A loyalty card that launches badly becomes a QR nobody mentions and a drawer nobody opens. One that launches well has fifty members by the following Saturday and staff who ask without thinking. The difference is a week of small, deliberate things. Here is the week.
Before day one: set the card
Sign up for Counter Club with your shop name, email, a password and your mobile, which is confirmed by a texted code. On the Loyalty card page, set the stamps to the reward and write the reward. If you have not decided, read the guide on how many stamps a card should have; the short version is six to ten for a weekly or daily regular, four to six for a fortnightly one, and a reward you make or stock yourself.
Save, and the join link and QR appear under the form. Print the QR at two sizes: an A6 card for the till, and a larger one for wherever people wait. Write the rule under it in your own hand or your own font: "One stamp per coffee, show your mobile." Laminate the one that will live near anything wet.
Day one, Monday: staff first
Do not launch to customers on day one. Launch to staff. Everyone who works the counter joins the club themselves on their own phone, so they have seen the join page and know it takes a minute. Then each one stamps the other from the Members page and watches the count go up. One of them fills a card by pressing until the target and sees what a reward code looks like next to the button.
Agree the words. Something short, such as "Are you in the club?" or "Scan that for a free coffee after ten." A handful of words, the same every time. Staff who have to improvise a pitch stop pitching.
Agree who stamps. Whoever takes payment presses Stamp, in the same breath as the total. Not a separate step.
Day two, Tuesday: the regulars you know by name
Put the QR out. Ask only the people whose order you already know, and ask while their order is being made, not at the moment of payment. Those people say yes at a very high rate because they already like you, and they are the ones you most want on the list. Ten to fifteen joins on a quiet Tuesday is a good day.
Watch the Members page as they appear. Stamp each one for the visit they are on, and tell them they are on one.
Day three, Wednesday: the QR goes where people wait
Move the big QR to the place with a queue: beside the coffee machine, on the bread bench, by the wrapping table. A join takes about as long as the thing they are waiting for. If nobody is scanning, the QR is in the wrong place or too small. Move it before Thursday.
Day four, Thursday: ask everyone
By now staff have said the words two hundred times and the pitch is automatic. Ask every customer who pays. Most will say no and that is fine; some will have seen a regular get stamped and be curious. Keep the ask to the agreed words and move on.
Day five, Friday: look at the list
Open Members. How many joined this week? How many have two or more stamps already? Is anyone who you expected to join missing? Those are the people to ask tomorrow, when the shop is busy and joining looks like the thing everyone does.
Check the Overview page too. If you are on the Free plan it shows members against the fifty limit. If you are close, decide tonight whether Saturday will fill it, because a join page that says the club is full on your busiest morning is a wasted Saturday. Regulars is twenty-four dollars a month and the change shows within a minute.
Day six, Saturday: the real launch
Saturday is when the card earns its keep. Two devices on the Members page if you have two lanes, a QR at each. Staff ask every customer with the agreed words. People waiting scan because the person in front just did. Expect your biggest join day of the week, and expect the first reward code or two for anyone who has come in daily since Tuesday. Hand the reward over at the till the moment the code appears, in front of the queue. Nothing sells the card like watching someone get their free coffee.
Day seven, Sunday: decide what to change
Look at three things. The number of members: fifty is a fine first week for a cafe, twenty is fine for a florist. The stamp counts: if nobody has passed three, the rule might be too strict or staff might be forgetting to press. The place where joins happened: if Saturday was most of them, the weekday ask is not landing and the words need work.
Change one thing for week two, not three. Then leave the card alone for a month. Members have joined on a deal; let them reach the reward on it before you touch anything.
What not to do in week one
Do not send a campaign. You are on Free, so you cannot, and that is right. The club needs a month of stamps before it has anything to be told. Do not add anyone by hand; there is no way, and the week is about customers choosing to join. And do not apologise for asking. A card is a thank you to regulars. Say it like one.