

Ask HN: Rewarding Loyalty - jdr5

Rewarding loyalty<p>Every morning I get a coffee on the way to work. I pass up to 6 coffee shops before I get to my regular barista<p>Event though I have tried other places I go to the same shop everyday<p>Today I was wondering why, the obvious is the coffee is consistently good and the staff always friendly<p>I also believe one of the big reasons is their loyalty program, nothing special, just a simple card they stamp every time I get a coffee. Once I purchase 7 coffees they give me a free one<p>I was thinking how the concept of rewarding loyalty can be used by websites to drive revenue and reward visitors<p>Because at the end of the day the aim of any commercial website should be to convert a visitor into a customer<p>Here are some ideas I was throwing around<p>- Send this link to X friends and receive Y
- Purchase X and we will give you Y<p>What are some of your ideas for rewarding loyalty?
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fogus
I think for simplicity's sake, the badge mechanism used by StackOverflow is a
nice system. That is, it plays to people's desire to be recognized by
attaching flare to their account after achieving certain predetermined goals.
Not only does it reward the recipient by providing some good feeling, but it
encourages further participation.

-m

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ScottWhigham
I think this is something we all need help with. I've done various promos -
"We'll give you $x for each friend you refer" as well as "Get a free widget
when you refer a friend!" These all had low, low response rates - so low, in
fact, that it didn't justify the time spent coding/marketing.

I wish I knew the answer.

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Raphael
Reduced ads for registered users.

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pasbesoin
I think the premise is a bit wrong. You build loyalty; rewarding it is a
byproduct of building it.

Back in the early days of Starbucks in Chicago, regulars were recognized by
the staff. There'd be some chitchat. Apparently, cost accounting was not yet
so anal retentive, and a staff member would occasionally comp you your drink
or something else. If there was a dispute, "the customer is always right".

Regulars really seemed to respond to that. Starbucks was not just about the
coffee (or the mocha and sugar). It was a daily social experience.

You might call the comping rewarding loyalty. I'd call the social interaction
and comping _building_ loyalty. It made Starbucks a place customers wanted to
be. Not just for the coffee; for the larger experience.

In a technical world, I think building loyalty has to do with offering a
quality product and making product and knowledge acquisition as easy and
streamlined as possible. For the social component, an active and informative
community is hard to beat. Such communities need leaders. You can offer the
leadership -- Look and PG and the moderators' effect here. Hopefully a
community with coalesce.

As for product and information, there has been a lot of discussion here.
Minimize sign up hassles and make sign up a late-binding feature in your
flows. Use a site design that organizes, is easy to read/view, and otherwise
gets out of the way.

Don't make your clients/customers jump through hoops. Don't make me solicit a
friend in order to get a benefit. If I truly value your site, I'm going to
tell my friend about it, regardless. What are you offering? Do that as well as
possible. I'll keep coming back. And make sure you understand what you are
offering. E.g. Are you just selling coffee? Or are you giving your customers a
daily social routine?

Another example: Amazon, NewEgg, and some of the other, better online
retailers. Is it just the product, price, shipping? Or is it also all the peer
reviews and tips? Also, for me Amazon means worrying less about my credit card
information. Their inclusion of third party sellers works well for me in this
regard, in that I can order while having trust in the payment system.

In this case, I'd argue they are selling security (and convenience in
ordering) as much as the product itself.

Free shipping is a nice perk (and I know shipping is just merged into the
price, anyway). But it's the previous things that keep my coming back to
Amazon.

It's not about rewards; it's about the original product. Really understanding
what that is, and delivering it as well as possible.

