*** How To Motivate Customers With Rewards

By David Mason, SelfGrowth's Official Guide to Business Coaching

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Customers love saving money. They love great deals and knowing they are getting the best for their money spent.

Motivating customers with rewards is can be really simple because many customers are already looking for them.

There are many different ways to reward customers, which in return motivates them to shop with you.

First, you can do a buy one get one free offer, or BOGO as it has come to be known. This actually pulls better than a 50% off sale, even though it is the same thing. It also is a very convenient way to reduce inventory and works best is you have a high profit margin on the item.

Second, you can offer something free for every set dollar amount spent in your store. Free stuff usually works with customers and if they want the item bad enough, they will spend the money to reach your set limit, rather than just purchase the free item. Today, you see many stores with gas stations associated with them. With the high prices of gas today, they offer pennies off per gallon for total amounts of money spent on their groceries.

Customers are easily motivated today when they are shopping and rewards programs are ideal. The loyalty card and the punch cards are a perfect example of this idea.

When the customer buys a certain dollar amount a hole is punched in the card. When they reach the predetermined number of holes they qualify for a gift certificate for the store.

In many cases you will see the customer add a small item or two to their order just to bring the total price up to the required level to qualify for the next hole punch. In the end they will generally have purchased much more in extra items than the actual face value of the discount certificate. But since it has happened over several visits to the store it goes unnoticed and has less of a direct impact on their wallet at any one time.

Offering excellent sales on items that are normally expensive is another way to get the customers into the store. You see this with "door crasher specials", where a store will sell something ridiculously low in an effort to bring people into the store. In many cases they use 'loss leaders', which means they are actually selling a product for a loss or less than the cost price.

The idea is that once you are in the store, you will continue to shop and end up buying a few other items.

The key is getting the customer into the store in the first place.

Sales, discounts, and free items are just a couple of ways to motivate customers with rewards in your store.

Motivating your customers also is a great way to ensure that they will continue to come back for more.

To your success!