CHICAGO, Nov. 11, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Cision, a leading media communications technology and analytics company, today announced a partnership with Loyalty360, the unbiased, objective, and market-driven association for customer loyalty, which seeks to encourage and enable customer-focused strategies that build strong brand-client relationships.  The partnership underscores Cision's commitment to helping brands globally take their clients from engagement to loyalty - and advocacy - the ultimate step for marketing and communications professionals.

Effectively combining content, data and technology with customer experience best practices can not only create clients that share positive experiences about your brand with others that are likely to buy, but also make them repeat buyers, raising average customer lifetime value (CLV) and revenue. In fact, repeat buyers spend 67% more than new ones¹. Because of the proven return on investment (ROI) of loyalty and advocacy programs, 62% of brands plan to spend more on loyalty programs and 76% list enhances customer experience as a top priority².

Loyalty360 also announced that Cision SVP of Marketing, Ken Wincko, has been appointed to the Board of Advisors for Loyalty360, joining C-suite peers from leading brands dedicated to steering the future of loyalty marketing. Driven by demand to bring loyalty to the forefront of marketing, Loyalty360 board members are focused on guiding strategic initiatives, such as development of clear metrics, best practices, standards and certifications.

"Loyalty360 prides itself on the wealth of content we create alongside our association members," said Mark Johnson, CEO of Loyalty360. "Armed with Cision's unrivaled media expertise and distribution capabilities, we look forward to sharing the voices of this association and continuing to drive the dialogue surrounding customer experience and retention."

Wincko will be speaking at Loyalty360's Engagement and Experience Expo, taking place December 5-7 in Denver. The event is a forum to openly discuss customer, brand and channel challenges and solutions as well as optimization of the customer experience and increasing the impact of engagement throughout the customer lifecycle. Marketing and Customer Experience professionals interested in attending the conference can use the discount code PRW16 for 25% off conference registration. The discount code cannot be combined with other offers and is not valid on existing registrations.

"Cision and Loyalty360 both share a passion for creating exceptional customer experiences," said Wincko. "A critical component for driving loyalty and advocacy is a deep understanding of buyer and influencer behavior, which we enable for our clients through our market-leading media communications technology, analytics and best practices.  We are excited to partner with Loyalty360 and help companies around the world enhance their customer experience capabilities."

About Loyalty360:
Loyalty360 is an unbiased, objective, and market-driven association for customer loyalty, which seeks to enable and encourage dialogue among industry leaders. Through a unique blend of content, collaboration, and diverse learning opportunities, we've created a network of brands and technology providers that represent some of the best voices that the customer loyalty industry has to offer. These relationships help us understand the cutting-edge tools, technologies, platforms, and strategic services that are allowing marketers to build authentic customer connections and earn long-term loyalty. From our introductory individual memberships to our top Premium tier, our members are provided with the exposure, certification, and the exclusive content they need to continue their path to true customer centricity.

About Cision:
Cision is a leading media communication technology and analytics company that enables marketers and communicators to effectively manage their earned media programs in coordination with paid and owned channels to drive business impact. As the creator of the Cision Communication Cloud™, the first-of-its-kind earned media cloud-based platform, Cision has combined cutting-edge data, analytics, technology and services into a unified communication ecosystem that brands can use to build consistent, meaningful and enduring relationships with influencers and buyers in order to amplify their marketplace influence. Cision solutions also include market-leading media technologies such as PR Newswire, Gorkana, PRWeb, Help a Reporter Out (HARO) and iContact. Headquartered in Chicago, Cision serves over 100,000 customers in 170 countries and 40 languages worldwide, and maintains offices in North America, Europe, the Middle East, Asia, Latin America and Australia. For more information, visit www.cision.com or follow @Cision on Twitter.

Contact:
Stacey Miller
Director, Communications
(301) 683-6038
stacey.miller@cision.com

¹https://www.loyalty360.org/content-gallery/research-and-reports/20-characteristics-for-best-in-breed-loyalty-progr
²https://www.loyalty360.org/loyalty-today/article/customer-loyalty-and-engagement-a-top-priority-for

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SOURCE Cision