Future of Loyalty and benefits of paying with points

From a customer perspective, loyalty programs are starting to look very similar, be it at an airline, bank or telco rewards program. More and more effort (and marketing) is required to stand out and maintain a clear differentiation, especially in the digital age of competing for attention. Taking a look at the bank reward programs, for example, almost all major banks in the Middle East today offer reward points on their credit cards, all have vouchers and/or a branded store to spend those points on travel or merchandize and all have cashback options. As a consumer, this has become the norm when applying for a card, to the point that this norm is no longer satisfying by itself.

The loyalty industry’s purpose has always been bringing customers back for more spend and engagement with the brand. Although there are multiple ways to achieve this, with little differentiation among the programs, loyalty managers need to think outside the box to keep their users engaged and their rewards relevant.

One of the main ways of differentiation today is enabling non-core redemptions, which is no longer seen as a luxury but in fact a must in the diversification of the redemption options. With the loyalty program redemption options starting to look the same, personalization is key to maintaining relevance. Providing more choice is generally desirable and creates increased satisfaction among loyalty program members. Once these options become non-core to the program (think spending airline points on the next online food order for example), now the reward program is immersed in the lifestyle of the user instead.

In allowing members to redeem on virtually whatever they want, reward programs get to learn what their users want. This is crucial in achieving hyper personalization of the redemption options, which is a proven way to get ultimate engagement from users.

Get in touch with PointCheckout to know more on how to elevate your reward program to a highly engaging one and provide a hyper-personal experience for your members, without changing the program itself.