Welcome to Retail Checks and Balances, a podcast that takes you behind the scenes of the bustling world of commerce and culinary delights to help you grow your business and win. Join us as we explore the fascinating stories, trends, and challenges that shape the retail and hospitality industry, from cozy corner cafes to sprawling shopping malls and everything in between. And now, here's your host, Kevin Spencer.

Welcome again to Retail Checks and Balances. Today is my birthday, 10-10-2024, a fantastic day. And today I wanted to use the opportunity of how you tie loyalty into a customer's birthday. It's the gift that keeps on giving. You know, birthdays often make us reflect on the importance of relationships. And, you know, we got to make sure that the experience that we can provide to a customer on their birthday would go a long way. For example, I felt, I went to this new restaurant for my birthday. And you know, when you got to the door, the actual reservation, I said, no, I'm just here on my birthday. And they say, happy birthday. This is great. And the place was sort of busy, but they made the opportunity for me to feel great because they fit me into the restaurant. And I heard that this restaurant had great food and great ambience, and I was not disappointed. And the thing about it is that what was great about this is that when I sat down, they took me to my seat. I sat down with my wife and the waiter came like, I would say probably within two minutes later and greeted me as, hi, Mr. Spencer. happy birthday hope you're having a great day and i'm going to give you the experience of your lifetime here today and that's important i never met this guy but it shows you that the the organizations cared about me having a fantastic experience on my birthday. So he already knew my name, he already knew it was my birthday, and general dialogue was great. The next thing was that he said, are you going to have wine? He gave me the wine menu. Less than a minute later, somebody came, their wine specialist came and started to advise what kind of wine you want to pick. You need some help. And that just shows that I was getting my experience going further and further into me enjoying what I would say would be the best experience I've had in a restaurant in a long time. And on these little gestures, you know, what you can take to even go further. I mean, let's go to the retail side and the retail signs, then the email or something exclusively offered to this customer. Let's say you've tried to figure out what, based on the loyalty information that you have in your database, I want to find out what is the number one product that this person buys. Probably I can give it to them for free. Probably I can give them 50% off. And this is how we foster loyalty and build emotional connections to our customers, you know. And, you know, the key drivers of customer loyalty or, you know, specifically for birthdays is delivering something that that serves to be consistent consistently and build a great foundation with your customer. Because every year you want to be able to offer them something different, offer them some sort of service, you know, based on their loyalty, based on your program, whatever the deal is. And, and, you know, we, we, we want to be able to build that, that loyalty community around your brand, because you want your brand to stand out as engaging with all your customers regularly. Every customer who buys from a certain place would say, hey, they really take special care of you on your birthday. And this is what you want, you know, tailoring the experiences an offer to the individuals can create a deeper loyalty than you can ever imagine. When we look at it in terms of the power of surprise, in these strategies, you know, giving your customers that unexpected reward or exclusive offers to something. And you don't want to do it on just their birthday. You know, you, you say within your birthday month, a month from your birthday, you can get these specific offers because we value your loyalty, you know, using the birthday as a metaphor. Well, customers feel when they receive unexpected perks from the brands in your store that they love. And that's why I come back to say, you know, make sure and do that. I mean, and you can go as far as even give them a small gift card. I mean, it's, and it's based on, you know, how they buy. You could even push it off to some, some other business or some other business that wants help from you, you know, And, you know, to take away from these particular examples, you know, how large or small, you can apply them into your business, not just for birthdays, for any sort of special circumstance. You know, when we talk about other things that we celebrate, Mother's Day, Father's Day, whatever the case is. And you know, this will continue to strengthen your loyalty, you know, build and maintain your customer retention. A great guy always speaks about that in his business. He's been able to keep over 90% customer retention. And, you know, we would love to do that in all of our businesses. And, you know, to recap, you know, I would say tie into the birthday what loyalty means to you, both personally and in your business. Encourage people, maybe offering that particular discount. to all your customers, let them know, you know, when they're signing up for loyalty, this is what we do on your birthday. This is what we do for any special occasions, you know? And, you know, I want to say this has been a great birthday so far, and it's amazing how, you know, you would feel when your birthday comes around and what experience you want to have from those retailers. Thanks again for joining and listening to Retail Checks and Balances. Have a great day. And I will have a fantastic birthday.

Kevin Spencer

Thanks so much for tuning into this episode. We sure do appreciate it. If you haven't done so already, make sure you're subscribed to the show, wherever you consume podcasts. So we'll get updates as new episodes become available. If you feel so inclined, please leave us a review until next time, friends.