ATLANTA -

Summit Resources is now providing dealers with a free version of its LoyaltyCash online rewards program, a tool it believes can drive more repeat customers at dealerships.

LoyaltyCash allows dealers to reward customers who come back to the store to make transactions, thus giving dealers another strong selling point.

LoyaltyCash monitors each transaction a specific customer makes at a dealership, whether it’s a vehicle purchase or a parts/service transaction. The amount of LoyaltyCash given to the customer depends on how much they spend at the dealership.

The customer can then use this LoyaltyCash in transactions at the store down the road.

“Dealers like the program because it increases repeat business, is highly cost-effective, easy to manage and integrates with their databases,” stated Summit Resources chief executive officer Jonathan Lucenay. “Moreover, dealers find LoyaltyCash is a powerful tool to help increase the profitability of fixed operations and makes a rewards program a profit center.”

In fact, the pilot LoyaltyCash program found that service revenue climbed 76 percent  for dealers who used the program for an average of one year. Meanwhile, dollars spent per repair order for that same group climbed 66 percent, and repair orders per month increased 15 percent.

Moving along, officials also noted that the product is “extremely easy to use.” Clients can enroll themselves in the program, which helps them save time.

The company noted that another benefit to LoyaltyCash cited by dealers is that it is “scalable and fully customizable.” Dealers can tailor it to include whatever percentage of cash on the dollar they want each reward to have. Moreover, they can also choose how much money they will allow to be put toward purchases.

A couple of dealers offered their reaction to the product.

“LoyaltyCash is efficient and has definitely increased our sales and service retention rates,” said Michael Brown, vice president of operations for Atlantic Auto Group in Long Island, N.Y.

Mike Breyfogle — who is the general manager of Tempe Dodge Chrysler, Jeep, Kia in Tempe, Ariz. — added his perspective, as well.

"I’ve always believed a well-managed loyalty program would benefit our dealership and improve customer retention. Several years ago, we developed our own loyalty program but quickly found it was a nightmare to administer and didn’t produce the results we wanted,” he shared.

“The Summit software is simple to use and automatically tracks clients’ entire repair order history, how much they spend with us and their LoyaltyCash balance. Our customers appreciate the additional savings and like the fact they can access their service records 24-7,” Breyfogle continued.

Officials noted that the Tempe dealership is seeing hundreds of customers joining the program on a monthly basis.

“Since it’s six to eight times more expensive to acquire new customers than retain existing ones, and repeat clients spend about a third more than new customers, it makes sense for dealers to do everything they can to build repeat business,” Lucenay pointed out. “Summit is proud to be the first company to offer a tested loyalty solution that dealers can implement free of charge.”

Summit Resources also provides a premium version of LoyaltyCash. It includes such expanded features as unlimited customer e-mails and offering reports on a monthly basis instead of every quarter.