Tesco. The third biggest retailer in the world. Their UK stores cover more floorspace than the city of London. They employ 472,000 people to sell 40,000 different products in 4,811 stores across 14 countries.
They also have something charities crave; customer loyalty. But what took Tesco ahead of Asda, Morrison’s and Sainsbury’s in the war for the wallet? The customer journey.
Tesco provides everything you need while you’re in the store and because you know they will, they have your trust as well. They make you feel wanted. We need different things from charities, but are they providing them? Do charities even consider them?
Imagine the scenario. It’s the day before your holiday. You need to buy food for tonight, holiday clothes and a foreign plug adapter. You need to change some holiday money, go to the chemist, visit the bank and nip into the post office. You need a haircut and the car needs washing and filling up with petrol before the airport drive. How many places do you need to visit? Just one.
Tesco also employ lots of staff. They know where everything is. They even employ someone to point out which self service till is available. It's mollycoddling in the extreme. Now I’m not suggesting charities should open up megastores, but why do some charities provide no journey at all?
Many moons ago, I decided to donate to a domestic violence charity. Back then, I didn’t even know any. I had to google one, then set up a direct debit. For this, I received a dull newsletter every month. I had no idea what my money was being spent on, how much of it reached the cause and what difference I made, if any. Why not?
Compare it to this. I moved to London last year and I needed to cram the cupboards. I googled the nearest Tesco and obviously it was less than ten minutes' walk. I knew what to expect when I got there, where the special offers were, where the reduced section would be and went safe in the knowledge that there would be plenty of trollies, staff and stock. I didn’t have to worry about my shopping experience.
Do I have the same opinion about any charity? Do I know they’ll spend my money wisely? Will they tell me what they spent it on? Do I know that the cause is being tackled at all, let alone in the right way? For me, the answer is no. No charity has ever tried effectively to tell me.
The crux of the matter is people need supermarkets. Marginalise the competition and you’re set for huge growth. No one needs to give to charity. Charities need to provide some sort of journey for their customer, or people will switch to the charitable equivalent of Asda, Sainsbury’s or Morrison’s… or worse still, stop shopping.
I want to be updated. I’d like to know that you’re grateful, but mainly I want to know I’m making a difference. I want to feel like I do pre-Tesco; that my journey is already assured.
Here are some random calls for action:
- If you’re sending me a newsletter, put some interactive things in it. Ask me for my experiences. But don’t rely on it, because I may well not read it
- Tell me what you’re up to without referring me to an annual report that I will never read. If I read about you in the newspaper or on social media, I’ll think "they’re really doing something and I contributed to that." You’re probably doing a great job, so don’t risk me not hearing about it
- Send me a text when my direct debit goes through. Say “thanks Rob, this month we’re focussing on X Y and Z.” I know what my £10 is going towards. I bet it wouldn’t cost you that much
- If I do cancel, give me a call and ask me why. You might pick up some feedback or I might have done it by accident. All I ever got were constant mailers (new paper aeroplane material) when I cancelled last time
- Make me feel like I’m not the only one who cares in this relationship!
I’ve donated to three or four charities recently, both for nfpSynergy and for myself, and I've never felt like they were too fussed. Some charities probably do it very well, but as a donor I’ve never experienced that. So was I just unlucky? Or are there lots more charities out there who, if they were honest, would say they fall short?
It is difficult to manage the relationship when you have thousands of donors, but make a start and put some more thought into the journey. Every little helps.
Have you never thought about this Till now? Or do you feel shortchanged? Aisle bet you have an opinion - leave us a comment below.
The suggestions in this
The suggestions in this article were relevant and useful - particularly about the need to keep in touch and be accountable to all supporters. However I am not convinced about how wonderful our supermarkets are. More often than not, when I go into one of my local ASDA, Sainsbury's, Tesco or Morrisons, I find lots of tills are unmanned, while customers are queuing up at the few that are open or having to scan all their own items at the ironically described 'Express Self-Checkouts'. We all know what's going on here. If the supermarkets can get us to check out our goods then they can make more of their staff redundant and increase bonuses for their Boards of Directors. So don't let's kid ourselves that our supermarkets are a module for charities to follow.
Much of this article
Much of this article resonates - we should be mindful that the best in the commercial world are far better at understanding their customers and their motivations, and using that information to maximise the relationship. However, I have a couple of concerns:
1) Your article quite rightly points out that Tesco generates loyalty by increasing it's product range so that you can meet many of your needs in one place. As charities, we have far more limited 'products' at our disposal. We can't simply add to our range of delivery, or invest millions in loss-leaders to attract new customers to store.
2) As a person who understands charities, you hit the mark about donor journey. However, you also speak here as a donor - and as a donor, you apply criteria that you don't when you buy from Tesco. If a charity were to feed back to you (as a typical donor) that it spent all your donation on developing world class donor servcie and loyalty programmes because it needed to secure the future for its beneficiaries, you'd likely withdraw your support because of high admin costs or because nothing had gone to 'the cause'! You (as a typical Tesco cusomer) don't apply the same conditions to the profit you allow them to generate on your sales.
Perhaps a better use of investment would be for charites as a whole to begin to develop a more mature dialogue with donors, which helped them understand that we need to invest in this sort of thing, and allow us to rely on their continued support at we do so.