How brands build loyalty

There is no shortage of options for your customers and clients. Online shopping, digital delivery and global shipping mean your business isn't just competing with the other shops in your town.

Your business is competing worldwide with companies in jurisdictions that may take labour laws or production standards less seriously or sell astronomical volumes of merchandise, allowing success with minimal profit margins.

These factors mean many businesses can’t compete on price and building brand loyalty becomes paramount to your company's success.

Building #brandloyalty requires attention and communication with your past, present and future clients to create an emotional bond between them and your products and services.

"I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel." - Maya Angelou.

Positive #customerengagement is the first step to building brand loyalty. Open lines of communication so that your team can quickly resolve an issue with your products or services when your customer has a problem.

Maintaining open lines of communication lets your clients know you're listening. It comes from an easy-to-find email address, a prominent helpdesk phone number and an active social media presence.

Past, present, and future clients want to know you're listening. By demonstrating your attention to them, they are more likely to return the courtesy by listening to your brand when it has new products or special offers or you want to send them a note on their birthday.

Understand your customers, and learn what they enjoy, notably how they use your products and why it makes their lives easier. Take note if you provide a complicated feature or service or offer less "joy" to your clients. Then your business can decide whether to provide more assistance or drop the complication altogether.

Be consistent in who you are and the value you offer. As we've written before, when creating a brand personality, your clients want to feel you are like them and they are like you.

Value can be price-related, but it's more than that. McDonald's offers inexpensive meals of consistent quality worldwide.

People buying from the dollar menu know what they're getting. The combination of pickles, chopped onions, ketchup, mustard, and American cheese likely triggers feelings of familiarity.

There's no mistaking a McDonald's dollar menu burger for the $17 single Au Chaval in Chicago. Still, people line up to buy the more expensive Au Cheval single to enjoy its premium blends of beef cooked to perfection with quality toppings served in a traditional diner setting.

Whether people are paying $1 or $17, both burgers are equally valuable to the person buying them at the time.

If you need to feed your child's soccer team or when you want to indulge in a sloppy indulgence, both brands know their role in making your life easier and stirring up positive emotions.

When your brand is inconsistent, like an unreliable friend or an ill-prepared burger, your customers won't know what they're getting from you in each interaction. That inconsistency hurts their familiarity and pushes them to reconsider their choices the next time they're making a buying decision.

When building brand loyalty, the best abilities are availability and reliability.

Merchant North's brand management specialists have a demonstrated track record of reliability in delivering brand experiences for our clients that elicit positive feelings and increased engagement to build brand loyalty.

Make the call. We're available to help you grow your business by creating experiences and solutions that attract attention, generate meaningful conversations and gain fans.

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