Loyalty - swear you will be faithful. Print21 article by Andy McCourt

Loyalty is an old-fashioned concept but it’s modern version can be found in the proliferation of programs that collect air miles and bonus points. These are proven ways to inspire customer loyalty so if you want to do the same with your customers, perhaps it’s time you showed them how it’s done with print.
“There’s just no loyalty anymore.” How many times do you hear this from print service providers, bemoaning the flighty nature of print buyers? You go the extra mile for them on a tricky job and next thing you know, they’ve sent a bigger job to a cheap-and-cheerful unknown printer who, more than likely, will get something wrong and you’ll end up fixing the mess. And then the same cycle starts again.
How wonderful it would be if all customers were like Lucie in Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities: “She was truest to them in the season of trial, as all the quietly loyal and good will always be.” There is a strained sort of printing connection here, because most of those to whom Lucie was so loyal were under threat of losing their heads to the guillotine. Not a Polar, Wohlenberg or Ideal though but the dreaded Madame Guillotine under which ‘La Republique’ offered a fourth alternative to Liberty, Equality and Fraternity- death.
“Look Squire, we’re about to chop your head off but me and the citizens want you to know it’s all in a good cause, namely freedom, egalitarianism and brotherhood.”
“But I agree…I am your brother now! I support freedom; I am on your side!”
“Pierre, this one says he’s on our…” Thunnnk! “Oh dear, too late….NEXT!”
Yes, loyalty can be a fickle handmaiden.

Life after Joe
But what is loyalty? And why does any business deserve the loyalty of customers? Too often, print service providers overlook the grass-roots dynamics of customer loyalty, expecting loyalty to continue because you once stayed back until 6pm to finish a job, put it in the boot of your car, and delivered it personally at 7pm. Then good ol’ Joe, for whom you bought a bottle of Scotch each Christmas, retires and a 20-something lady takes over the print buying.
“Hello, this is Crystal, the new marketing communications manager at Acme Limited.”
“Hello Crystal, nice to talk with you. Do you like Scotch?”
“Well, no actually but could you prepare a justification document for me, outlining your company’s value proposition and why we should continue using your services in an increasingly competitive business environment?”
“But we’ve been doing your printing for 20 years and have always looked after Acme when Joe was there.”
“Well I realise that but we do need to look at all options going forward, Six Sigma and all that.”
“Sick what?”
“Sigma, it’s a business analytical program they teach at Uni – it makes for better business relationships.”
“Don’t worry love, we’ll always look after Acme, you can depend on that, just send us the PDF files and we’ll do the rest.”
“Well maybe, after we receive your value proposition document…” and so on.

The laws of loyalty
There are at least four immutable laws of loyalty. Incidentally, the Old French origin of the word loyalty relates to the Law.
1. Loyalty must be earned, repeatedly.
2. Loyalty is a person-to-person thing.
3. Loyalty is a two-way street.
4. Loyalty is based on obligations, commitments and reward.
The third point is the least understood by most printers. They view loyalty as a chivalrous quality based on an unspoken decency of ‘doing the right thing’. The ‘extra mile’ is often traversed but often the customer does not recognise this as an obligation to continue to patronise a particular company. As the dolphins say in Douglas Adams’ fourth book in his famous Hitchhiker’s series: “So long – and thanks for all the fish.”
Loyalty print marketing is gaining pace all over the world. It is both a service that successful printers can offer their clients, and a tool that can help them retain those same clients. Its relevance will increase in tandem with environmental pressures and privacy legislation. Every business dealing with a printer should have a loyalty program, and this involves the printing of loyalty cards, personalised direct mail shots with variable targeted content, reward programs and special, exclusive offers.
In its simplest form, it can be a card issued by a coffee shop where every time you buy a coffee you get a star punched in the card. Buy six coffees and the seventh one is free. Similar themes are used with hairdressers, dry cleaners and fast food outlets. Why? Because they increase sales. The effect of the discount given in return for repeat business is more than offset by the higher sales volume and patronage. There is an obligation to return.
The more involved loyalty programs offer points and targeted offers based on ‘opt-in’ customer data – thus overcoming privacy concerns and also the negative image of ‘junk mail.’ The mailshots are welcomed by the rewarded ‘loyal’ customer and response rates leap from DM’s traditional 2 or 3 per cent to double-digits and, in some cases, over 50 per cent.
Are you actively offering to develop loyalty programs for your clients, big and small? Are you using the power of loyalty marketing to attract and keep print buying customers?
If not, it’s time you got in for your chop, if you’ll pardon the pun.