CPG brands have historically been challenged to collect and activate first party data on their consumers, thereby failing to truly connect with their consumers at a human level. By leveraging loyalty programs that provide consumers incentives to relinquish data directly to the brand, CPG companies can begin to aggregate not only identifiable information on their most valuable consumers, but unique information that allows them to create authentic campaigns that achieve their business objectives.
7. A Loyalty Program Can Help
CPGs Actively…
Fighting private label commoditization
Protecting share from new category entrants
Looking to build D2C connections
Seeking to connect consumers across promotions
Struggling to measure attributable ROI
Names / Roles
Keep short + activities
Purpose: engagement based loyalty overcome middle man to build D2C connections and collect 1st party
Background – category development Kroger Macy’s
Hi Scott + Carter w/me + roles…will keep our presentation short, but hopefully interesting, as I know there’s afternoon activities looming. Cite something about activity from Monday…transition
I’m going to spend the next half hour with you discussing the power that multichannel, engagement based loyalty programs can have for CPGs like you in today’s competitive environment and ultimately how these programs help you overcome the middle man, or your retail customers, to build valuable D2C relationships with your consumers
A little about myself first though…I’ve been in CPG space for ten years…
-I spent 5 years at Kroger working in category development, loyalty marketing and consumer insights roles with brands like Coke and J&J
-After Cincinnati moved to NYC to work on Macy’s Customer Strategy & Intelligence again supporting category development and direct marketing with Macy’s beauty vendors like Estee Lauder & Lancome
Common thread was CPG hungriness to data
Old model pay a lot $ of secondary data access still lacking D2C
often data access is still a challenge
Challenge persisted until found CT’s multichannel loyalty engagement platform
Need to solve this challenge more important than ever before…
…a common thread between my roles at Kroger and Macy’s was vendor access to data…believe you me, our partners were paying a lot of money for just indirect access to data about their customers. That said, even with this newfound data access, my vendors’ views were limited to the specific retail customer only. Further yet, these vendor partners still lacked a D2C connection with the consumers they were analyzing. And that’s the challenge that has always persisted for CPGs…access to first party data on your consumers to build effective data-driven yet authentic relationships
That challenge persisted until I discovered CrowdTwist’s loyalty and engagement platform and the power it brings for CPGs to be an effective means of building D2C relationships with consumers while collecting new, first party data points that were totally unimagined before…the need for a solution to solve this challenge is more important than ever before…
It’s more important than ever for brands to re-evaluate their GTM strategies because the landscape has become so hyper competitive.
The industry data speaks for itself here …for example, Catalina has reported 90 out of the top 100 national CPG brands have experienced market share loss…
Reasons (private label commoidization, new category entrants, shifting consumer preferences
Re-evaluation means growing emotional loyalty through data driven strategies + authentic touch points for greater equity
Of course this is from a variety of reasons we’ve heard yesterday and today including private label commoditization…new category entrants and shifting consumer preferences…new D2C brands and more…ultimately, what the really means is the marketplace is growing more competitive by the minute and only CPGs that re-evaluate will thrive…
What does re-evlaution mean? Re-evaluation is about building stronger emotional loyalty to your brand through data-driven strategies and authentic touch points that builds brand equity with your consumers so much so that your equity helps your brand rise above the competing forces that exist in the marketplace.
Today, brand equity and loyalty is key to profitability
…I don’t think it will come as a surprise but Bain and company reports that just a 5% increase in customer retention would increase profits by 25-95% depending upon the industry…
Yet as marketers, we still focus so much of our effort on net new acquisition vs. showing love to the ones we’re with…or using our emotionally loyal consumers to more efficiently bring in new consumers within their network. And that just it, the key is generating emotionally loyal consumers because they will be our most valuable consumers in a variety of ways…
Business Insider reports some of those variety of authentic brand touch points being:
Advocacy as I mentioned – 60%
Your most emotionally loyal consumers are more likely to engage with your brands in a variety of ways including with their pockets but in other touch points that go beyond the point of purchase. And those non-purchase, D2C touch points are super important…it’s getting D2C access your consumers that’s critical…
One effective and proven means of building D2C relationships for CPGs with their consumers is through a brand owned loyalty program.
Our CPG friends have experienced CLV growth in key segments since rolling out loyalty through the collection of unique engagement based data points both within the traditional retail aisle as well as non-traditional channels…we’ll admit that a loyalty program does not come with an easy button nor will it solve all your potential challenges especially if there are underlying factors in play such poor product performance
…that said though, an engagement based, D2C loyalty program can be extremely valuable to you if you’re…
Looking to build D2C connections. This allows you to go around the middle man and potentially collect information, such as purchase, that was once only owned by your retail customers
A branded program also generates new value to fight the proliferation against private label brands and give you a new currency to talk and incentivize purchase amongst your consumers
Along the same lines a private label commodization, a D2C program protects brand share against new players in the category and often provides you information that improves defensivsability or increases your awareness about preferences of your consumers at who made be ripe to switch or try a new product
Seeking to connect consumer across campaigns…if you’re heavy in shopper marketing or calendar promotions, linking loyalty can help bridge the time between promotions and purchase to build relationships with your best consumers throughout the year
And finally, measurable ROI…with a new D2C connection, you can see real time impact of campaigns to measure the effectiveness of your promotions…
This is no easy feat. It takes time and a holistic view of your customer, coupled with quality data to understand your buyer and their engagement with your brand.
From there, you’re tasked with developing that relationship in a meaningful and scalable way.
I’m going to provide tips on how to build a successful engagement based loyalty program and provide you real world examples from some best in class CPG brands…
Authenticity should be at the heart of the customer experience you generate via a loyalty program
the heart of your program, for you, should be about collect actionable data…
Those data points should beyond transaction that target specific touch points along key customer journeys
Match program to key segments’ unique RFM so there’s something attainable and aspirational for everyone…
Break through the clutter…do a landscape study, sync to what’s unique about your brand position’s in the marketplace and use the loyalty program to personify that brand mission
If I had to name the three keys to success for a CPG engagement based loyalty program…they are:
Frictionless, on-mission experience…loyalty should add to product experience, not detract
First reward upon join and next within 90-days…these can be a simple every day coupon or thanks for being a member and higher value earn reward…creating bonusing against patterns of key behaviors such as making a purchase every week or logging in dashboard weekly should be bonused to incentivize habit
Don’t approach the program one-size fits all…design first around your known key segments…and find ways to identify which segment a new member belongs to early on…appended data, on-boarding surveys, first purchase basket details, etc…as soon as you can identify who a customer is…personalize the experience at all touch points in a scalable way
Example touch points:
When made last purchase
Next opportunity to purchase
Change in preference
Preferred retail brand
Flavor / diet profiles
Social channel engagement
So let’s discuss how some tips more in details and I will share some relevant examples of how brands like you are achieving this today
Collect tons of data on many different levels to learn more about customers
Purchase – on the bag code to receipt scan (ability to capture any channel through trained OCR and any SKU including competitive)
It’s not just about collecting data but it’s about what you do with that data and how you interpret data to know when a consumer reaches an influenceable moment
Not a new concept…but really here the difference is:
Using new data points to understand those influenceable moments or potential inflection points on the customer journey that you see here…being able to predictively encourage migration upward on the loyalty value chain or to predictively know when you reach out to a customer before the exhibit signs of potential attrition
Ultimately every customer is on a personal journey and part of program design (and vendor selection) needs to consider how personal journeys are activated upon within a program. For example, at CrowdTwist we use not only purchase data, but engagement data to create potential customer lifetime value scores earlier on in member’s lifecycle…and on the opporsite end of the journey we can more quickly identify attrition through personal churn scores based on purchase and engagement…while it’s important to have the insight, it’s more important to have the right offers/incentives/messages/content to relevantly speak to these customers at these moments…
This process should also be automated within the platform for scalability…that means little on-going effort send the relevant triggers to communication channels or be able to generate the consumer messages itself during unique consumer journeys
First and foremost, collecting data from all points of purchase…and not just traditional outlets like grocery or mass, but event venues and bars
Building connections in new places (insert coaster image) and giving consumers a touch point beyond the moment of purchase both before and after purchase to extend the brand experience and control the brand message
Pre-purchase behavior includes knowledge of upcoming event attendance (screen shot of sports team rewards + Ticketmaster integration) via surveys, rewards redeemed (like ticketing events) and direct integration w/ticketmaster…enables Budweiser to send targeted content/offers to these consumers before their attendance to encourage consumption in-event
Fan interest via surveys allows marketing personalization at a personal level to encourage Budweiser to be a part of fan/entertainment experience for upcoming in-home and out-of-home experiences
Gamification / connection with consumer after marketing experience such as the World Series / July…it’s a connection that last beyond the campaign end as now consumers see an entirely new world to engaged with their favorite beer brand beyond the aisle
Drizzly (new channel for at-home delivery…similar to peapod/fresh direct)…allows Budweiser to own a new channel first through its best fans
Budweiser is really good at reaching consumers during their influenceable moments – or opportunities where Budweiser might be part of a consideration set for purchase
First and foremost, collecting data from all points of purchase…and not just traditional outlets like grocery or mass, but event venues and bars
Building connections in new places (insert coaster image) and giving consumers a touch point beyond the moment of purchase both before and after purchase to extend the brand experience and control the brand message
Pre-purchase behavior includes knowledge of upcoming event attendance (screen shot of sports team rewards + Ticketmaster integration) via surveys, rewards redeemed (like ticketing events) and direct integration w/ticketmaster…enables Budweiser to send targeted content/offers to these consumers before their attendance to encourage consumption in-event
Fan interest via surveys allows marketing personalization at a personal level to encourage Budweiser to be a part of fan/entertainment experience for upcoming in-home and out-of-home experiences
Gamification / connection with consumer after marketing experience such as the World Series / July…it’s a connection that last beyond the campaign end as now consumers see an entirely new world to engaged with their favorite beer brand beyond the aisle
Drizzly (new channel for at-home delivery…similar to peapod/fresh direct)…allows Budweiser to own a new channel first through its best fans
Budweiser is really good at reaching consumers during their influenceable moments – or opportunities where Budweiser might be part of a consideration set for purchase
First and foremost, collecting data from all points of purchase…and not just traditional outlets like grocery or mass, but event venues and bars
Building connections in new places (insert coaster image) and giving consumers a touch point beyond the moment of purchase both before and after purchase to extend the brand experience and control the brand message
Pre-purchase behavior includes knowledge of upcoming event attendance (screen shot of sports team rewards + Ticketmaster integration) via surveys, rewards redeemed (like ticketing events) and direct integration w/ticketmaster…enables Budweiser to send targeted content/offers to these consumers before their attendance to encourage consumption in-event
Fan interest via surveys allows marketing personalization at a personal level to encourage Budweiser to be a part of fan/entertainment experience for upcoming in-home and out-of-home experiences
Gamification / connection with consumer after marketing experience such as the World Series / July…it’s a connection that last beyond the campaign end as now consumers see an entirely new world to engaged with their favorite beer brand beyond the aisle
Drizzly (new channel for at-home delivery…similar to peapod/fresh direct)…allows Budweiser to own a new channel first through its best fans
Budweiser is really good at reaching consumers during their influenceable moments – or opportunities where Budweiser might be part of a consideration set for purchase
First and foremost, collecting data from all points of purchase…and not just traditional outlets like grocery or mass, but event venues and bars
Building connections in new places (insert coaster image) and giving consumers a touch point beyond the moment of purchase both before and after purchase to extend the brand experience and control the brand message
Pre-purchase behavior includes knowledge of upcoming event attendance (screen shot of sports team rewards + Ticketmaster integration) via surveys, rewards redeemed (like ticketing events) and direct integration w/ticketmaster…enables Budweiser to send targeted content/offers to these consumers before their attendance to encourage consumption in-event
Fan interest via surveys allows marketing personalization at a personal level to encourage Budweiser to be a part of fan/entertainment experience for upcoming in-home and out-of-home experiences
Gamification / connection with consumer after marketing experience such as the World Series / July…it’s a connection that last beyond the campaign end as now consumers see an entirely new world to engaged with their favorite beer brand beyond the aisle
Drizzly (new channel for at-home delivery…similar to peapod/fresh direct)…allows Budweiser to own a new channel first through its best fans
Budweiser is really good at reaching consumers during their influenceable moments – or opportunities where Budweiser might be part of a consideration set for purchase
First and foremost, collecting data from all points of purchase…and not just traditional outlets like grocery or mass, but event venues and bars
Building connections in new places (insert coaster image) and giving consumers a touch point beyond the moment of purchase both before and after purchase to extend the brand experience and control the brand message
Pre-purchase behavior includes knowledge of upcoming event attendance (screen shot of sports team rewards + Ticketmaster integration) via surveys, rewards redeemed (like ticketing events) and direct integration w/ticketmaster…enables Budweiser to send targeted content/offers to these consumers before their attendance to encourage consumption in-event
Fan interest via surveys allows marketing personalization at a personal level to encourage Budweiser to be a part of fan/entertainment experience for upcoming in-home and out-of-home experiences
Gamification / connection with consumer after marketing experience such as the World Series / July…it’s a connection that last beyond the campaign end as now consumers see an entirely new world to engaged with their favorite beer brand beyond the aisle
Drizzly (new channel for at-home delivery…similar to peapod/fresh direct)…allows Budweiser to own a new channel first through its best fans
Budweiser is really good at reaching consumers during their influenceable moments – or opportunities where Budweiser might be part of a consideration set for purchase
Non-purchase behaviors to track:
-Relevant to the brand mission & consumer experience
-Inform consumer journey
-Add new value to the product or consumer brand experience
Tutorials/Tips – on new products to build awareness and increase consideration ---and on the after purchase experience to ensure the product experience was right such as how to apply a new eyeliner
UGC – before/after – tapping into that younger demographic + all about me generation
Refer-a-friend – making it easy for friend in the digital sphere to share their favorite brand or products
Tutorials/Tips – on new products to build awareness and increase consideration ---and on the after purchase experience to ensure the product experience was right such as how to apply a new eyeliner
UGC – before/after – tapping into that younger demographic + all about me generation
Refer-a-friend – making it easy for friend in the digital sphere to share their favorite brand or products
Tutorials/Tips – on new products to build awareness and increase consideration ---and on the after purchase experience to ensure the product experience was right such as how to apply a new eyeliner
UGC – before/after – tapping into that younger demographic + all about me generation
Refer-a-friend – making it easy for friend in the digital sphere to share their favorite brand or products
Purina Cat Chow wants to be there for you across all feline life stages – pre-adoption / new kitten acquisition to a maturing feline…and they execute this in two ways – under a clear brand mission that is personified through hthe program…healthy nourishment, lifestyle and emotional well beingh…
And a unique brand voice quipping on cat lingo
Purina curates an active social community and encourage engagements across channels, particularly social by offerings points for engagement / providing feedback / etc. Members are also point on unique brand journeys depending upon what lifecycle they’re in and this include digesting relevant catipedia articles about how to take care of feline best friends across the pillars
Of course, community giveback and shelter donations (both food and monetary points) is significant in program. Top members can nominate shelters in their local communities and pawsitive stories are championed throughout their network…
Purina Cat Chow wants to be there for you across all feline life stages – pre-adoption / new kitten acquisition to a maturing feline…and they execute this in two ways – under a clear brand mission that is personified through hthe program…healthy nourishment, lifestyle and emotional well beingh…
And a unique brand voice quipping on cat lingo
Purina curates an active social community and encourage engagements across channels, particularly social by offerings points for engagement / providing feedback / etc. Members are also point on unique brand journeys depending upon what lifecycle they’re in and this include digesting relevant catipedia articles about how to take care of feline best friends across the pillars
Of course, community giveback and shelter donations (both food and monetary points) is significant in program. Top members can nominate shelters in their local communities and pawsitive stories are championed throughout their network…
Purina Cat Chow wants to be there for you across all feline life stages – pre-adoption / new kitten acquisition to a maturing feline…and they execute this in two ways – under a clear brand mission that is personified through hthe program…healthy nourishment, lifestyle and emotional well beingh…
And a unique brand voice quipping on cat lingo
Purina curates an active social community and encourage engagements across channels, particularly social by offerings points for engagement / providing feedback / etc. Members are also point on unique brand journeys depending upon what lifecycle they’re in and this include digesting relevant catipedia articles about how to take care of feline best friends across the pillars
Of course, community giveback and shelter donations (both food and monetary points) is significant in program. Top members can nominate shelters in their local communities and pawsitive stories are championed throughout their network…
Purina Cat Chow wants to be there for you across all feline life stages – pre-adoption / new kitten acquisition to a maturing feline…and they execute this in two ways – under a clear brand mission that is personified through hthe program…healthy nourishment, lifestyle and emotional well beingh…
And a unique brand voice quipping on cat lingo
Purina curates an active social community and encourage engagements across channels, particularly social by offerings points for engagement / providing feedback / etc. Members are also point on unique brand journeys depending upon what lifecycle they’re in and this include digesting relevant catipedia articles about how to take care of feline best friends across the pillars
Of course, community giveback and shelter donations (both food and monetary points) is significant in program. Top members can nominate shelters in their local communities and pawsitive stories are championed throughout their network…
Purina Cat Chow wants to be there for you across all feline life stages – pre-adoption / new kitten acquisition to a maturing feline…and they execute this in two ways – under a clear brand mission that is personified through hthe program…healthy nourishment, lifestyle and emotional well beingh…
And a unique brand voice quipping on cat lingo
Purina curates an active social community and encourage engagements across channels, particularly social by offerings points for engagement / providing feedback / etc. Members are also point on unique brand journeys depending upon what lifecycle they’re in and this include digesting relevant catipedia articles about how to take care of feline best friends across the pillars
Of course, community giveback and shelter donations (both food and monetary points) is significant in program. Top members can nominate shelters in their local communities and pawsitive stories are championed throughout their network…
Collect the data and use it in activation channels…at crowdtwist, we don’t horde the data…we share it with our brands’ consumer experience partners and activation channels to create a seamless omnichannel experience…our data is your data…we don’t want to play the role of an another inefficient middle man