Credit: Mashable 7/13/2010
Mashable just posted an article by Lauren Indvik on the Ann Taylor promotion using Foursquare, Foursquare Mayors Get 25% Off at Ann Taylor [Exclusive]. They’re running it as a trial balloon in their New York City stores. If it’s successful, they’ll run it in all 279 stores across the country.
Lauren says, “Nevertheless, we were impressed by the size of the offer and the fact that Ann Taylor intends to offer the discount indefinitely, rather than for a short timeframe.”
I’ll agree that running the campaign and discount indefinitely is impressive but otherwise, pardon me while I yawn. Come on, where’s the WOW! in that campaign? I have to check in five (5) times to get 15% off full price merchandise? And if I’m the mayor, I get 25% off. It doesn’t say whether that’s every check in or every fifth check in but it reads like it’s every fifth one. That mayor offer is not too shabby other than the every fifth time part of it. I’m the mayor for gosh sakes. That means I’m there more than anyone else. That means I likely spend a lot of money with Ann Taylor. Why not make that discount every time I check in? It’ll keep me coming back and it’s a big enough discount to encourage others to try to take the mayorship away from me, especially if they do something that’s not as lame as 15% off full price purchases every fifth check in.
In tying this to every fifth check in, I’m going to assume that they understand the Pareto Principle, or the 80/20 Rule if you will, and are trying to reward their best customers (those 20% that account for 80% of the revenue), as well as encouraging those who aren’t in the 20% to join the fun. But does 15% every fifth time accomplish that? I’ll be curious to see.
I can’t help but think that this would work a little better. Reward the mayor as I suggested above. Make that something every woman who shops there and values a deal wants to attain. Then offer those 20% who do 80% of your business a discount every time they shop. Go ahead and exclude sale merchandise. That’s not a deal breaker. Encourage them to shop more often and chase that mayor. Then, offer those other 80% a discount every X number of times they check in. Encourage them to shop a little more often and once they’ve checked in a given number of times they should have spent enough to move themselves into that 20% category, where they get a discount every time they shop. Anne Taylor will know how many times and what that dollar amount will be based on statistics they are likely already keeping.
That would be the sort of location based promotion that would keep me checking in and ringing their registers.
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