Here's How You Can Drive New Enrollments In Your Loyalty Program

The barrage of online content and advertising can make it difficult to attract and hold customer attention. Brands who are looking to start a loyalty program or increase memberships for their existing program have to contend with dozens of other companies and competitors looking to do the exact same thing. With the average customer already belonging to multiple loyalty programs at once, their attention and energy is limited. But having a valuable incentive offering for initial enrollment in your loyalty program can go a long way towards capturing customer interest.

One of the most effective methods of getting customer attention in your loyalty program is through prize promotions such as sweepstakes or contests. The chance to win a free prize, especially one with a high value, is a great motivator for customer participation in any type of campaign. Even if you already offer some type of perk for new sign-ups, like a one-time 30% discount code or instant free shipping, a sweepstakes prize can help motivate customers who need a little extra incentive to enroll. The key is to be strategic about the type of promotion you’re running and the steps you want customers to take. 

You can increase your success rate by following these tips for using sweepstakes or contests to generate new member enrollments in loyalty programs: 

1. Make Prize(s) High Value
2. Offer Multiple Chances to Enter Or Win
3. Include The Promotion In Brand Marketing and Advertising

Offer A High Value Prize

If you want customers to enroll in your loyalty program via your sweepstakes promotion, the prize or prizes they could earn need to be high-value. Using sweepstakes for enrollment campaigns is different from using sign-up discounts or receiving cash back on a purchase. Those types of incentives provide instant gratification for the customer when they enroll in the program; sweepstakes on the other hand require entrants to complete enrollment and then wait to find out if they’ve won. To make the enrollment effort and wait worthwhile in the customer’s mind the potential prize should be of significant value. You’ll see more customer interest and higher enrollment numbers if your sweepstakes prize is a $500 gift card versus a $5 gift card. Remember your first goal is to capture customer attention in your loyalty program - once that goal is completed your focus will switch to engaging and retaining program members.

Offer Multiple Chances to Enter Or Win

If you want to increase the appeal of your enrollment sweepstakes campaign even more, offer customers the chance to receive multiple entries for certain actions either during or after the enrollment process. For example, you could run a weekly sweepstakes that’s open to current program members and new enrollees. Each week members have to take a specific action or complete a challenge for a chance to win the weekly grand prize. Studies have shown that the better we think our chances are to win a prize, the more likely we are to make an attempt to do so. Increasing your customers’ chances of winning by either offering multiple prizes or giving them more entry opportunities will help drive customer enrollments in your program. 

Include The Promotion In Brand Marketing and Advertising

If you run any type of enrollment promotion, such as an instant win or sweepstakes, you should make sure the promotion and details are included in your brand’s advertising and marketing efforts. You can advertise your sweepstakes on your brand’s social media pages, display promotional banners on your website, and even include sweepstakes details on your product labels and packaging in-store. Existing customers who haven’t enrolled in your loyalty program are perfect targets for this type of enrollment campaign. You can include promotion details within email marketing and transactional communications such as order confirmations, shipping notices, and product review requests. Promoting the sweepstakes at multiple touchpoints helps to build interest and drive participation numbers up.  

While there are numerous benefits to using sweepstakes or contests to drive enrollments in your loyalty program, these types of promotions do have their own challenges. There are promotional laws and best practices brands need to follow when creating and executing certain types of promotions. Then after the promotion ends, new members need to continue finding value in participating and engaging in your program. But when it comes to generating buzz and driving new member enrollments, using promotions such as sweepstakes and contests are powerful and effective method.

If you're interested in adding a promotions engine to your loyalty program or learning more about how Brandmovers can help increase enrollments in your loyalty program enrollments using promotions, contact us today!