Today Marriott Rewards did something you should do if you haven’t already. They enticed Members like me with a significant potential reward to “like” them on Facebook. But not only that, they successfully convinced me also to link my Marriott Rewards Member number to their Facebook page.
They have followed our advice (or someone’s just as smart as we) and tied their social media strategy to their loyalty strategy. Some other hotel chains, the AIRMILES (Canada) Rewards program, and very few others have done this so far. Have you?
As we have reported many times, from our own Word of Mouth studies in 2009 and 2011, it’s vital to ground your social media interactions and listening into the accountability framework of your loyalty program. While it may be interesting and potentially actionable to hear what your customers might be saying about you out there, it’s absolutely critical to your success that you know what your BEST customers are saying, and hearing. Why not get them to identify themselves on the social media as your Members? Done with persistence and shared rewards, this smart marketing move allows smart marketers like you to measure and manage the social conversation your customers-especially your BEST customers-are having about you and your brand. Once accomplished, smart marketers like you can invite conversation and commentary, thereby identifying your WOM Champions by their ability and willingness to post. And that allows you to measure whether those posts have a positive or negative effect on trips, transactions, spend, visits, flights, etc., both of the posters, and the “postees” – those that are exposed to the commentary.
Such a simple step to finally have a way to tell your CEO and CFO what all the buzz is doing for your revenue and brand.
A show of hands: are you doing this today? Do you plan to do it tomorrow? Why not? Let us know. We’d love to start a conversation.
