Loyalty Program Design
In 30 days you will know whether your loyalty program pays for itself against similar customers who never joined, which single behaviour it should pay for, and what each member is allowed to cost you in gross profit.
Most loyalty programs pay your best customers for coming back. They were coming back anyway.
One decision, and the tools to make it
Should you run a program at all? Which behaviour should it pay for? Does it earn more gross profit than it costs?
- The Matched-Comparison Test: build a matched group from a customer export in about an hour, and see what the program adds beyond what members were already spending
- The Behaviour Test: score candidate behaviours on 5 questions and pay for one that customers can actually change
- The 3-Tier Commitment Ladder: Rewards, Loyalty and Tribe, chosen with a decision table, plus when the right answer is no program
- The 4 levers: continuity, an earned rate just past your own churn month, billing cadence, and status with consent
- The arithmetic, all in gross profit: lifetime gross profit, break-even lift, allowable cost per member, program contribution, points liability and discount leakage
- loyalty-calculator.xlsx: every formula built, with a green, amber or red verdict
- 8 message templates in the book, more in the worksheets
- A 30-day sprint and a 90-day launch: top 20 first, one behaviour, one quarter of comparison before anything grows
- A GoHighLevel setup guide for running it on tags, dated October 2026
The chapters
- The 15-Minute Quick Win
- Why Most Programs Are Rebates
- What To Pay For
- The 3-Tier Commitment Ladder, Chosen on Purpose
- The 4 Levers That Change Behaviour
- The Arithmetic
- The Matched-Comparison Test
- Your First 30 Days
- Eight Templates
- Worked Examples: 2 Composites and 1 That Went Wrong
- Metrics That Matter
- Common Mistakes
- The 30-Day and 90-Day Look-Back
- Proof: What Is and Is Not in This Book
SAMPLEThe 15-Minute Quick Win
Do this before you read anything else. It needs a phone and your customer list.
Step 1. Pull your 10 best customers. Sort by spend over the last 12 months, or by visit count.
Step 2. Before you send anything, write down one line. Which single thing would you most like these 10 people to do more of? Not "spend more". Something they can choose to do. Book the next job before this one is finished. Try the service next to the one they always buy. Bring a neighbour.
Step 3. Send this from your own phone, not the business line.
Step 4. Guess, then count. Before you send, write down how many of the 10 you think will reply, and how many will come in within 3 weeks. Then count. We are not going to tell you what to expect. The count is your baseline, and the gap between your guess and the count is the first lesson.
Step 5. If you already run a program, do the 10-minute rebate check. Look up what your members spent in the 12 months before they joined. Compare it to your average customer in the same 12 months.
If members were already spending more before they joined, the program is not the reason they spend more now. That is the most common finding in this whole subject, and almost nobody checks it.
The rest of the book turns that check into a decision: the matched comparison, the behaviour worth paying for, and the arithmetic that says what each member may cost you.
Questions
Will this tell me what lift to expect?
No. The book prints no lift factors, no cost bands and no benchmarks, because a number from someone else's customers says nothing about yours. It gives you the break-even lift instead: what your program must cause before it earns a dollar.
Why gross profit and not revenue?
Because revenue is not yours to spend. Spend 60% of a revenue gain on perks at a 40% gross margin and you lose money on every member. Every formula in the book runs on gross profit.
Do I need loyalty software?
Probably not in year one. A spreadsheet, your customer database and a calendar can run a one-behaviour program. The appendix lists software by category, not by price, dated October 2026.
I already run a points card. Is this for me?
Yes. Start with the rebate check, then the Matched-Comparison Test. The book shows how to change or close a program fairly, including the points you still owe.
What is not in this book?
New-member welcome sequences, referral rewards, win-back offers for lapsed customers and surprise gestures each have their own book in the library. This one owns the program: the rules, the levels and the arithmetic.
Read it in your library.
This is included with The Standard, along with every other guide in the library. Your monthly re-audit tells you which one to open next. $497 to start, $297/mo to keep it running. Cancel any month and keep everything.
See The Standard →Not sure yet? Take the free Bucket Audit or tell us what's broken.
