Introduction
The travel and hospitality industry are well aware of the shifting demands and expectations of today’s consumers. With customers seeking more personalized experiences, the need for hotels to create effective loyalty program strategies has become increasingly crucial. According to Oracle, 58.7% of the participants responded that they are not a part of any loyalty program, and only 3.2% of the participants are enrolled into loyalty programs in more than five hotels.
This huge disparity in between the numbers shows the potential areas where hotel owners can create effective customer loyalty strategies and increase the chances of getting repeat guests. Since the pandemic, the hospitality industry had been forced to turn around the operations around 360-degree and opt for new methods and ways to conduct their operations.
Now offering a loyalty program that rewards customers for their continued engagement is no longer just an option—it’s an essential tool for retaining guests and growing sustainably during increasing competition.
But how can hotels create the best loyalty program strategies? By migrating their guest data to Snowflake and with composable CDPs. Snowflake—a leading cloud data platform—plays a pivotal role in transforming how businesses in the travel and hospitality industry approach loyalty programs. By leveraging Snowflake’s robust AI-driven tools, you can design and implement sophisticated, personalized brand loyalty programs that drive engagement, increase revenue, and boost customer loyalty.
This blog will explore the importance of loyalty programs in hotels, how Snowflake helps create the best loyalty program strategies, and how Kasmo can help you make successful reward programs for customers.
The Importance of Loyalty Programs in the Travel and Hospitality Industry
Source: Oracle
Loyalty programs are essential for building loyalty with guests. As guest needs continue to evolve hotels must adapt their loyalty strategies to increase the number of guests signing up for their loyalty programs.
These loyalty programs offer incentives or rewards that encourage guests to return to the same hotel again and again. These rewards can come in many forms, including points, discounts, exclusive access to services, and personalized experiences. A well-structured customer loyalty scheme can significantly impact on a brand’s reputation.
To craft successful customer loyalty strategies, businesses must gain a comprehensive overview of customer behavior and how to effectively leverage data without violating data privacy policies. Snowflake, a powerful cloud data platform helps hotels gain a 360-degree view of their customers while protecting sensitive guest data.
Let’s take a broader look on how hotel owners can leverage the benefits of Snowflake:
Snowflake’s Role in Enhancing Loyalty Program Strategies
Snowflake helps travel and hospitality brands harness the power of their data. By building composable CDPs on Snowflake, hotel brands can centralize customer data from various touchpoints (e.g., reservations, loyalty accounts, on-property interactions) and gain a 360-degree view of their customers. This unified view allows businesses to understand customer preferences, behaviors, and past interactions, which is vital for crafting personalized loyalty programs that resonate with individual customers.
Before we venture out to understand how you can utilize the benefits of Snowflake and composable CDPs built on Snowflake, let’s gain a brief understanding on the major difference between CDPs and Composable CDPs:
Since now you have a basic overview of composable CDPs, you understand why your traditional CDPs won’t just make the cut in this intense competitive market. Here are some important factors that makes building composable CDPs on Snowflake a better option, if you are dedicated to creating the best loyalty program strategies that just work for your guests:
Unifying Data for Personalized Experiences
Oracle’s survey shows that more than 20% of the participants showed disinterest in signing up for loyalty programs because the rewards did not interest them. By building your Composable CDPs on Snowflake, hotel owners can build rich, personalized guest profiles. These profiles can inform the hotel professionals to create loyalty programs in such a way that grabs the interests of guests. Once customer profiles are unified, you can leverage this data to send targeted promotions, offers, and rewards that cater to each guest’s preferences.
For example, a hotel chain could use Snowflake’s platform to analyze a guest’s booking history and suggest personalized room upgrades or exclusive discounts for frequent guests. These tailored promotions drive greater customer satisfaction and foster long-term loyalty.
Facilitating Data-Driven Decision-Making
With Snowflake hotel owners can continuously optimize their loyalty offerings. The platform’s capabilities analyze customer data in real-time and recommend personalized offers that maximize engagement. For instance, Snowflake can help identify high-value customers and trigger the hospitality professionals to deliver tailored loyalty rewards—such as discounts on flights or hotel stays—encouraging repeat business.
Comprehensive Marketing Campaign Intelligence
Snowflake also enables travel companies to track and optimize marketing campaigns across multiple channels. With this cloud data platform businesses can analyze the effectiveness of loyalty program promotions, pinpoint successful strategies, and refine future communications. By understanding which offers perform best for specific customer segments, companies can maximize their loyalty program’s impact and improve overall customer retention.
Seamless Integration for Multi-Brand Hospitality Operations
For companies operating across multiple brands or regions, building composable CDPs on Snowflake offers them with seamless integration capabilities. This cloud data platform centralizes data from all touchpoints, including various properties, loyalty programs, and customer service channels, enabling you to offer consistent loyalty rewards throughout the chain. Whether managing a luxury hotel chain or a budget resort, Snowflake ensures that all customer data is accessible and actionable.
This flexibility enables businesses to tailor loyalty rewards to the specific needs of each brand or location, fostering stronger relationships with guests while maintaining a unified customer experience across multiple properties.
A Step-By-Step Process to Creating the Best Loyalty Program Strategies
Designing an effective loyalty program involves several critical elements. Follow this step-by-step procedure on how you can create the best loyalty program strategies:
Don’t Think About Yourself When You Create Loyalty Programs- Think About Your Customers!
Loyalty programs give a boost to the revenue earned by the hotel. But if you are creating loyalty programs solely based on this idea, the revenue will not be sustainable. Here’s why –
Loyalty programs are channels through which hotels can create constant communication with their guests, making them feel included, increasing brand loyalty. Now, if you create rewards, points and offers keeping in what HOW your customer will react, you have hit the jackpot!
By leveraging Snowflake’s data cloud and composable CDPs, you can craft highly personalized loyalty experiences that resonate with customers. This includes offering personalized discounts, rewards, and experiences that align with the customer’s interests and past behaviors.
Give Your Customers Something Exciting – Not Another Boring Loyalty Program!
Creating loyalty programs and rewards for your customers is not enough! No, not even hyper-personalization. In this age where hotel brands are diversifying their business models and growing in numbers, you need to think how your loyalty programs cannot sink amid other loyalty programs.
A tiered loyalty program structure can encourage customers to increase their engagement with the brand. For instance, customers who frequently book with a specific hotel chain could be rewarded with exclusive perks such as free upgrades, early check-ins, or higher loyalty status.
With Snowflake data cloud, you can analyze customer behavior and identify individuals who are likely to reach the next tier in the loyalty program. This insight allows brands to offer timely incentives, driving further engagement and motivating customers to climb the loyalty ladder.
Reward Your Long Time Customers
Long-term loyalty is often more valuable than short-term gains. A well-structured reward program that incentivizes continued engagement can be highly effective. If a customer gets to know about the benefits, they can achieve by investing in your loyalty program, then they may continue to do so and encourage others to hop on your customer rewards program.
By leveraging Snowflake’s cloud data platform, you can track customer behavior over time, offering more unique incentives that encourage customers to maintain their loyalty.
For example, a hotel chain might offer special anniversary rewards for customers who have been loyal for several years, or provide personalized offers based on previous stays. These gestures make customers feel appreciated and foster a deeper sense of loyalty.
Conclusion
In the travel and hospitality industry, creating basic customer loyalty strategies is not enough. You have to be creative in how you can make your programs and rewards different from other businesses. With the help of Kasmo’s expertise you can build composable CDPs on Snowflake cloud data platform, helping you stay ahead of the curve in an increasingly demanding market.
The right loyalty program strategy can turn first-time customers into lifelong brand advocates, and with Snowflake and Kasmo’s expertise, businesses can ensure their programs are optimized for maximum impact. As consumer expectations continue to evolve, investing in a smart, data-driven loyalty program powered by Snowflake is the key to long-term success in the travel and hospitality industry.
