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How Your Small Business Can Build Loyalty with Singapore’s Millennials

Among the top challenges for startups is getting a devoted customer base. Millennials are the most brand-loyal generation, and therefore big targets to small businesses. Targeting this generation could be the key to winning lifetime loyalty.

Millennials hold an immense purchase power. Therefore, if you can successfully tap into this market group, your business’s future is bright. From surveys conducted across the world, millennials spending is high. For instance, in America, they have a spending power of up to $600 billion. Small businesses should think about how to build a stable and lasting relationship with the millennials.

Before you can rush to introduce your brand to millennials, you need to understand them first. They belong to a unique generation. Millennials detach themselves from the ever-honored institutions like religions and political parties. This generation disregards the bureaucratic set-up and honor independent living.

The millennials want to associate themselves with digital life mostly. Their spending habits, values, brand preferences, and personalities are digital-oriented. For instance, they are uninterested in TV ads and tend not to buy from the brands engaged in such advertisements. If you want to get their attention, it’s best to use social media. This is where you will always find them trying to catch with the latest trends.

Here is how to build loyalty with the Singaporean millennials and develop a long lasting relationship with them.

1. Have a social presence

You are highly likely to attract millennials with your brand if you engage them through social media platforms. They respond quite well to social messages, and social marketing makes a lot of sense to them. The majority of millennials won’t be inspired by TV commercials but highly affiliated with the social phenomenon. The importance of social media is evidenced by the Shorty Awards which rewards the brands with the most significant social media presence.

You will build a name with the millennials if you contact them often to say hello; get their opinion about your product. Talk to them freely; establish friendship, and you will build trust and loyalty. Find out their favorite hangout platforms. The mostly liked spots include Facebook and Twitter. You can use them to share emotional messages since millennials are emotional-driven. Also, they take an interest in the way they look among their circles. They can buy a product even when they don’t need them to gain recognition among their peers.

2. Show your understanding

If you want to gain recognition by the millennials, show how you understand them. They will love a brand that is tied with creativity and offers convenience. Therefore, be sure to provide cutting-edge offerings. It shows you are customizing the product to them and this will put you ahead of the crowd.

Whenever they need you, be there for them, but otherwise leave them alone. A mix of social media usage, providing creativity and convenience will show the millennials you are targeting them. This will pool them to your direction and will help you establish loyalty with this group.

3. Be authentic

Authenticity is the quality of being true. Millennials consider a product to be authentic if it delivers on its promises and respects consumer data privacy. They don’t recognize how big a brand sells, but their concern is community awareness, top quality, and its actions. Such characteristics are a show of customer relations.

Cohn and Wolfe’s study indicate that customer relation is more important than the brand’s beliefs. This is evident in its top authentic brands across the world. Today, millennials have more ways than ever to establish a product or service authenticity. Social media provides a way to know if a brand is believable. Moreover, you can know this immediately after the product’s first delivery.

4. Use multi-channel marketing

While you establish a social media presence, do it on several platforms. Include Facebook, Twitter and Instagram among the platforms you will use. This will enable you to reach the maximum potential audience and make more loyal customers. It will be a way to diversify your marketing presence such that if one doesn’t work maximally, the others will do.

If your brand initiates a following in one channel, this may ignite a following in other channels, and your brand will eventually win a loyal customer base. Social media users like sharing anything that matters to them and this is how your brand reputation will spread. Including a loyalty program to reward the loyal in your marketing will take you a long way. It will be like adding butter to a piece of bread. You will reinforce the loyalty already created by your brand authenticity.

5. Use experiential marketing

The highly interactive world brought by technological advances only makes a conducive environment for experiential marketing. You give your offering to the consumers and let them get excited about it. You offer your product or service for free to have potential consumers experience it. They will spread the news about its performance.

You can use experiential marketing in several areas which include:

  • To introduce a brand into the market

  • To build loyal fans of your brand

  • To create awareness of your positive brand qualities

  • To incite brand purchases

  • To create an emotional connection with your product


An example of experiential marketing is the Coca-cola hug machine. It was put at the National University of Singapore and dispensed free cans of coca-cola to anyone who hugged it. When millennials like your offering, they will share the story on the Facebook platform or others.

Targeting millennials may appear a challenging imperative to the old Singapore marketers. It is because they are used to bureaucratic advertising methods like TV commercial ads. However those that master the science will win a competitive advantage. Here the goal is to capture the attention of the most brand loyal group. Millennials will provide the most credible loyal customer base.  

Here is more for you:

How Part-time Jobs are Changing Employment Landscape in Singapore

Helping Millennial Make Better Financial Decisions

How The Next FOMC Meeting Will Affect Your Trading

(By Racheal Muriithi)

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