Loyalty Newswire – June 8th, 2020

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By: Wise Marketer Staff |

Posted on June 8, 2020

Here's your loyalty-related news for this week:

  • Analyzing how seven top brands approach loyalty in different ways
  • Food Lion enables shoppers to use digital coupons and redeem MVP points while shopping online
  • 7-Eleven deploys new customer service management platform
  • Zendesk highlights the importance of a consistent customer experience
  • Survey Monkey aims to combine all CX solutions under one umbrella
  • Three in five consumers shopped at local stores during the COVID-19 lockdown according to new Deloitte research
  • NRF forecasts that spending in the 50 largest retail markets will be around $528 billion lower than it was in 2019
  • Hotel CEOs discuss the current and possible future state of the hospitality industry
  • Air Canada and Eithad Airways announce new partnership to offer more earning and redemption opportunities for members

LOYALTY PROGRAM NEWS:

Analyzing 7 Well-Known Reward Programs: Amazon, Kellogg’s, Uber and More

Quotable: “As life has started returning to normal after COVID-19, customers’ demand for businesses to honor their loyalty is on the rise. However, when planning a rewards program, you might feel overwhelmed by the myriad strategies and schemes to choose from.”

Food Lion links loyalty program to online grocery services

Quotable: “The new services give Food Lion customers more ways to save through its online grocery services, the Salisbury, N.C.-based chain said Monday. Customers see their accumulated Shop & Earn rewards on the checkout screen, as well as the “clipped” digital coupons applied to their order.”

CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE NEWS:

Exclusive Q&A: 7-Eleven overhauls customer support operation

Quotable: “We wanted a solution that was not only internal customer-friendly (everyday employees in the IT, HR, facilities management and customer service), but was also just as friendly to our external customers (people who shop at our stores). The solution needed to integrate all these systems to improve service across the full spectrum of the business, because having a Slurpee machine out of order or a gas pump down in a location requires servicing and repairs to meet the customer’s need.”

Zendesk: COVID-19 Has Only Increased the Need for Consistent Customer Experiences

Quotable: “'Companies that are using WhatsApp and chat and social media as channels for engaging with their customers have just seen huge spikes in volume and support — and that’s really become a de facto way that customers want to engage with the brands that service them,' he noted. Email has increased also, but phone use for support 'has seen a drop-off — it’s really not how customers want to engage,' he said.”

SurveyMonkey Accelerates Position in Customer Experience (CX) Market

Quotable: “The suite will combine all of SurveyMonkey’s current CX solutions under one umbrella, including the GetFeedback CX platform built for the Salesforce customer, and Usabilla, which offers digital experience capabilities that bring real-time feedback from websites and apps. Both platforms were acquired by SurveyMonkey in 2019, and together they will be known as the GetFeedback Suite. SurveyMonkey will continue to offer both GetFeedback and Usabilla to organizations globally while working to integrate the two product lines into a multi-channel CX offering.”

RETAIL NEWS:

Deloitte: three in five consumers have used more local stores and services to support them during lockdown

Quotable: “According to Deloitte Digital’s research, 46% of consumers say they are more likely to spend money at a business that supports local charities, such as food banks, once the lockdown has lifted. In comparison, 25% of consumers say they are more likely to spend money at a UK business with a large national presence and just 7% say they would be more likely to use a business that has a large global presence.”

Through the retail lens: Global opportunities and obstacles

Quotable: “Like the U.S., all countries have seen a spike in online sales and grocery retailers have outperformed as consumers started to stockpile. However, countries where consumers are very digitally enabled in terms of shopping — like China, South Korea and Singapore — have seen sales hold up better as retail brands quickly switched from physical to online engagement.”

HOSPITALITY NEWS:

Hotel CEOs Discuss the Present and Future of Hospitality Industry

Quotable: “Most of the CEOs have discussed the difficultly of having to furlough and let go employees, but offered glimmers of hope in how to move forward. 'All of us, as leaders, have a lot of people looking to us, whether that's our family, our children, our loved ones, friends [or] the hundreds of thousands of people that wake up every day that work in these fine companies of ours,' said Christopher Nassetta, President and CEO of Hilton. 'And what they need to have is hope. They need to have a light at the end of the tunnel and it's our jobs to give them that.'”

AIRLINES NEWS:

Air Canada & Etihad Airways Launch Partnership

Quotable: “With this new partnership, Air Canada and Etihad Airways are offering reciprocal mileage earning and redemption opportunities. Air Canada belongs to the Star Alliance, while Etihad is unaligned (they used to have Etihad Airways Partners, but that kind of fell apart), so it’s cool to see a partnership like this.”

View last week's newswire: Loyalty Newswire – June 1st, 2020

The Loyalty Newswire is compiled and edited by the staff at The Wise Marketer.