Thinking outside the box when it comes to finding and retaining customers

Thursday, 11 August 2011 12:09

If your business is struggling to find and retain customers, you might want to think about employing some rewards initiatives that will help your company in these areas.

To get people interested in your firm and what it offers, it can help to use tried and trusted methods to incentivise consumers to shop with you such as good marketing tactics, but it can also pay dividends to think outside the box and come up with reward schemes.

Setting up a virtual incentive points system can be a great way of luring new consumers to your business and rewarding them regularly, forming part of a scheme that both helps you acquire and retain customers.

Many businesses offer new members a set number of points for their first shop or for taking advantages of specific offers, and this might work well for your business. Other rewards to consider however include gift vouchers, merchandise, cash and travel incentives, so you'll need to give some thought to what will best motivate your target audience when deciding on an appropriate scheme.

Multi-option gift vouchers are another popular way of attracting new customers, giving consumers the freedom to spend the tokens at a variety of stores and therefore catering for a broader spectrum of the public. Vouchers are also a great way to retain shoppers, constituting an easy-to-implement, low-cost scheme.

An added benefit is that firms will often provide you with a discount when you buy gift vouchers over a certain value, so you can make savings while potentially increasing your market and profits.

If you're wondering how to go about setting up a customer acquisition or retention package, you'll find a number of firms that specialise in doing all the hard work for you. Some such companies provide a one-stop-shop, coming up with the ideal schemes for your specific firm and putting them into operation for you.

Once you've decided on the type of incentive or reward scheme that will be most suitable for your target audience, you may well notice a boost in market growth as well as enhanced customer retention as regular rewards can help consumers to feel valued.

Why not take a look at the acquisition and retention schemes available for your firm and start boosting business today?

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