The world of Fast-Moving Consumer Goods is fiercely competitive, and brand loyalty is eroding fast, especially with the rise of the “Zero Consumer” who prioritizes price and convenience over brand allegiance.
In this environment, repeat sales are the new standard of success.
(Image by Steve Buissinne from Pixabay)
Here’s the truth: loyal customers are more valuable than ever.
That’s why loyalty programs are key to driving higher customer lifetime value and providing a predictable revenue stream.
After all, research shows that when a company achieves a 7% increase in brand loyalty, the customer lifetime value of each customer can rise by 85%.
Alexa Jachowski, CRM Senior Director at FreshDirect said, “Companies will have to offer higher rewards offerings, a more frequent catalog refresh, and greater incentives to join a program to keep customers loyal to a brand. Personalization is going to be key, as customers want to feel like brands know them and are giving them what they want.”
But how do you build brand loyalty and encourage repeat purchases in a world of endless options?
The answer lies in the strategic marriage of customer data and gamification.
Start Capturing First Party Customer Data
Unlocking the secrets of your consumers lies in first party data, e.g., contact details and purchase data. This helps your brand personalize emails and messaging across different channels to encourage customer loyalty.
Other valuable information is also revealed such as:
- Preferred brands and product categories: Do they gravitate towards organic options or national brands? Understanding these preferences allows for targeted gamification experiences.
- Purchase triggers and motivations: What drives their purchases? Are they seeking convenience, promotions, or specific ingredients? Aligning gamification with their motivations can fuel engagement.
- Purchase frequency and basket size: How often do they buy? How much do they spend per visit? These data points help you design challenges and rewards that resonate with their buying habits.
A study confirms that purchase frequency directly and positively influences the formation of brand loyalty. This is particularly important in the FMCG space where items are replenishable, and customers typically follow a fixed purchase frequency. For example, customers may buy a vitamin supplement (e.g., Vitamin C + Zinc) to last them for a month.
This means that towards the end of the month, a vitamin producer should be checking in on their customer database to remind them to replenish their stock of vitamins.
You can personalize the message further by looking to cross-sell related wellness products based on purchase data. For example, Folic acid is geared primarily to women so this should be among the recommended purchase alongside the restock of vitamins if the customer is a woman.
But to maximize this opportunity, you can also recommend vitamins and supplements for her whole family. For example, multivitamins for her children and B-complex supplements for her spouse. This increases her basket size tremendously and if you add in a discount for a bigger spend, this will be an easy decision for her.
But how do you collect this data in the first place? Here are some methods commonly used in the FMCG industry:
- Loyalty programs: Classic loyalty programs especially in the vitamins and wellness niche incentivize repeat purchases with points and rewards. The amount of customer data collected here, whether through a physical loyalty card or through the online member store, is tremendous because vitamins and supplements are bought at least monthly. You’ll be able to spot trends, interesting combinations of vitamins and supplements bought together, preferred brands, and how your loyal customers use their accumulated points or discount coupons.
- Receipt capture tools: Use tools that process receipts like SKALE’s Smart Receipts to collect purchase data even for offline purchases. Shoppers simply need to take a clear photo of their receipt, and then upload it through a web app, a chatbot, or an app.
- Chatbots: Advanced chatbots work round the clock to help you collect first-party data. These chatbots are often integrated into games along with a receipt scanning platform to streamline data collection and ensure a fantastic shopper experience.
Through a QR campaign or Meta Ads campaign, shoppers can be directed to a chatbot where they register their details and then upload their receipt for spend verification. They input their details and then upload their receipt for spend verification. If you’re keen to do some market research, you can also run a few market research questions first after they input their contact details.
For example, in the vitamins and supplements space, Mintel research shows that US millennials are keen on focusing on vitamins and minerals they are lacking in rather than buying one-size-fits-all multivitamins. These are the kind of first-hand data you can collect using chatbots which can help you give personalized offers to your customers.
These tools, combined with data analysis, paint a detailed picture of your customer base, allowing you to design personalized experiences that foster retention and higher customer satisfaction.
Standing Out: How Gamification Creates Loyal Customers
Gamification is the art of applying game mechanics like points, badges, and leaderboards to non-game contexts.
In the FMCG world, it can be a powerful tool for boosting repeat sales.
Gamification is often integrated in effective promotional strategies like Spend & Win campaigns, and studies show that promotion has positive impact on trust, and that frequent use of promotional tools increase brand trust.
Adding gamification elements is a proven method made by global brands across industries to boost sales.
According to Steve Bocska, CEO of Pug Interactive, “Gamification is an engine that stimulates engagement in the most meaningful and relevant way possible.”
Here’s how:
- Points for repeated purchases or completing tasks: Award points for buying specific products, referring friends, or completing surveys. These points can then be redeemed in exchange for rewards. Repeat sales happen because of positive repeated interaction with the brand.
A Harvard Business Review study found that reducing customer effort is the number one factor in creating customer loyalty. This means that your loyalty program should be easy for them to join, to use, and to get their rewards.
- Tiered gamification: Just like Body Health’s Loyalty Program, they have a tiered system wherein the higher the tier the person gets, the easier it is to achieve rewards. For example, the elite tier gives you 15 points per $1 compared to the starting Family tier where you only get 5 points per $1.
(Screenshot from bodyhealth.com)
This tier-based system motivates customers in the lower tiers to try to reach the next level of spending.
- Pair monthly subscriptions with your loyalty program. A monthly subscription, e.g., vitamins and supplements should be integrated and rewarded by your loyalty program. This is a fantastic way to increase average order value and incentivizes your customers to build up reward points for a repeat purchase on your other products.
Combining Data and Gamification for Maximum Impact
On its own, gamification is gimmicky.
But when combined with customer data, magic happens.
Here’s how: Personalized Gamification Experiences
Tier-based Reward Programs
Offer exclusive rewards such as more points, higher discounts, and the opportunity to create their own discounted bundle of vitamins and supplements, based on customer loyalty tiers, so that your most engaged shoppers feel that VIP status.
For example, those who have reached a certain target for total spending can get promoted to the next tier and be rewarded with bigger points and discounts. Those in the highest tier (upon reaching a certain total expenditure) will get the most points and the best rewards for their continued loyalty.
Points-based Loyalty Systems
Reach past purchasers and set up a points-based mini game that awards them for buying their favorite product.
Points-based loyalty systems are extremely popular so why not let your shoppers accumulate points based on the amount of money spent on your various multivitamins and supplements using an effective game like Tap and Win.
Exclusive Mini Games
A good strategy to use is to identify your top shopper segments for specific SKUs. After which, you launch a Spin & Win game that lets them win vouchers for those SKUs.
For example, you might discover that your top shopper segment for your Vitamin C + Zinc vitamin are the active lifestyle mothers. With this information, you run a Spin & Win game that targets them with exclusive discounts and prizes for their continued patronage.
Gamified Bundle Promotions
Another effective strategy is to create bundle promotions based on top combinations from your shoppers’ purchase data.
For example, you can bundle a family pack that has vitamins for the whole family, including the children. This targets families with children, and you can reward them with a prize, for example, a discount code for their next bundle purchases next month through a digital scratch card.
Real World Examples:
- A leading FMCG brand in oral care wanted to capture deeper shopper insights on brand preferences and oral care concerns. Using SKALE’s customized chatbot and Digital Scratch Card, they were able to capture real-time data 24/7 and influence increased basket size significantly with irresistible incentives in exchange for data.
- A regional FMCG powerhouse wanted to implement a data-driven loyalty program. Leveraging SKALE’s Digital Stamp Card and Smart Receipts technology, they worked with their partner restaurants to offer exciting rewards tied to the repeat consumption of cream-based dishes. This led to repeat sales and the capture of valuable first-party customer data will help improve their marketing strategies.
(Photo by Dollar Gill on Unsplash)
Ready to watch your repeat sales soar?
Time to consider implementing data-driven gamification strategies.
