Does Customer Engagement need a Boost of Joy?

Only a fraction of loyalty and customer engagement programs appear to prioritise investing in experiences that truly delight their customers. This may help explain why upwards of 50% of loyalty program members are disengaged with the programs they've signed up for. Does customer engagement need a boost of... joy? 

I opened my email inbox today, and had literally 10 emails from brands telling me they had an amazing deal for me. Sound familiar? 

Let's face it—many customer engagement and loyalty programs are really glorified sales campaigns. They are really about sending messages (emails, text messages and push notifications) to different customer segments with specific offers to drive a commercial outcome.

The reality is, these tactics may work in the short-term, but are getting harder and harder to pull off effectively due to increasing privacy regulation, saturation and channel fatigue. 

It's little wonder that McKinsey found that, even though the average American belongs to 10+ loyalty programs, upwards of 50% of program members are inactive and not engaging with their communications or offers. 

After all, what's the point of having members in a loyalty program if they're not actively engaging with your brand?

So we find ourselves in a saturated loyalty program landscape with low engagement… 

The solution? Tools and tactics that drive engagement, of course! 

All of that said, there are some brands absolutely killing it in the space.

Hungry Jacks “Shake & Win”

Hungry Jacks have been running their “Shake & Win” promotion for years, and we think it's a textbook example of how gamification can be used to make traditional “offers” more exciting, engaging and memorable. 

Members download an app, and get two shakes a day, so if they don't like their first prize, they can shake again. Once they shake, they are presented with an offer or prize, which they can head in-store to redeem. 

What's clever about Shake & Win is that despite its remarkably simple mechanic, it reduces the need for Hungry Jacks to spam its customers with offers, instead encouraging customers to “chase” offers themselves.

Up Bank's “Perk Up” 

Another great example of adding engagement, “surprise & delight”, and frankly, a bit of fun to customer engagement programs is Up Bank's “Perk Up” campaign. It works like this…

If you're a customer at the bank, each morning between 7 am and 11 am, if you buy your morning coffee with your Up card, you go into the running to have your coffee shouted by your bank. A few lucky members every day will go in, order their coffee, swipe their card, and a moment later, receive a notification saying the charge has been refunded and the coffee is on Up.

This tiny gesture creates so much joy and delight, and if you search for #perkup on social media, you'll see it creates plenty of UGC and organic testimonials too. They call it “random acts of free coffee”.

A genius engagement tactic, perfectly executed.

Mecca “Beauty Loop”

Mecca's Beauty Loop program routinely wins awards for the most loved and popular loyalty program in Australia. And we think it's easy to see why— it's a loyalty program that keeps it fun, engaging and exciting. They, too move beyond offers and messages and invest in experiences that surprise and delight their customers. 

From unannounced gifts to birthday shoutouts—Mecca "walks the extra mile" to deliver value. They have a few clever little loyalty mechanics which seem simple, but do more than your garden variety loyalty program. The most interesting example, in my view, is, say, if you've got a big wedding coming up, Beauty Loop members can head in-store and get their makeup done, by a professional, for free.

This a great example of adding more than just deals to a program and focusing on customer joy.

Foxtel “Feast with Foxtel”

One of the best activations we've seen amongst our own customers on our own platform was Foxtel's “Feast with Foxtel” campaign they ran in conjunction with the launch of the House of the Dragon series last year. 

The campaign was remarkably simple yet extremely successful. Foxtel members could enter an instant win competition using Komo's “Scratch & Win” product to go into the running to win a free pizza every week, to be eaten of course, in front of the telly watching the latest episode of House of the Dragon. 

Why is this activation so clever? Well, it encourages Foxtel members to engage with the brand using their Foxtel member number, it touches on their passion points (the show), and it gives Foxtel a chance to amplify and leverage its partnership with Crust, who were dishing out the pizzas. 

Foxtel’s Director of Customer Marketing and Loyalty, Lisa Cronin, said “As an entertainment company, Foxtel needed a platform that rang true to its offering and engaged customers through a range of fun and diverse content. This meant stepping away from the repetitive 25 words or less campaigns, which were triggering user fatigue, and moving into the exciting realm of gamified engagement tools on a dedicated, noise-free platform.”

Adam Posner, a customer loyalty specialist and author of the annual customer loyalty and loyalty program research ‘For Love or Money™’ comments, 

“Brands need to lift their customer engagement and loyalty programs out of the sea of sameness from the bland and boring, discount, points, perks and birthdays.  While transactional offers are a base ingredient, they need to be augmented by more emotional connections and experiences or what I call Joyalty* moments. These are one or a series of Moments of Magic giving your customers a feeling of maximum joy and delight”

Here's the thing. Spamming your customers with offers may work in the short term, but it won’t build long-lasting loyalty and customer advocacy. Investing extra time and resources into building compelling and memorable experiences will always pay off in the long term. 

The big opportunity we see here is for brands to “move beyond messages” and instead create compelling experiences that make members feel valued and get value out of a program.

At Komo, we are building the Complete Customer Engagement Platform, a self-service solution that helps brands and marketing teams spin up these types of engaging promotions and campaigns in days, not months. 

We are already powering customer engagement for brands like Foxtel, Woolworths and Maccas.

If you're interested in learning more about our all-in-one intuitive marketing platform, request a product demo using the button below. We'll personally introduce you to Komo and show you the future of customer engagement!