Customer retention for loyalty program members can help you retain your most valuable customers by optimizing your campaigns to reach and re-engage members of your loyalty program. Learn more About customer retention for loyalty program members.
To get the most out of customer retention for loyalty program members, there are certain best practices that you can follow. This article explains how to improve measurement, data foundations, and optimization of the setting.
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Measurement best practices
- Anchor on the correct metrics: As with all performance campaigns, we recommend focusing on Conversion Value. These are the primary performance indicators. They show the direct impact of the campaign on the value generated.
- Conduct rigorous testing: For ongoing analysis, leverage Google Ads reporting to monitor changes in performance, like loyalty member ratios and ROAS, before and after implementing the Loyalty goal. Run tests for an adequate duration (at least 6-8 weeks) to allow for ramp-up and sufficient performance data.
Data foundation best practices
- Maintain loyalty program details: To implement and maintain your loyalty program, use Google Merchant Center to input your core program details, including the program name, description, signup URL, and a tier/benefits breakdown. Next, integrate your benefits by adding member pricing to your product feed and by completing the member shipping configuration. To ensure accurate benefit display and pass Google’s verification process, you must maintain absolute consistency between your website's live loyalty information and the data submitted via your feed, particularly when utilizing the [loyalty_program] attribute.
- Leverage high-quality first party data: Customer Match lists are essential. You must upload and regularly refresh Customer Match lists of your loyalty members to power Google AI solutions and ensure accurate targeting. To bolster match rates, supply multiple match keys (e.g., multiple email addresses, phone numbers, zip codes). Ensure lists meet minimum requirements, typically greater than 100 users. For Loyalty audiences, accurately label audience lists with “Audience customer types” (for example, Loyalty Tier 1, Loyalty Tier 2) to inform Google’s AI for bidding and optimization. Ensure the tier you select in Google Ads matches how you define the tiers in Google Merchant Center to ensure performance. You can also integrate data sources and use GA4 audiences and Google Ads Data Manager for enhanced customer segmentation.
- Understand privacy implications: Google’s privacy policies apply for the retention goal and other personalized ads. You’ll see the label Unknown in your reporting for users who have opted out of personalization. This includes iOS users affected by ATT, and those who have opted out of Google Ads personalization.
- Establish a durable first-party data and measurement strategy: Leverage tools such as GA4 audiences and Google Ads Data Manager. These solutions provide simplicity and durability by easily connecting your proprietary customer data through various platforms (e.g. Shopify), which will improve the accuracy and targeting of your lifecycle campaigns, helping identify and reach your most valuable customers
Optimization best practices
- Strategic value Setting: If specific lifetime value data for loyal customers is unavailable, we recommend starting with an aggressive multiplier and adjusting as you test. Avoid arbitrarily low values as this hinders Smart Bidding optimization and can misrepresent performance.
- Campaign structure (specific events vs. evergreen campaigns): For time-bound events or campaigns focused on specific loyalty inventory, consider setting up a net-new campaign to maximize visibility and impact. For always-on, evergreen loyalty benefits, existing campaigns can continue to run as-is.
- Ongoing optimization: Monitor performance and adjust loyalty values higher or lower to achieve business goals.
- Increase budget to acquire valuable customers: Acquiring and retaining high-value customers can be more costly but can yield returns. Budget constraints can limit your campaign’s ability to reach the desired audience to maximize performance.
- Use App Connect: For businesses with an app, we strongly encourage directing your loyal customers to it. This can be achieved by implementing deep linking and optimizing your bids for in-app conversions..
- Interoperability: Customer retention for loyalty program members can effectively complement settings like customer acquisition, allowing you to build a holistic lifecycle strategy within a single campaign. However, avoid pairing conflicting optimization settings that cannot coexist. For example, customer retention for loyalty program members is incompatible with the “New Customer Only” and “Retention Only” settings as a single campaign cannot optimize for exclusive acquisition and exclusion retention simultaneously.
