Square Loyalty Q&A: Ask our product team anything about Square Loyalty 🤝

[Tom]

Hello Seller Community — hope your February is off to a good start!

On Thursday, February 17th, @seiderman (Product Manager) and @cspillane (Product Marketing Manager) hosted a deep dive into the world of loyalty. Together, they answered questions from “How can I drive more success from my loyalty program?” to “What features are on the horizon?” — we want to help you grow your business with Square Loyalty. We'll share a summary of best practices and address the main themes that came up on this day, and mark it as a Best Answer as soon as possible.

A few example questions:

• How can I configure my Square Loyalty program to increase engagement?
• What's the best way to increase awareness about my loyalty program?
• If I could do "_______" with Square Loyalty, it would make a big difference for my business.

[Abigails_stl]

On the Square register when using Square for Retail, the customer can't log in to their account on the customer facing screen until after the purchase has been made.  We have to take the additional time to add them to the purchase on our screen and then look up to see if they have any available rewards. I would love it if the customer could log in on the customer facing screen and select their own rewards. It would create more engagement and excitement about the program.

[cspillane]

Hi @Abigails_stl,

Thanks for getting in contact with us! This is definitely a request we’ve heard from multiple sellers, and thus one of our biggest priorities this year! We’re hoping to have this feature rolled out for you by early Spring, and it would include not just pre-transaction check-in, but also pre-transaction buyer enrollment for your loyalty program.

Stay tuned for updates — we will be sure to notify all sellers using Square for Retail. 

[Abigails_stl]

Thats great to hear! Thanks @cspillane 

[larissa166]

How do I use a customer’s rewards after a transaction (when I’m using the app for an in person transaction)? 

Common scenario: Customer doesn’t tell us they have a reward(s) to claim. We go thru the transaction and I get the message at the end that they have more than enough points to redeem a reward. I’d love to claim the reward right then and auto-adjust the final transaction amount. 

[seiderman]

Hi @larissa166,

At this time, rewards cannot be redeemed after the transaction is already complete. Within the current product, we’d recommend having your employees / cashiers ask each customer for their phone number upfront to check their points and reward balance. Also, if you're using Square Register, customers should have the option to self check-in and review earned rewards prior to the transaction completion. That said, improving reward redemption across all devices is a constant top of mind for my team and I. While I don’t have anything specific to share at this time, we’d love to make this easier for businesses that are not using a device with a customer facing display.

[Cawampole]

Will there be an option to automatically set Double Points for certain days and times? 

[cspillane]

Hi @Cawampole,

Yes! This feature is in the works and should be ready soon. In related news, we’re kicking off beta testing next week. Let me know if you’re interested in being one of our beta testers, and I’ll be happy to get you early access. 

[Cawampole]

Hello @cspillane, YES, I would absolutely test it. 

Thanks,

Cealy

[Elyn]

Hi there! You can join our testing group in the Beta Community and I'll make sure you're included in the test! Join here

[whimsyteaco]

I’d love to be able to do different categories of rewards. For us we would like to have a packaged tea category and a tea to go category. Currently we just have buy 10 get one free for packaged retail teabags we want to do rewards for folks that get cups of tea to go ( without extra costs for us) . 

[seiderman]

Hi @whimsyteaco,

From what you described, it sounds like you want to set up two different loyalty programs: one for tea packages and one for to-go orders. Unfortunately, while you can set specific category rules, it’s all under a single loyalty program. This means that any points earned from to go teas would be valid for packaged team (and vice versa). 

There are a couple ways you could get around this in the current product. One of them is what @artizansty suggested in his post to @Sunflowerrec. The other is using a spend based program. This is usually the program type we suggest for businesses like yours, as it allows you to provide a higher earnings for someone purchasing tea bags vs to-go orders. 

Hope that helps!

[whimsyteaco]

What we ended up doing is a punchcard system. It’s an extra step but I think it works. Perhaps at some point we will be able to have tags with qr or bar codes we can scan and have it tracked with square. 

[CinDenRx]

Why can we not allow redemption of points on one product more than once at the traction? Also can we send out text massaging though royalty program?

[Tattoochick]

Would love to see a retail referral program. A one time use code or link my current customer could share with a friend. That new customer could sign up for the loyalty program, giving original customer points. Maybe points for the 1st time the actual make a purchase. Word of mouth is still a great advertising tool and this would help incentivise customers to share.

[cspillane]

Hi @Tattoochick,

Thanks for contacting us. A referral program for Loyalty is something we’ve thought about a lot (and are still exploring). We’re hoping to add this to our functionality in the future, but unfortunately I don’t have any specific details that I can share with you today. If/when this comes to fruition, I’ll make a note to circle back with you.

[WineCurmudgeon]

I moved from another POS system two years ago. That POS system had its own loyalty function which I used. Now I'm using Square Loyalty, but I have to manually integrate my old system with my new Square system to deliver the perks I promised. It would be such a big help if I could manually adjust the points in Square Loyalty to bring the accumulated points from the oil system into the new system. Obviously this needs to be done without triggering unintended rewards. The old system had the ability to manually adjust the lifetime accumulated points. The key here is to not trigger any rewards while adjusting lifetime accumulated points. We give out rewards for accumulated points milestones, but we also have a rewards club based on total accumulated points. The rewards club gets additional benefits such as invitations to special events held only for rewards club members.

[seiderman]

Hey @WineCurmudgeon,

We can definitely help you transfer points from your old provider to Square Loyalty. If it’s alright, I can follow up via email as I’ll need some more information from you to kick off the transfer.

[WineCurmudgeon]

Yes, Please contact me about setting up a transfer.

[JessPoynter]

This is SUCH an exciting topic! I have been using Loyalty now for a few years almost and my clients are loving the points. It often generates a higher ticket at the end of service. 

One feature I would love to see included with Loyalty is a variety of earning rules. For example, I'd like to be able to give points for a visit AND a specific amount spent AND any item in a category, each with different point values attached to them. If I had a client come in, purchase a hair mask and receive a haircut, I'd like for them to automatically get 3 points without me having to keep tracking and add it in manually. 

Another great thing would be a point update on their receipt for easy reference. 

I'm sure I have other ideas in my head too. Hopefully they come back to me on Thursday! 

[cspillane]

Hi @JessPoynter,

Thanks for reaching out. I’m happy to hear you’re enjoying the product! 

At this time Square Loyalty requires spend-based, visit-based, item-based, and category-based programs to be mutually exclusive. We do appreciate your feedback though as it helps us better understand how we can iterate our offerings in the future to best serve your (and your customer’s) needs. 

With regard to your 2nd comment, if using digital receipts and/or the Cash App integration, buyers are able to see the points they’ve earned.

[JessPoynter]

Is there any way to see the points on paper receipts? I have the Register