Can You Afford to Lose 17% of Your Client Base?

What are community rewards and how can they enhance your business? How can you measure ROI with community rewards?

Community giving has long been viewed as something that bleeds money for businesses and provides minimal return. While this may be the case, it’s no longer true with the right approach. We know it is more profitable to retain a current customer than acquire a new one, and a strategic community giving program is a proven retention builder.

Community Rewards 101:

In the grocery space, community giving started as a program where grocers would sell paper gift certificates to schools at a discount, which the schools would then resell at face value in the spirit of fundraising. This approach to business was somewhat effective in incorporating and generating sales in the spirit of charity; however, it resulted in administrative and financial issues for both the grocers and the school. Today, a new concept called Givex Community Rewards still provides grocers and customers the opportunity to give back to schools and non-profits in their local community but enables grocers to measure the results on a customer-specific basis.

Grocers who participate in Community Rewards can allocate their existing community giving to the charities that their shoppers designate when they enroll in the program. Similar to loyalty rewards programs that allow customers to earn points every time they shop, Community Rewards enable its customers to automatically earn money for the charity of their choice by shopping at participating locations. With the right technology partner, when grocers use community rewards to give back to their community, they have the added component of customer specific, personalized, and measurable sales. Grocers can see the direct correlation between their community rewards investments, and the customer gets to support an organization that is meaningful to them.

How can you measure Community Rewards?

Beyond the goodwill and local giving component, grocers that have a Community Rewards program also enjoy more loyal customers. When comparing customer retention year over year for community rewards program members vs. non-members, one major U.S retailer found that they were losing 26% of non-community rewards members, but only 9.1% of community rewards customers – resulting in a 17.3% difference in improvement of customer retention. This not only means that customers respond to and engage with the program, but that their loyalty to that grocer improves.

When grocers donate to charitable organizations it shows good-will in the community, and with a community rewards program grocers can quantify that donation and the resulting sales. If a customer identifies themselves within a community rewards program, the grocer will know exactly when they shopped and how much additional revenue was generated because of that sale. This type of data is invaluable to a business, especially when selected charities can encourage customers to shop at a particular grocer, furthering the ROI that comes from these programs.

Looking to improve customer retention? Wanting to give back to the community in a profitable way? A community rewards program is an impactful tool for grocers. Now, with Givex Community Rewards, grocers can reap the benefits of a global organization that is omni-channel, end-to-end integrated, and can serve multi-unit, national grocers alongside some of their biggest clients including Wendy’s, A&W, 7-Eleven, MLB, MGM Resorts and Best Western.

Visit the Givex website here to learn more about how community rewards and loyalty programs can boost sales and customer retention.

Can you afford to lose 17% of your client base?

As Givex’s Vice President of Community Rewards, Andy Ruff has successfully implemented retailer specific cause marketing and community give-back programs. With Givex’s Community Rewards platform, Ruff’s team has generated more than $450 million given back to schools, churches, pet adoptions and other charities over the last 15 years. He has a passion for and keen understanding of how customer information, especially in cause marketing, impacts an organization’s marketing and brand identity and has worked with dozens of grocery retailers of all sizes in successfully implementing these strategies.