Andy Swenson, VP of Database and Revenue Management at Pinnacle Entertainment outlined their approach to customer loyalty, which included some great takeaways for companies in any industry.

The gaming resorts leader partnered with Teradata to provide the database and with SAS to handle the marketing solution that enabled them to differentiate themselves with their My Choice loyalty program.

Challenges in the gaming industry include turnover – a typical casino loses ⅓ to ½ of its members each year, which means they need to have a new guest acquisition program in place.  Once you’ve successfully prompted a first visit, then the focus is on subsequent trips by building the relationship with the guest. As was noted by Scott Hudgins in the case of Disney, a partnership between marketing and property operations is key to build loyalty.  In Andy's words, "long lines do not help anyone, but neither does an empty casino."

Key learnings for a gaming loyalty program include:

• Have a clear purpose behind your incentives - a coupon a day is not a strategy.
• Cash incentives don’t drive one-time traffic spikes but not true loyalty,
• Guests want consistency and fairness in their offers and not a roller-coaster, so strategic testing can provide better insights than sporadic pulsing and cutting.
• Remember to manage the calendar program and reinvestment, in part because multiple offers redeemed can easily result in losses.

He made some good points about loyalty programs that would apply to any industry:

• To drive true guest loyalty, you have to manage experiences and access.
• Don’t limit the focus to your loyalty program, cultivate a loyalty culture across the company.
• Have your brand stand for something.
• Focus on the guest relationship and how you engage with them.
• Get involved in outside activities so you extend the brand.

Looking into the future, Pinnacle sees promise in bringing additional data sources into their data warehouse, building models to predict future outcomes, and to actively create drive more marketing activity that is digital, mobile and real-time.  With an approach like that, odds are in Pinnacle's favor for continued success in customer loyalty.  What do you think?