The competitive nature of the fuel market has seen a radical shift over the last decade. What was once a simple transaction at a fuel station has now become something close to a ‘retail experience’. That is why fuel businesses are trying to win customer loyalty by offering better fuel products, personalised offers, discounts, additional services, cashback, etc.
Furthermore, emerging technologies are vital in encouraging consumer visits and providing easy, targeted, and connected experiences that can reinvent fuel delivery businesses. That is why fuel retailers are looking for robust technologies to keep the customer engaged and loyal. And they have got the answer in the form of an on-demand business model.
So if you are a fuel retailer looking to grow your fuel delivery business, then you should integrate customer loyalty methods into the on-demand delivery solution for fuel delivery. To build an on-demand fuel delivery solution, you can get a software development company or you can outsource on-demand delivery app development to remote developers.
In this blog, we will show you why customer loyalty is important for you. And also show you the best methods of customer loyalty.
Why is customer loyalty important for the fuel delivery business?
Customer loyalty is a consumer’s willingness to repeatedly purchase a product from the same company with which they had an outstanding experience. It can also extend to occasional repeat customers – for example, a customer who always visits a particular fuel station when his car goes out of fuel.
As per a report by Bond, approximately 77% customers are likely to stay with the company who have a good customer loyalty program. Customer loyalty is important for the growth of any business and the fuel delivery business is not an exception.
Here are some more reasons why customer loyalty is important for the fuel delivery business:
Repeat purchases
Sometimes loyal customers purchase more things than needed if the admin has implemented the customer loyalty programs. For instance, a customer buys fuel at a certain period and receives some discount or cashback from the retailer. Thus, the customer would likely to return to that fuel retailer. Moreover, he will also purchase or avail of additional products or services from the same retailer.
Also, repeat purchases get you to know your customers well on a first-name basis and learn more about them. Thus, a loyal customer-business relationship will get created and that is why customer loyalty matters.
Better customer retention
It doesn’t matter if you are a big fuel delivery business or a budding fuel startup, customer retention should be your top-most priority. This can be only achieved when a business focuses on building customer loyalty.
The major benefit of customer loyalty is that the more rewards your customer will get, the more he feels valued. For this, you need to use effective customer strategies such as feedback, targeted offers, auto-generated emails, personalised follow-up, faster query resolution, etc.
Increased profits
Returning customers spend more money on products and services when compared to first-time customers. The likelihood to spend more stems from a sense of trust that the customer has developed over time for their favoured brand. So once a customer likes and trusts the quality of your brand, they’re more likely to purchase in higher quantities.
Read More : How to head-start a fuel delivery business at your location?
Allows you to gather data
Customer loyalty makes it easy for you to collect customer data. By analysing this data, you can make better business decisions. Also, you can use this data to detect drawbacks to your sales if you are not getting satisfactory results.
Furthermore, you can use this customer data to reshape your loyalty programmes. You can add a new loyalty programme or you can replace the existing one.
Engages more customers
In today’s competitive world, it is really hard to differentiate your products from competitors. Your most successful product can be outshined in the future by your competitors.
However, customer loyalty can help you a lot here. Customer loyalty is a crucial factor as it affects the buying decision of customers. So if you and your competitors have the same product but you have better customer loyalty, surely your product will have the highest demand among customers.
Attract new customers
Customer loyalty programmes are the most efficient way to attract new customers. If you give a discount or a cashback to your customer, they will purchase more from you. Also, you can allow your customers to share referral code among their family and friends. Due to this, you can attract new customers for your business and retain the existing ones by offering them attractive rewards and cashback.
Gain valuable feedback
Another benefit of the customer loyalty program is that loyal customers provide an honest opinion about your fuel delivery services. This opinion can help you in the following ways:
- Customer opinion can help you to improve your services
- Consider this feedback before launching a new product or service.
- Helps you to measure customer satisfaction
- Accurate forecasting
So here you have seen the importance of customer loyalty in the fuel delivery business. Now, let us look at the best customer loyalty methods.
6 Best customer loyalty methods for fuel delivery business
There is frequent repeat purchase of fuel with a relatively high basket value. Therefore, on-demand fuel delivery companies differentiate themselves from their competitors by providing something unique.
These initial fuel retail loyalty programs were either simple earn & burn style affairs that failed to reach their full potential or coalition programs that didn’t provide enough data to the partnering companies.
Referral programs
If you use referral programs in your on-demand fuel delivery solutions, then you can easily get more customers for your product thanks to the word of mouth. Also, tracking the referral will not only let you show the customers who are on board but also show you the customers who are happily promoting your products over various platforms via forum or feedback.
Referral programs allow you to get creative since there are unlimited ways to share love and care. If your customer refers your fuel delivery services to their loved ones, then that person receives a specific reward. And as an incentive, your customer will get something in return. So referral programs are like a win-win situation for all the parties.
Offers and promotions
Offers and promotions are one of the important parts of the on-demand fuel delivery app. Also, you can give them a special discount or freebies to make their birthday or marriage anniversary special.
Moreover, you can give attractive discounts and offers to the customers at festivals. Apart from this, you can also give referral codes to the customers which they can enter at the time of signup on the on-demand fuel delivery app to get cashback or discount.
Read More : How a fuel delivery app can benefit your business?
Cashback
Cashback is an amazing opportunity for customers to save money. For every given dollar amount spent, customers participating in these rewards programs receive cashback to use on a later purchase.
In the case of offering discounts, you need to tie-up with some company. For this tie-up, you have to pay a specific amount. But in the case of cash back, you just have to give a little portion of the purchase amount. Also, you do not have to give any additional discount.
Loyalty cards
You can promote your fuel delivery service by providing loyalty cards to your customers. Give reward points to customers when they buy multiple products from you.
Make sure you promote it effectively over social media if you want to reap the benefits. Also, highlight these rewards on your homepage and your product pages. This offer is available to your loyal customers only, and shouldn’t be available to others to maintain a sense of exclusivity that will make members feel special.
Apart from this, loyalty cards also help you to target premium customers. Moreover, you can also think of offering bonus points to customers who are loyal but not part of your loyalty program. Also, you can send the link to loyalty cards via SMS or Email.
Gamification
The Gamification method encourages the natural desire for socializing, achievement, self-expression, altruism, or closure. Mostly, the gamification method is based on the reward strategy. In it, the user who accomplished the predetermined tasks. These gamification rewards consist of achievement badges, points, progress meters, points, etc.
Moreover, Gamification also includes multiple things such as adding meaningful choices, onboarding tutorials for fuel apps, increasing challenge, and adding narrative. In a nutshell, the main motive of gamification is to make simple tasks feel like a game to the customer.
Spending Based Programmes
We have already discussed above that a loyalty-based programme points to the customer on every purchase. But how would you reward those customers who make purchases for a short time? How do you encourage those customers to continuously spend the money?
The answer to both of these questions is ‘Spending Based Programmes’. Spending based programmes are reward programmes that allow fuel companies to reward customers with higher spending.
Furthermore, these spending programmes allow fuel businesses to engage customers with minimal spending. For this, fuel delivery owners offer attractive perks such as gifts, refreshments, meal coupons, extra fuel, etc. to the customers who reach the elite status.
Thus, the spending programmes help the fuel delivery companies to detect the pattern of buying and spending among the customers.
Final Words
The main aim behind the above-mentioned loyalty programs is to boost fuel deliveries and garner loyalty for it. You can easily use these ideas and also you can revise them as and when needed. However, don’t forget to keep your business goals in mind when designing your customer loyalty program.
What type of loyalty program do you need to integrate into your fuel delivery solution? Which are the most effective customer loyalty ideas? What is the cost to develop fuel delivery app? If you are looking for the answers, then feel free to reach out to us to share your ideas. Thank you for your time.
