On occasion, participation and engagement amongst your program members may wane over time. Luckily, there are several actions you can take to reinvigorate members so that they continue posting and tagging your brand.
Change up your rewards and implement a monthly grand prize
Your most active brand ambassadors have likely earned all of the rewards available to them and may feel oversaturated. Declining participation, especially amongst your fiercest advocates, is a telltale sign that a reward restructure may be necessary. Below are some creative ways to spruce up your rewards:
Include a surprise & delight reward where qualified members can choose from a selection of gifts. Shopify makes this possible and easy to implement via hidden collections.
Change up existing reward tiers, or add-on new tiers to your existing reward structure. Need some ideas? Swap out discounts for site credits, gamify based off of content type, etc. Check out this article with all the reward possibilities available through LoudCrowd.
If not already, start running challenges with program members in which you implement a grand prize. Something as simple as “Each month, our favorite Reel will receive a $100 Amazon gift card. Good luck!” goes far, especially amongst those who have already earned every other reward possible. Offering a participant reward to qualifying UGC is another great way to boost participation when running challenges with your program members.
Level up your program by incorporating other perks like early access to exclusive products or merchandise, access to a private Discord, content creator training, etc.
Integrate with your existing Loyalty Program (Yotpo, Loyalty Lion, etc.).
Add-on an affiliate component for personalized ambassador codes that members can share with their followers.
Level up your communication flows with surprise gifts
Your ambassadors may feel fatigued from your existing communication cadence. Changing up your messaging and frequency is a great way to catch your ambassadors' eye and get them intrigued again. In particular, weaving in special or surprise gifts, especially into your welcome flows and other flows, may incite product purchases and, thus, more content.
Include a gift in your welcome flow to ensure recruits have (new) product to post about
Include surprise discounts/gifts into your monthly briefs / comms. Again, this will ensure that your members have the most up to date products to share on social media.
Implement SMS for program communication and reward delivery
Email is not the most effective modern-day communication method with your biggest advocates. SMS reaches ambassadors where they shop and post their smartphones. Data suggests that SMS open and click-through rates are magnitudes larger than email. You can expect more engaged and knowledgeable ambassadors by simply implementing SMS comms. On top of that, the ease of creating an SMS message allows you to get more creative/thorough with your comms. Check out this article to learn more about implementing SMS and this article for the importance of SMS for program communications.
Engage with and feature your ambassador content on your website and socials
One goal of many ambassador/social reward programs is to make your community feel valued and special. The easiest way to do that is to show your advocates that you appreciate them by engaging with and reposting their content. Getting your engaged and unengaged ambassadors excited about the potential to work closely with a brand will drive participation, especially amongst wannabe influencers/creators.
Never miss an opportunity to say thank you with Auto Story Replies. LoudCrowd’s Auto Story Replies functionality allows you to send automated messages to your ambassadors (or anyone) that tags you in an Instagram Story. You can customize/segment these messages based on a variety of profile features. More on Story replies here.
Featuring your ambassadors on your Instagram Story + Feed, and on TikTok communicates that you genuinely love their content and therefore makes it more likely they’ll post about you again. Wannabe influencers are especially inspired by branded boosts through features. To turn this into a routine, consider processes along the lines of Ambassador Friday Features, or Ambassador of the Month.
Comment warm prior posts from your ambassadors. Show your members that you care about them and that you are impressed by the content they produce.
Dedicate a portion of your website to featuring your Ambassadors. This will surely ignite excitement amongst those who have and have not been thoroughly engaged.
Graduate ambassadors into a new ~exclusive~ program
Your fiercest advocates can sometimes become fatigued by the existing program structure. Some will be willing to do more content creation for slightly better rewards/perks. Exclusive programs allow you to graduate high-value creators into content engines. Consider adding on an additional program with unique and exclusive rewards/perks. Foster some ideas for your next LoudCrowd program with some inspiration here.