successive purchases.
Higher Cart Value
As we mentioned in the above point, you can use the collected data for related products, cross-sell, and up-sell. You can suggest accessories and provide discounts on related products. Furthermore, the loyalty program can bring relief by increasing demand in slow seasons. The best example is the airline mileage program which is available on selected flights. Because of the less wastage, these promotions are prone to provide more satisfactory results.
Reducing less profitable customers
Loyalty programs one benefit is highly underrated. It let the companies shed their unnecessary weight. A loyalty program, when properly designed will let you segment the customers and distinguish between profitable and unprofitable customers. Thereafter, you can drop off the customers who are only buying the discounted lines and are avoiding the premium range. These customers’ profiles will cost more money than profit. You can minimize the payout to these unprofitable customers and can reward better customers only.
Better Communication
You can directly communicate with the customers through customer loyalty programs. This is useful in the case of an emergency. By matching purchase dates, you can e-mail relevant customers about a recalled product instead of sending out an auto-generated email which will be ignored.
Attract New Customers
A good customer loyalty program is not limited to just retention of the existing customer but can also attract new customers. If the loyalty program is on the social media platform then the new customers will come to know about discounts and offers which will lead them to check out your e-commerce store.
Improve reputation
Business is all about ethics and reputation. Money can come and go, but you can’t compromise with your reputation. Customer loyalty programs can serve a double capacity: guarantee that current customers feel esteemed, and boost new customers to keep patronizing your business.
Top Loyalty Apps To Integrate Into Your Shopify Store
Finally, we will know about the best loyalty apps which you can use for your Shopify store. Shopify app store is renowned for its astonishing apps which can enhance the overall features of your store. These apps are either free as well as paid. Finding a perfect among hundreds can be a hassling task, thus we have listed the premium apps among which you can choose the best. Here’s the list:
- Smile
- Growave
- Swell
We will discuss each of these in more detail.
1. Smile
Smile is amongst the best loyalty program apps which you can use for boosting and repeating new sales. It can level-up your e-mail marketing and subscription tools with loyalty data, incentivized reviews with points, and much more. Currently, more than 40,000 Shopify brands are using Smile’s loyalty platform and have achieved huge success.
It comes with an eye-catching rewards program experience for the customers from their first visit to your Shopify store all the way to checkout. The loyalty program of Smile gives access to exclusive perks, discounts, and a fun way to engage with your brand whenever they log-in to your store.
Highlight Features
- Points for different events such as creating an account, making orders, giving reviews, etc.
- Point expiry campaigns or create urgency with bonus points
- Redeem points for free gifts or coupon codes
- Easily monitor referral traffic
- Strengthen customer retention with VIP statuses and perks
Pricing
The app comes with a free plan and 3 different paid plans. In the free plan, you get limited features while the paid features increase with the cost. You can try the Starter plan at $49/month, Growth plan at $199/month, Pro plan at $599/month.
2. Growave
Do you want to increase the sales with product reviews, points program, and want to send in stock reminders to the customers? Then Growave loyalty program app would be the best choice for you. Using this app you can collect photo reviews on autopilot with review requests, create a points program, rewards with discounts, and much more.
It is an all-in-one marketing platform that will empower your Shopify store with referrals, social logins, loyalty programs, wishlists etc. It is ideal for small and medium-scale Shopify stores. You can grow your brand by rewarding customers to spread your brand.
Highlight Features
- Increase engagement using points expiration reminders and nudges
- Rewards with points and discounts for sharing your store on social media platforms
- Social login for multiple social media platforms
- Customers can save their favorite products on the wishlist
3. Yotpo
Whether you need to implement loyalty programs, custom VIP Tiers loyalty program or build a referral marketing program, everything is possible with the Yotpo loyalty app. It can help you in maximizing the customer lifetime value, creating customized, on-brand loyalty programs & much more.
It is a full suite of multiple solutions such as Reviews, Visual Marketing, Loyalty, Referrals, and SMS. There are more than 15 unique actions for which you can reward customers such as for every dollar spent, make X purchases, referring a friend, creating an account, product reviews, etc.
Highlight Features
- Custom loyalty program with points and rewards
- Increase engagement with VIP Tiers
- Integrate your e-mail service provider
- Save time with campaign scheduling
- Create a paid membership such as Amazon Prime
Pricing
You can either use its free plan, or its Silver plans which costs $29 per month, or Gold plan which costs $249 per month.
4. S Loyalty
You can launch a beautifully branded loyalty program with rich campaign features and delightful personalizations using this loyalty app. S Loyalty apps come with exciting rewards, bonuses, and point-based campaigns to give your customers.
Highlight Features
- Advanced Rewards Program Theming & Design
- Automation For High Volume Sales
- Points handling for a better customer experience
- Multi-language support
- Holiday Campaigns and Bonuses
Pricing
There is a free plan with limited features while paid plans are Basic plans at $19.99 per month and Higher Volume plans at $199.99 per month.
5. Referral Candy
Last but not the least, Referral Candy is a highly popular Shopify referral app that can automate your referral program. It can boost sales, build social proof, increase customer retention, through an easy-to-use referral program. Referral Candy has generated hundreds of millions of dollars for the Shopify merchants in referral sales.
Highlight Features
- Check metrics and reporting on the Dashboard
- Amazing customer support and simple setup process
- Track results with e-mail integration
- Social media sharing through Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or Messenger.
Pricing
It is priced at $49 per month.
Custom Loyalty Program App Development
It is not necessarily true that the pre-built apps can meet all your business requirement or industry niche. You may need an app that is specifically designed for your requirements. In that case, it is best to hire an expert Shopify developer for developing a custom loyalty program. It will be highly beneficial for your business. You can get all the required features and functionalities and can customize the configure details. There will be no issues in installing or managing the app.
Wrapping Up
There can be multiple benefits of a loyalty program. It will help in customer retention, knowing your customers, and much more. If you want to incorporate custom features in a loyalty app then getting in touch with Shopify expert is a good choice.
