How to Sprinkle Extra Holiday Magic on Your Customer Loyalty Program

With 65% of a company’s revenue coming from repeat business, loyalty programs work by rewarding returning clients and building deeper relationships. That’s why Disney, Walmart, Target, Nike, and 90% of all big brands now have them. But loyalty programs need a little festive cheer to incentivize spending and delight holiday shoppers. Here’s how to sprinkle holiday magic on your customer loyalty program this year.

Customer Loyalty Programs During the Holidays

Some things just go well together. Mac and cheese, turkey and potatoes, and customer loyalty programs and the holidays. Customer loyalty programs work exceptionally well at Christmas because there’s an increase in people shopping for gifts and seeking out deals. Brands offering exclusive holiday discounts, double-points, or unique holiday-themed rewards are likely to get chosen over unfamiliar brands. Brands with loyalty programs also have the advantage of letting customers opt-in and be contacted by email or text.

63% of US consumers surveyed consider built-in loyalty programs important when it comes to their research and buying experience, according to Forrester Research.

Other factors at play are the sense of urgency, and limited-time offers combined with loyalty rewards can drive impulse buys. Loyalty programs foster emotional connections by making us feel appreciated, boosting our holiday spirit and goodwill. And all this equates to increased retail dollars.

Important note: Loyalty incentives come in all shapes and sizes. Check out how DSW offers VIPs free shipping. And that’s free shipping all the time, not just at Christmas. Use your Agorapulse scheduling tool to set fun reminders as we countdown to those peak shopping days!

So how can you sprinkle holiday magic on your customer loyalty program? Retail Santa and I have devised a 5-point plan filled with ideas you can try right now!

1. Understand What Your Customers Want

Just like leaving carrots out for Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer, we must understand what our customers want to sweeten the deal. Before you start designing your holiday loyalty campaign, run through these steps.

Analyze past holiday season data to identify what customers purchased the most

Perhaps it was a gift item, a holiday-themed bundle, or a great offer you had for free shipping or gift wrapping. You don’t have to repeat the same offer, but you can build on it for this year.

Look at what’s trending and see how it matches your offering

Retail-centric social media sites like Pinterest publish incredibly accurate predictions based on site searches. Using the site that covers everything from food and home furnishings to fashion and holidays, you can find accurate trends to suit your business niche.

Segment your customers to create tailored offers for different groups

Your groups might be split by your high-spending VIPs versus your small-purchase customers. The two groups might not have the same budget or willingness to spend on big-ticket items. By segmenting, you can achieve sales from both groups.

Ask your customers what they want using your social media channels

Run a poll or interactive Instagram Stories vote. Think about the offers carefully to ensure you are making a good profit on each of them.

“In 2024, holiday retail sales in the United States were forecast to reach about 979.5 billion U.S. dollars. This figure was given as a conservative value; retail sales over the holiday season was projected to be between 979.5 billion U.S. dollars to 989 billion U.S. dollars in 2024.” (Statista report, 2024)

Use Agorapulse’s social media reporting

Agorapulse lets you dig into what content and social media campaigns are working well and which ones need some serious (and minor) adjustments. By using the Agorapulse’s reporting feature, you’ll also see the content that resonates and the dates and times that work best for your audience in that channel.

2. Offer Exclusive Holiday Perks for VIPs

The psychology behind exclusive VIP perks hinges on several powerful motivators deep rooted in human behavior.

First, the sense of belonging and status taps into the principle of social identity theory. This is where individuals derive a sense of pride from being associated with prestigious groups. They are pleased to tell others, thereby enhancing brand loyalty.

Then there is the concept of exclusivity, where people place a higher value on things that are perceived as rare or limited. This is linked to FOMO (fear of missing out), as non-VIP members who see others enjoying exclusive benefits will want to sign up to avoid missing out.

So, what holiday perks can you offer for your VIP loyalty members?

• Gate your holiday sales items and give VIP members early access to them. If you limit the shopping time to 24 hours and promote it, you will see a surge in sales during this time.
• Add a free gift for purchases over a certain amount. VIP shoppers will spend more to accumulate more free gifts that they can then use as gifts for their loved ones!
• Offer free or expedited shipping during the holidays as a perk for VIP members. It’s also important to be realistic about your shipping times. Give a cut-off date for guaranteed Christmas delivery, for example, December 20.
• Double or even triple your bonus or loyalty points for purchases made during the holiday season. You might also want to add extra points for items you want to shift before the end of the year! Remember to think about your omnichannel experience and ensure loyalty points and rewards are accessible across all channels (online, in-store, mobile).

Tip: Take great photos of your top products and design some promotions. You can then promote your VIP perks through your Agorapulse dashboard, email, SMS, and via in-app notifications. If you don’t have a designer, check out Canva’s great selection of templates. I made this design in under 2 minutes.

(Agorapulse’s Canva integration helps you save time in creating and posting your designs via our social media management tool.)

SPANX leverages referrals to drive traffic to its Cyber Weekend event. Key to the repeated success of this campaign is that SPANX rewards its advocates after the sale is completed. This is a great way to encourage purchasing after the holiday season as well!

And SPANX is also keen to build and reward its loyal community. It’s important to do this year-round and then increase the benefits during the holiday season.

With Agorapulse, you can easily identify your social media brand ambassadors and build your own community. The Agorapulse Advocacy feature allows you to create campaigns and share your scheduled and published posts directly to your advocates so they can help boost your content.

3. Enhance Rewards for Referrals and Social Sharing

A referred customer is 18% more loyal and 4X more likely to refer more customers to your brand. And customer acquisitions through referrals spend 200% more than the average customer. Those are two of the many excellent reasons to sprinkle holiday magic onto your customer loyalty program with an emphasis on referrals.

Ideas for enhancing customer rewards

• Encourage your loyalty members to refer friends and family to earn extra rewards during the holiday season. You can generate codes using a free WordPress Plugin or a more professional solution. WooCommerce, Shopify and Referral Factory are a few notable ones.
• Reward social media users who tag you in their festive products. Feature them on your Instagram page and Highlight them like Molton Brown did here:

• Ensure your messaging is consistent across all your touchpoints. That’s in-store, email, SMS and social media. Even if your referral program is social media-specific, you can still promote it in-store.

Example of a holiday challenge for customer engagement

TikTok is a great place to start a holiday challenge that centers around your brand or products, and I have three ideas to get you started:

#HolidayMakeupChallenge

Encourage your followers to showcase their favorite holiday-themed makeup look or festive character featuring your products. (This could work for other sectors like homeware or fashion, too). The challenge might include transitions where users switch from natural to made-up, set to a popular holiday song or a trending sound. Lead the way by creating the first video, tag it #HolidayMakeupChallenge and offer spot prizes or discount codes for the best ones!

#ChristmasRecipeChallenge

If you’re in the food and beverage space, ask your fans to share their favorite holiday recipes or cocktails. Brands can showcase their culinary flair and products in the initial challenge and via Duet videos. If you love a fan recipe, why not add it to your festive menu and reward them with a discount voucher or free meal.

#GiftWrapChallenge

This challenge will encourage your audience to compete to wrap gifts as quickly and creatively as possible. This challenge can involve fun twists, such as wrapping oddly shaped items or using unconventional materials. Bonus points for cats messing with wrapping paper and absolute wrapping fails or wins. This challenge is perfect for showcasing your free gift-wrapping perk or for brands selling wrapping supplies or holiday gifts.

Tip: Keep your challenges inclusive. Holiday marketing isn’t just Christmas. The holiday period includes Winter Solstice celebrations, Las Posadas, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Hanukkah, Bodhi Day, Kwanzaa, New Year’s Eve, New Year’s Day and many others!

 77% of consumers say they’ve remained loyal to a specific brand for 10 years or more. That’s a great reason to keep rewarding loyalty!

Tip: If you’re using hashtags for Instagram, too, try using Agorapulse’s hashtag feature to track integrations and your best-performing hashtags. 

4. Engage Customers with an Advent Calendar or Countdown

Holiday-themed Advent calendars and countdowns are so popular. And with the rise in gamification tools, brands can really sleigh their way to engagement. Plus, Advent calendars also work for service-based brands who can offer discounts, trial offers, eBooks, add-ons, training, and other digital giveaways.

Develop a holiday wishlist where customers can select 10 items from your site

At the end of the contest, losers get a discount and the winner gets the entire wishlist gifted to them. This allows for great social media sharing and photo opportunities.

Create a Christmas-themed leaderboard where people can compete against each other based on challenges completed or their loyalty activities

Every social media share is 1 point, and every friend sign up is 5 points. You get the idea. The top 5 leaderboard winners get a great prize as December 25 approaches. You can utilize professional tools like UPSHOT.AI shown below to help you do this.

Create a “12 Days of Christmas Rewards” program

In this promotion, your brand offers daily exclusive perks or bonuses for loyalty program members over a 12-day period leading up to Christmas. You can make social media gifs and Stories for each day with teasers of what lies behind the calendar window.

Each day will feature different incentives and might look a bit like this:

• Day 1: Double reward points on all purchases
• Day 2: A free gift with a minimum order
• Day 3: Early access to holiday sales for VIP members
• Day 4: 20% discount on popular holiday gift items
• Day 5: A bonus for referring a friend to the loyalty program
• Day 6: Triple points on purchases over a certain amount
• Day 7-12: Additional rotating rewards like free shipping, gift wrapping or entry into a grand prize raffle

Example of a gamified customer loyalty program for the holidays

SPAR’s gamified advent calendar for Switzerland is a great example. One of its main goals was to include its brand partners as prize givers and gain interaction with its customers. The calendar was beautifully designed and integrated their color palette. Doing this instilled trust and familiarity, avoiding the spam factor entirely. SPAR hid three extra games behind calendar doors to enhance engagement. These were one Advent Memory game, Spin the Wheel, and a Scratch Card. The advent calendar gained awareness through strategic and repeated promotions on social media platforms and by leveraging their subscriber newsletter. Additionally, SPAR used posters in their stores to increase the campaign’s visibility. Partnering with various brands, SPAR offered daily prizes including kitchen appliances, skincare items, exclusive hotel vouchers, and SPAR shopping vouchers, among others.

5. Use Personalized and Real-Time Communication

When you sprinkle your holiday magic, do it with flair. That means expertly written captions and emails, personalized offers, and real-time communication via social media. Personalization significantly boosts engagement and sales with 80% of consumers more likely to make a purchase when brands offer personalized experiences. It also leads to a 10-15% rise in conversion rates, which makes perfect sense if you’re being offered products that you like or purchase regularly.

Example of personalization for holiday-themed customer loyalty program content

• Share your best-selling holiday gifts via email like Beautyline did here to create FOMO.

• Send personalized messages with holiday-specific offers based on past purchases and browsing history. “Hey Charli, we know you love the L’Occitane range, so enjoy 20% off all L’Occitane products until December 10.”
• Use real-time notifications for low-stock items, exclusive discounts, and reminders about loyalty perks. If you’re using the TEMU app, you’ll know this is one of the techniques they use to drive sales. And it works. Just look at my shopping cart and the low stock/almost sold out reminders. (I’d better go purchase those!)

• Remind your customers about deadlines such as “last day for free shipping” or “final day for guaranteed delivery before Christmas.” You will know these dates in advance so schedule social media reminders ahead of time in your Agorapulse calendar. Remember to add links so social media fans can shop right away.
• Don’t stop communicating because the holidays are over! Keep in touch with your loyal customers and provide offers that incentivize them to return after the rush. January Blues? No thank you!

That’s A Wrap

Customer loyalty programs are proven to engage customers, encouraging repeat purchases and fostering brand loyalty. But it’s easy for customers to forget about them or for your loyalty program to blend into all the others out there. By implementing festive promotions, challenges, and giveaways, you create urgency, a sense of exclusivity, and a feeling of generosity and goodwill. To maximize the impact of your added holiday magic, roll out these plans early so you can increase sales during the most lucrative time of the year. And speaking of giveaways, grab a free trial of Agorapulse right now!