Tasti D-Lite’s loyalty program fueled by Twitter, Foursquare

Editor’s note: This story is covered in a video in Ragan’s new distance-learning portal RaganTraining.com. The site contains more than 200 hours of case studies, video presentations, and interactive courses. For membership information, please click here. A woman in New York City tweets, “Waiting for 4:30. Going uptown to meet husband, get some Tasti D-Lite or Mr. Softee. Mmmm … ice cream.”

B.J. Emerson—an executive with the dual brand Tasti D-Lite and Planet Smoothie—follows her on Twitter and sends her a tweet from @tastidlite. The woman notices, exclaims “OMG,” and then asks about Tasti’s rival: “Where is Mr. Softee?”

Snoozing, maybe?

Well, Tasti is listening—and offers her coupons for the site where she’s heading. Guess whose ice cream the couple bought.

Social media’s location-based services have changed everything about marketing, Emerson says. Tasti has melded punch cards and coupons with the word-of-mouth that is social media—a double dip of customer loyalty and free advertising, says Emerson, who is vice president of technology for Tasti/Smoothie.