Summary
SONIC Drive-In is the nation’s largest drive-in restaurant chain, with more than 3,500 restaurants. Since 2009, SONIC has provided funding to support public school teachers through its Limeades for Learning program, and the brand recently wanted to expand that support by rewarding teachers with special menu offers in the SONIC App.
SONIC created the Teachers’ Circle rewards program, but to ensure the offers were exclusive, it needed to easily verify teachers through its app. SONIC leveraged SheerID’s Audience Network, and when it launched the program, it drove 2.8 billion earned media impressions and a 900% increase in the average daily program sign-ups.
The SheerID team was technically skilled and had experience working with our CRM, so we knew it would be a turnkey solution.
Challenge
For nearly 70 years, SONIC Drive-In has delighted guests with a diverse menu that its iconic carhops deliver to a customer’s car—often on roller skates. Since 2009, the company has also been well known for Limeades for Learning, a program that has provided educators with more than $22 million for project grants.
SONIC wanted to personalize its support of teachers even further by using its popular app to give them exclusive offers. To do this, the company needed a platform that would digitally verify teachers to protect the offers—and its more than 3,500 restaurants—from high-volume discounting. And the platform had to seamlessly integrate with the SONIC App so that teachers would have a streamlined experience and their data would automatically move into SONIC’s CRM.
Brittni Shull, SONIC’s director of digital marketing, began researching vendors and quickly learned that SheerID’s Audience Network was a perfect fit.
SheerID had a strong reputation for verifying teachers, and a demo of the platform confirmed that verification would occur easily and instantly.
Solution
Brittni’s team implemented SheerID and created the SONIC Teachers’ Circle—a free rewards program exclusively for educators. Teachers would get verified when they signed up for the SONIC App by entering basic information—like their school and email address—into a simple SheerID form. Once they were verified, they could start receiving special offers just for teachers.
SONIC’s teacher program was a hit even before the company officially launched it. To test the verification process, a SONIC employee asked a few family members and friends who are teachers to sign up to receive the first offer—free medium tots.
News of the offer immediately spread like wildfire. Teachers shared it with colleagues, and schools posted about it to their staff. Within two days, SONIC had thousands of sign-ups—all from word-of-mouth.
When SONIC saw teachers actively promoting the program, the company knew it would be a hit. The marketing team’s approach to promoting the program includes:
- Emailing its database, inviting teachers to sign up, and encouraging everyone to share the program with teachers they know.
- Developing PR campaigns that tie teacher offers to Limeades for Learning announcements.
- Using the first-party verification data it collects to notify teachers of new offers.
Brent Reams, SONIC’s PR manager said, “SONIC doesn’t currently use paid media to promote its teacher offers. Word-of-mouth between teachers is by far our program’s biggest driver.”
Teachers are a tight-knit group and love letting their colleagues know about the benefits our teacher program offers.
Results
Brittni and Brent said the teacher program is wildly popular and has helped drive SONIC brand awareness and loyalty. This is particularly evident when SONIC ties a teacher reward to a Limeades for Learning campaign, like it did for Teacher Appreciation Day in May. The company announced a $1.5 million donation to teachers and used the occasion to invite teachers to sign up for the Teachers’ Circle rewards program to get a free cheeseburger.
Membership in the program went through the roof.
“By offering a notable reward and an easy way for a specific audience to participate, SONIC saw Teachers’ Circle program sign-ups increase by 900% compared to the daily average during the campaign,” Brent said. “Rewarding teachers is a great way to capture the attention of the press.”
Brittni credits much of that success to SONIC’s partnership with SheerID—and sees the potential for more to come.
“SheerID keeps our offers truly exclusive. That makes teachers feel special, and it’s the kind of personal touch we want to give every customer coming into our drive-in,” she said. “We’re always looking for new communities to engage, and we’re excited by the ability SheerID gives us to go above and beyond to reward them.”
Every teacher reward spurs additional purchases, but the program’s real value is how effectively it raises awareness of our mission to support teachers.