In the United States alone, there are more than 30 million small businesses projected to spend over $3 trillion a year – a number expected to grow 25 percent annually according to BCG Research. With numbers this large, it’s clear small businesses represent a significant opportunity and are key to helping merchants increase sales and enhance the bottom line. Even so, merchants are finding it increasingly difficult to identify, attract and retain small business customers. The development of new products and programs – such as automatic savings programs – can drive new customer acquisition, increase spending, improve brand awareness and loyalty and ultimately help capture more of the small business opportunity.
   

     Driving Loyalty: Small Business Customers and Automatic Savings

    According to MasterCard research, three-quarters of small businesses that use cards to pay for business expenses are strongly interested in savings programs and consider them to be important or very important in helping them better manage their business. This research also shows that small businesses owners value rewards and look for them when making purchasing decisions; they generally look for rewards that save them money and enable them to grow their businesses.
    Merchants that offer loyalty and reward programs geared towards small businesses can attract new customers and cultivate more loyal, regular customers. When determining a program to offer, consider the following:

    Savings count.
    Small businesses are always looking for ways to save money. Programs that provide simple, automatic savings remove barriers to small businesses’ participation while encouraging additional spending at the merchant level.

    Keep it simple.
    Easy-to-use savings programs – such as those that offer discounted purchases, remove the hassle from managing and redeeming reward points, coupons and codes – thereby making it easier for small businesses to participate.

    Make it automatic.
    Automatic savings programs ensure small businesses take advantage of merchant offerings. More importantly, they provide immediate gratification which deepens loyalty.

    Include credit and debit.
    Research shows that many new small businesses use a business debit card. Reward both credit and debit card use to attract a broader range of small business customers and help increase sales and revenue.

    Communication
    Frequent communication of program benefits is essential. Increase engagement and program loyalty by enabling small business owners to interact more often with your brand and view the benefits they have earned.

     Motivating Small Businesses: Automatic Savings Can Help Increase Sales

    For today’s merchants, the decision to implement a loyalty program is both strategic and economic. As you consider implementing a program, you should look for unique opportunities to attract hard-to-reach small businesses while building brand loyalty and enabling these operations to better manage and grow their own companies. Additionally, a good loyalty program should:

    Help grow your business.
    The program you pursue should provide profitable revenue growth opportunities. For example, MasterCard research reveals that 85 percent of small business owners would increase spending at participating merchant locations, thereby making it a program that positively impacts both the small business owner and the merchant.

    Establish competitive differentiation and increase brand loyalty.
    The program should change small business owners’ behavior in exchange for merchant savings.

    Be customized to meet your business needs.
    The savings offered should be based on how much value motivates your customers to spend more and shop more often.

    Provide a turnkey implementation solution.
    There should be no changes required at the point-of-sale and the program should be managed by a provider that can take care of program implementation, administration and maintenance.

    In the end, it’s important to remember that in addition to being simple and turn-key, automatic savings programs provide benefits for both merchants and small business customers. As small businesses focus on streamlining their operations and saving money, discounts and savings with the merchants they frequent can make it easier for them to manage and grow their own businesses. For merchants, participating in an automatic savings program can lead to attracting hard-to-reach small businesses, enhanced loyalty, improved satisfaction and a stronger bottom line.

Bruno Perreault serves as Group Head, Small and Mid-Sized Enterprises for MasterCard Worldwide, in charge of leading MasterCard’s commercial payment initiatives and product development for small and medium sized enterprises.