Reward customers who keep coming back
A loyalty program gives a customer a reward every few completed visits: say every 5 visits, 20% off their next one. There is no card to hand out and nobody signs up. Every customer with a completed visit is on it, Lightspire counts the visits, tells them when they've earned a reward, and your agent offers it when they call to book.
Before you start
- Your account is on the Growth plan. On Free and Pro, the Loyalty tab and Grow › Loyalty explain what it does and the account owner can upgrade in Billing.
- A reward needs services with a price in Agent › Services: a percentage or an amount comes off that price, and a free service must have one. A service that needs a quote can't be a reward.
- On a team account, setting it up needs Marketing at Edit in Settings › Team; View shows it.
- With more than one agent, each agent has its own program and its own members: pick the agent in the agent menu at the top first.
Five steps
Open the Loyalty settings
Open Agent, then Loyalty under Grow in the list of settings (or type "loyalty" in Search settings).
Choose the visits and the reward
- Visits for a reward: from every 2 to every 20 completed visits (5 to start with).
- Visits that count: Every completed visit, or Only some services and tick them.
- Reward: a Percentage off, an Amount off or A free service (pick which one).
- How long a reward lasts: 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, 6 months or a year from the day it's earned.
The line under them says the rule as customers will get it, for example "Every 5 completed visits: 20% off your next visit".
Choose when counting starts
Today counts visits from today on. An earlier day counts the completed visits since that day too (up to two years back), so your regulars don't start from zero. Before you save, the line under it says how many customers have visits that count and how many have a full card: those customers earn their reward as soon as you save.
Check the messages
Two messages go to the customer: When they earn a reward, and 7 days before it ends if they haven't used it. For each, choose Text, Email, Text and email or Don't send. A text starts with your business name and ends "Reply STOP to opt out."; an email comes from your business with the reward in a box and a button to call you. Leave the wording empty for ours, or write your own with {first_name}, {reward}, {expires}, {phone} and {business}. The preview shows the text exactly as a customer gets it.
Loyalty messages go only in the sending hours (9 am to 8 pm on weekdays, 9 am to 5 pm on Saturdays) and only to customers who haven't opted out; texts use your marketing texts and emails your month's emails. They don't wait for the week between offers that campaigns and follow-ups keep to.
Switch it on and save
Turn on Run the loyalty program and press Save changes.
Grow › Loyalty shows the program as On with your rule, and your members with their cards. When you mark a customer's fifth booking Completed, the message says "Sam earned a reward: 20% off your next visit".
How a reward is used
- A visit is a booking marked Completed, by you, your team or the iPad. Cancelled bookings, no-shows and bookings still to come never count.
- Your agent knows the program, so a caller who asks how it works gets an answer. When a returning customer calls and confirms their name, it knows their visits so far, and tells them about a reward waiting when they book: the booking is made at the reward's price, and the agent says it's their loyalty reward.
- The booking holds the reward. When that visit is marked Completed, it's used; if the booking is cancelled or a no-show, the reward is theirs again. A reward is for one booking.
- A customer's page shows their card and their rewards, and a booking shows the reward it was made with and whether its visit counted.
Turn it off
Turn off Run the loyalty program and save. Every card and reward is kept, and rewards already earned can still be used. No new visits are counted and no messages go until you turn it back on. Visits while it was off don't count.
If something's not right
A customer's visit didn't count
Check the booking was marked Completed (not just its day passing), is for a service that counts, and is on or after the day counting started. A booking marked Completed before its day counts from that day.
I marked the wrong booking Completed
Set it back to Confirmed or No-show. Its visit comes off the card. If that visit had just earned a reward the customer hasn't used, the reward is taken back too; one they've already booked with or used stays, and the next visit makes up for it.
I changed the rule and nobody lost anything
That's on purpose: changing the visits needed, the services or the reward never takes away visits or rewards already earned. A rule that needs fewer visits can fill some cards straight away, and those customers earn their reward.
Customers aren't getting the messages
A text only goes to an Australian mobile that hasn't replied STOP, in the sending hours, while you have marketing texts left in Billing. An email only goes to a customer with an email address who hasn't unsubscribed, once your business's email is in Settings › Business (so their replies reach you), while you have emails left this month.