Encouraging First Steps: Re-Establishing Habits in Existing Loyals by using a prompt. Examples from

Continuing the theme explored in my last few articles, today I want to talk about ways to prompt previous customers to return to purchasing your brand or service.

Costa are looking to encourage shoppers to return by using their points collection scheme. Current members and lapsed members just need to log into their account to get points worth £3 added to their account. This is enough to get a free coffee but you can also spend the points on other items as well. They hope that this will kick start the habit loop and their points collection scheme is enough of a long-term reward to keep customers coming back.

The offer advert below appeals to current loyals as it uses the learnt colours, shapes and fonts of the brand ensuring more of them pay attention as it uses existing pathways.

But even though the offer is also available to any new members who sign up it won’t attract new customers particularly well. This is because it’s only 1 drink, it’s a lot of hassle for such a low amount and it only encourages one single purchase which is unlikely to be enough to start a new habit loop, although it could be enough to re-start a previously established habit.

To understand habit loops see my previous article: https://ardurham59.wixsite.com/tonydurhamlimited/post/covid-19-crisis-or-opportunity-5-actions-you-should-be-taking-now-to-build-your-brand

This Costa offer is not as good at stealing customers and building a habit loop as the Pret example I showed in the article below: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/rebuild-habit-purchasing-your-brand-great-example-pret-tony-durham/

This Marks & Spencer offer works in a very similar way offering £10 and a free tote bag to any current shoppers who have the “sparks app”. Vouchers like this work because of the Endowment Effect which means humans value something much more once they own it. Giving someone a coupon generates this feeling, which is why they glow red hot in my wife’s bag until she spends them. Not spending a voucher once you have been given it or not picking up the free bag generates a feeling of loss and humans are twice as frightened of incurring a loss as happy about a gain and hence more likely to take action.

BJ Fogg’s behaviour model is a great way to understand if these deals will encourage shoppers to return and when is the right time for you to consider something similar.

Fogg’s model explains that behaviour happens when there is sufficient Motivation (high vs low left axis), and enough Ability to do it (hard vs easy base axis) in a sufficient combination to push people above the action line. Once above the action line a Prompt (CTAs, POS, adverts, vouchers) will activate the behaviour. So if your target shoppers are still too frightened to come to your stores (Low Motivation) or the public transport system is not working correctly (Very Hard) then it is unlikely that your shoppers will be over the Action Line so you would be wasting your money on creating Prompts to kick start purchases again.

However, if you believe that your customers have for example missed the social interaction in your coffee shops and are fed up of being locked up at home (High Motivation) and are being asked by their employer to come back to work in the office so they will pass your coffee shop (Easy to pop in) they will be over the Action Line and a Prompt will be successful.

The UK Office for National Statistics reported that when high streets, retail parks and shopping centres were allowed to open on the 15th June the proportion of adults shopping for anything other than the basics rose to 19% from 13% the previous week and 5% four weeks earlier suggesting that behaviour is not quickly returning to normal. This simple model can be used to understand what action your brand needs to take to influence shopper behaviour by generating Motivation and removing barriers to the shopper’s Ability and when to consider investing in Prompts.

If you want help on deciding when and how to do Prompts to kick start habit loops, get in touch either via LinkedIn or my website: https://ardurham59.wixsite.com/tonydurhamlimited

Training is available online or in person based on any of my articles, cognitive psychology, behavioural science or claims development applied to packaging, In-store, POS or marketing.

Please feel free to share this article with friends and colleagues where you think it might help.

Tony Durham

If you are desperate for a free coffee use this link: https://www.costa.co.uk/free-coffee