Loyalty & Marketing

“Loyalty is not about a customer being loyal to you. It’s about you being loyal to the customer.”

John Bartold delivered this quote at a retail conference two yearsago. In our opinion, Mr. Bartold, contributing editor to Colloquoy, amagazine and web site devoted to loyalty, is a person well worthconsidering.

In the past six months, we have seen several companies strugglingwith loyalty program issues – how to frame them and how to improve them.

The key point is for a company to be loyal to their customers, toknow the customers as individuals and to serve up just what thecustomer wants.

My favorite local restaurant is Harry’s Country Club, and they know how to create loyalty.

The servers know my name. They knowwhat I like. And Ashley, one of my favorite servers, will steer me awayfrom daily specials that she doesn't think I will like.

But, you can argue, that it’s a small business and they can manage onthis scale. You can argue that huge businesses cannot manage the same intimaterelationship with millions of customers.

I disagree that size is the barrier.

Amazon.com knows every product that I have ever purchased and theyconstantly provide me with pre-release offers on books by authors Ilike.

Amazon and Harry’s do exactly the same thing. They both know me.And, they both are loyal to me by steering me to the products I’lllikely choose.