In 2006 Advanceit funded its 1st merchant $2,500, in 2011 it funded its 10,000th advance surpassing a cumulative total of $100 Million. 5 years have passed in the blink of an eye. Meeting the demands of a growing user base has brought about a considerable amount of organizational change, among them, 3 corporate names, 4 logos, 3 websites, 3 phone systems & (soon to be) 3 offices, each ultimately exceeding its usefulness in the face of our growth. The Advanceit of 2011 would be virtually unrecognizable to someone who knew us at inception. The only element that has survived the test of time is our approach to operating the business. As an organization we have never lost the speed, determination & excitement that comes with the new new thing. We continue to act quickly both in the face of growth & adversity. The spirit with which we funded that 1st merchant in 2006 remains alive & well and has become contagious among our employees & partners.
In trying to rationalize why we have not succumbed to the pressures of bureaucracy that plague many organizations of our size, the answer came to me quickly. It is because despite the accomplishments of the past it really feels like we are just getting started.
Are you the owner of a retail business? Do you offer your customers a Loyalty Program? I take 3 major takeaways from the summary given in this article from Marketing Magazine earlier this year based on the study from Maritz Canada.
1- Not all customers are created equally
There is a great coffee shop in our building which has a standard Buy 10 coffees, the 11th is free card. For the “typical” customer I’m sure this works well. Since I’m there at least once a day, there is an even better perk, no lines. By personalizing the customer loyalty experience and by focusing on RFM-recency, frequency and money, the coffee shop is able to deliver superior loyalty experiences to all of their customers.
2- Use new technologies to help your customers
Just like you, the small business owner, many of your customers have smartphones which make use of different social media and location based applications, so do the loyalty programs offered by Small and Medium sized Canadian businesses. The lesson here is to make sure that you make it easy for your customers to use and remember the loyalty program you have created, which brings us to point 3.
3- 70% of Loyalty Program Members Have Lost Interest in the Program
Similar to how your products and services are changing and innovating the loyalty program needs to be responsive to your ever changing customer needs. Therefore, to tie back to the first point it is imperative to make the loyalty program as individual based and targeted as possible.
Where do you get started with more general info? I find the Inc Guides a good place to start for creating loyalty programs as well as a general how-to guides for SMB and entrepreneurs.
Merchant Cash Advances are a great way to finance the creation of your loyalty programs, by using larger future receivables due to your newly increased sales levels.
Do you remember a time when the fanciest TVs came with the most complicated remotes? When programming a VCR was a 10 step process? When you had to take a programming course to learn how to put your pictures online?
The meteoric rise of Apple & the passing of Steve Jobs have brought to light perhaps the greatest accomplishment of our era, simplification. In this context, simplification is the process of taking near infinite options & reducing them to a one button device that is so intuitive that the manual is an afterthought. The intention of its creators was that after 5 minutes of playing with it, regardless of age, you instinctively mastered it.
Remarkably, all of this has happened in the last 30 years. Perhaps just as remarkable is in the same timeframe the process of financing a small business remains largely the same. This is not to say there has been no innovation in the field but the experience continues to be paper heavy, lengthy & process driven….far from Simple.
Simplification has become the opportunity of every business. The idea of taking long established, complicated & cumbersome processes & reducing them to simple intuitive clicks is not relegated to the technology sector. It applies universally & will drive customer adoption faster & more effectively than accumulating “likes” on Facebook or any other social media push that prevails today.
I have challenged our executive team to make Advanceit “Simple”. Looking forward to 2012, Advanceit will continue to make massive changes to how small businesses get financed. I look forward to your feedback as we roll out the changes & wish you the very best for the upcoming holiday season.