“Khushiyon Ki Home Delivery”

Dominos sure knows what they are talking about.

My husband and I are loyal and very regular customers of Dominos; so much so, that when my husband and I went on a diet and gave up pizzas for about 6 months, their customer care personnel called us to ask why we’d stopped ordering pizzas, if they had done anything wrong, if they could do anything to get us to order pizzas again. A single call – a simple gesture of caring for their customer – and they won us over.

My husband suggested that they include a whole wheat pizza option on their menu – as a healthier alternative. Promptly, the very next month, a pamphlet was delivered at home, talking about the launch of the new whole wheat thin-crust pizza! I’m not saying that the credit goes to my husband for this brilliant addition to their menu, I’m sure they heard this from enough of their customers before they decided to go with it – but this won them pots of brownie points from us. Not only did they introduce the pizza, they also knew who to inform about the same.

This sure got us ordering pizzas once again. We started asking for “less cheese” on the pizzas. The first couple of times we did this, we had to really explain to them what we meant by less cheese – because they weren’t used to hearing it at all. Now, after about 3 months of doing so, “less cheese” and “no cheese” have become standard options to choose from – there’s no hesitation or speck of surprise in the voice of the person taking the order.

That said, these options aren’t offered across all Dominos outlets. They have identified pockets of the city where there is demand for such healthier alternatives, like, the Dominos on Pedder Road in Mumbai has these options but the branch in Prabhadevi, although aware of the offering in other branches, does not have the option themselves. On the other hand, the Dominos in Nagpur hasn’t even heard of this option (I was met with a look of “pizza and whole wheat are oxymorons” when I tried ordering a whole wheat pizza in the Dominos in Nagpur). Smart move – acting locally and how! No added complexity and cost in the form of additional product options unless there is sufficient demand for them. But where sufficient demand exists – Bingo!

In addition, they track their regular customers very closely. And not only do they track them – they also create customized communication material and discount coupons for these customers and mail/ email/ sms regularly to them. In our case, since we always order two thin crust pizzas with a fixed combination of toppings – we receive mailers that have a set of coupons such that they are always applicable for our typical orders. Our friend, an even more regular Dominos customer (he orders from there at least twice a week) has a standard order combination of a thin crust pizza and a pasta dish – the coupons that he receives in the mail are always addressing his typical order pattern. Another friend, who always orders a dessert with his pizzas, gets a bunch of coupons via email with offers for their Tiramisu and Choco-lava cake.

It’s brilliant! A lot of companies do use customer information, but few actually succeed at making the customer feel so special!

They call this their Precision Marketing Program – I say, Well Done!

Need some results to show what this investment and effort into technology and analytics has gotten Dominos?  Sales generated solely basis precision marketing efforts  account for 30% of total sales.

This strategy is surely Precise!

By,

Roshni Jhaveri