Connecting digitally with customers – more important than ever for Valora
It has taken three weeks for consumers to all become far more tech savvy. With convenience retail one of the few sectors continuing to operate amidst the challenges of Covid19, there has never been a more important time for retailers to connect digitally with their customers.
Much of this connection is going to be through the consumer’s own mobile phones, rather than through shared and public touch screens.
Valora in Switzerland is one of Europe’s most innovative retailers and has already invested in a digital loyalty programme – giving them tools they need at this unique time to engage and communicate with their customers. From this week Valora also launched a new online shopping service (www.avecnow.ch) offering customers home delivery for a wide range of 1,000 food and non-food articles in trial locations within one day of orders.
As one of the most developed countries in the world with the highest nominal wealth per adult in the world, Switzerland is widely recognised and respected as a country with cities that boast an exceptional quality of life.
With its “stable, prosperous and high-tech economy and great wealth“, its eight and a half million citizens enjoy a peaceful and prosperous lifestyle, so it’s no surprise to learn that it’s also a mature market when it comes to retailing, innovation and the loyalty landscape.
The leading grocery retailers have offered loyalty programmes for several years, thereby educating Swiss users about the benefits of registering and sharing their purchase data in order to earn exciting rewards. They also ensure that any loyalty programmes in the convenience industry will need to demonstrate some compelling benefits for users in order to earn a place in their lives.
In this article, we discuss the latest ideas and insights from Valora – the leading foodvenience provider in the country in an exciting interview with Michael Wirth, their Head of Digital.
A long time partner of the company even before he joined the team in this key role, he shares some of the latest loyalty enhancements they’ve launched for their “k kiosk” app-based programme that truly embody the guiding principles of the company – “nearby, quick, convenient and fresh” – increasingly evident in their innovative online programme, as they’ve done so successfully offline in their stores since their humble beginnings in the 19th century!
Launching Loyalty
When it initially launched in 2017, the k kiosk app focused on two key consumer benefits: firstly, the simple benefit of regular discount coupons as well as a digital stamp card to track coffee customers and their spend. Coffee customers get every sixth coffee free, as well as generous incentives to download the app, on their birthday and any time they recommend the programme to their friends and family. These simple benefits were also supplemented by a number of gamification campaigns that continually drive engagement.
While this early strategy has proven an excellent approach to begin to connect with value-conscious and coffee-drinking consumers, it was clear to Wirth that higher-spending customers deserved a more compelling proposition with greater recognition and rewards. And so began the careful planning and launch of this latest phase of their customer connection strategy, ensuring their digital channels deliver the same ultra-convenient experience for customers that their incredible network of small format stores has always done.
The k kiosk app offers a generous reward – every 6th coffee is free!
Asking Customers
As so many convenience shoppers simply “grab and go”, our industry has (perhaps unfairly) for many years assumed that convenience shoppers did not expect to be recognised or rewarded for their loyalty. In order to understand if this was true or merely an assumption, the Valora team decided to actually ask their customers. A simple yet often overlooked step when it comes to building something that will work! And the results were exciting and not too surprising – customers that plan more and spend more, expect more!
The message was clear – beyond stamps and coupons, they wanted the option to earn for every purchase and every transaction, and so a points system was designed and added to the platform to ensure exactly that! For loyalty marketers, points are sometimes undervalued in terms of their power to drive behaviour and enable relevant rewards, however Valora’s customers understand the value exchange of loyalty programmes so well, that it was clearly an essential mechanic that customers would appreciate.
The k kiosk loyalty app has recently launched exciting improvements for convenience customers in Switzerland.
Listening and Learning
The k kiosk’s new points feature went live in December 2019 and Wirth is excited with its potential to enable the company to continually evolve and perfect their customer’s experiences, now enabled by a complete “closed loop” feedback system that also ensures that customers feel “heard”.
With its “soft launch” phase now several months in the market gathering insights around adoption and usage, k kiosk is now focused on its in-store marketing campaign designed to excite and educate its customers throughout the country on the points programme, as well as continue to promote the delightful “share and care” coupons that this award-winning convenience brand is already famous for.
Eternally Evolving
When asked what he’s planning next for this innovative programme, Wirth is excited about the possibilities of payment-linked loyalty with its proven ability to simplify the collection of data for their entire customer base, even those the segment who currently spend less than others and remain laser-focused on speed and simplicity. He is also working with his buying colleagues to connect with suppliers who realise the potential of behavioural data at such scale and how it can be combined with the power of mobile as the most intimate connected channel to customers. He has even added a “like” button to the app to capture additional glimpses of insights that can be shared anonymously with their manufacturing partners to deliver even-more compelling benefits for k kiosk customers.
What Do We Know “For Sure”
Wirth’s key insights for our industry is that “one size will never fit all” – specific feature sets can (and should) be designed to delight customers so much that they install the k kiosk app permanently. Only then will they be sure that the brand is always as “nearby” digitally as it has always been physically.
