Reasons why restaurants and cafés are inclining towards loyalty programmes

Last year, Akshita began her food-and-coffee café in a posh area of the metro city. Initially, she incurred substantial advertising expenses in print and digital space to create brand awareness, due to which sales surged within a few months. 

However, as the competition rose and other cafés entered the market, she started losing the customers. The retention rate became almost nil and the sales dropped drastically. 

Cash was bleeding out of the company, due to which high spending on advertising was also impossible. 

At last, she decided to put her money to implement a robust loyalty programme for the customers. 

Her team sent messages to the existing customers and offered them rewards, discounts and special offers. 

Akshita and her team started wishing customers on their birthdays and anniversaries and encouraged them to throw a party in the café at discounted prices. 

This strategy reinforced the attention of the customers in Akshita’s café, and they started coming back. The customer retention ratio scaled up, and the sales and revenue multiplied in numbers. 

Like Akshita, most brands are today turning towards innovative brand loyalty programmes to engage the customers and increase their spending power. 

Almost 65% of Gen Z and 71% of Millennials are highly influenced by loyalty programmes. 

Isn’t it a fascinating fact?

When implemented rightly, a loyalty programme is one of the most proven ways for a restaurant to host the satisfied, happy customers regularly and increase revenue and sales. 

Starbucks offers makes you feel special by offering a tall drink of your choice in your birthday month. Read other interesting rewards in My Starbucks Rewards. 

For regions like Europe, America and Australia, Uber has introduced Uber Awards through which you can earn Uber Cash and earn other benefits. 

Sure, every restaurant strives to prepare the best quality food at a market matchable price to maximise customer satisfaction. However, despite the best efforts, customers don’t turn up again sometimes, especially with the magnitude of competition present today. 

In order to retain the customers and enable them to return to your restaurant regularly, a loyalty programme could come to your rescue. It not only retains new customers but even plays a crucial role in expanding the customer base, thanks to out-of-mouth promotion done by existing customers. 

Today, we are going to tell you 4 reasons why loyalty programme is a must for your restaurant or café - 

1. Loyalty Programme guarantees a better return in lower cost 

As compared to other marketing strategies which are expensive and time-consuming, loyalty programmes are cost-effective and fairly responsive.

Their maintenance cost is also low, due to which even startups and small business can easily take their benefit to grow the business. 

2. Customer loyalty multiplies because of recognition and gratification

Through loyalty programmes, restaurants can wish customers on birthdays and anniversaries. Also, they can encourage the customers to celebrate the event at their restaurants by offering discounted prices, gift hampers or special privileges. 

A recognition on birthdays and other events connect a customer with a restaurant on a personal level and thus results in an increment in sales and revenue. 

3. Special treatment with customers increases the brand affinity

Some restaurants offer members-exclusive loyalty programmes, where the member customers are offered distinct discount coupons, rewards and promotions as compared to non-member customers. 

By doing so, the member customers feel exclusive and happy about being a part of a special club, and visit the same restaurant regularly, which increases the sales even more. 

4. Personalise the messages to be communicated to your clients for more relevancy

Sending pizza discount coupons to a 70-years old person living in the desert area of Rajasthan won’t be as effective as it could be if the coupon was sent to 23-year old graduate living in a metro city. 

That’s where a loyalty programme helps restaurants – it empowers them to filter the customer data based on various factors, and customise the message to the targeted audience. 

Some restaurants which use Loyalty Programme Mobile app can even use Mobile’s location data to show nearby offers and schemes, which impacts a customer’s decision even more firmly. 

Bottomline

A good loyalty programme ensures and safeguards the customers’ interest and doesn’t bombard them with frequent company news or promotional messages. 

Customers can choose the frequency and type of messages they wish to receive, which gives them a sense of relief and security. 

Also, as technology is upgrading, so are the loyalty programmes. Instead of traditional mobile punch or stamp punch options, companies are enabling customers to use their phone numbers as loyalty card, so as to make the entire experience smooth, hassle-free. 

Are you using a loyalty programme for your restaurants to build relationships with customers? If not, what’s stopping you from doing it?

Xeno is helping a number of restaurants & cafe in running successful loyalty programmes. Interested? Ask for Demo & we’ll be happy to assist you.