In this week's Newswire you can enjoy a curated list of the latest customer loyalty, technology, payments, and other relevant marketing news. We include a spectrum of topics, all with the intention of keeping you informed and enabling you to star in your next big meeting.
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- Alibaba 11.11 Global Shopping Festival prioritizes customer loyalty to drive long-term retail growth
- Expedia is ramping up customer loyalty investments
- Frost & Sullivan report shows Auto Dealers build Customer Loyalty through After-sales Service
- Detroit’s Rocket Cos. Launches Future-focused Rewards Program
- Antavo Enterprise Loyalty Cloud launches new spy-themed video series
- Sephora Launches Same-Day Unlimited Subscription Offering
- Outdoor Retailer Evo launches new evo Membership program
- Drone Racing League launches new loyalty rewards program with PointsKash
- Wow Bao enters metaverse with a tiered NFT membership program
Alibaba 11.11 Global Shopping Festival prioritizes customer loyalty to drive long-term retail growth
Alibaba Group Holding Limited (NYSE: BABA; HKEX: 9988) today officially kicked off the 14th edition of its 11.11 Global Shopping Festival, featuring more than 290,000 brands. The event is the most powerful engine for merchants’ customer growth every year and this places customer loyalty at the center of the action. In its pre-11.11 research report released in late October, Bain & Co found that retailers need to prioritise customer loyalty over discount-led sales growth. The survey revealed that retailers who ranked the highest on consumer loyalty scored well on product quality, product range, and membership programmes. Consumers who gave these retailers the highest scores cited these as the top-three reasons, with less emphasis than average on pricing.
This year, Alibaba will equip merchants with tools and solutions to grow their brand loyalty membership programs and unveil new products, among other initiatives, to help them succeed during and beyond 11.11. To date, more than 40 brands on Tmall have loyalty membership programs that surpassed ten million members and 600 brands have loyalty membership programs with over one million members.
Expedia is ramping up customer loyalty investments
Expedia will continue to invest in gaining long-term value customers despite the risk of losing bookings to its competitors, as it focuses on brand awareness, paid app downloads and its loyalty program. Peter Kern, Expedia Group vice-chairman and CEO, said there had been up a “ramp-up of loyalty that we are balancing against other types of investments,” during an earnings call on Thursday.
Frost & Sullivan report shows Auto Dealers build Customer Loyalty through After-sales Service
After-sales service in the fiercely competitive automotive marketplace is renowned for fickle customer loyalty. Lack of transparency and lengthy repair delays result in customers losing trust in their service providers. A new research report from Frost & Sullivan finds that something as simple as effective communications and updates about the cost and time required for a job can prevent most of the issues. Dealer management systems (DMS) and customer relationship management (CRM) can be combined with rugged handhelds and digitization to give dealer services center workers access to customer information, including their relationship history. If you are working to build customer loyalty with auto dealers, you’ll want to read the full report.
Detroit’s Rocket Cos. Launches Future-focused Rewards Program
Rocket Cos. Inc., the Detroit-based fintech platform company consisting of Rocket Mortgage, Rocket Homes, Rocket Loans, and Rocket Money, has unveiled Rocket Rewards, a loyalty program empowering consumers to accrue points that can be redeemed toward various financial transactions across the Rocket Platform. The initial phase of the program will allow homebuyers to earn and redeem reward points to save money on their closing costs when financing their home purchase through Rocket Mortgage.
Jenn Steeves-Kiss, chief experience officer for Rocket Central, the centralized hub for the Rocket Cos.’ fintech platform said “What’s most exciting to me is that we are just scratching the surface of what’s possible with a powerful rewards program inside the Rocket ecosystem — whether that is finding innovative ways to provide discounts toward personal loans, free premium Rocket Money subscriptions, or even money off the installation of solar panels.” You can learn all about Rocket Rewards here.
Antavo Enterprise Loyalty Cloud launches new spy-themed video series
The Wise Marketer’s mission is to make loyalty programs better, and we are all about spreading this message across the world. But who knew that one simple phone call could change everything… or what a single CLMP™ would be capable of!
Each episode of this series will be published on The Wise Marketer. The 9-part mini-series features Antavo’s Jess Mizerak, CLMP™ as she and her trusty team unravel the mysteries and challenges of Loyalty Marketing. Follow the entire series to learn valuable tips and techniques delivered in an entertaining and creative format. The first episode is up now and you can see it here.
And about the phone call… look for the special cameo appearance from Mike Capizzi, Dean of the Loyalty Academy spreading our mission.
Sephora Launches Same-Day Unlimited Subscription Offering
The wave of subscription programs continues to roll. Cosmetic retailer Sephora has introduced Same-Day Unlimited, a subscription service that delivers products to customers in as little as two hours. The service offers a free trial for 30 days and there is no order minimum. Following the trial period, the subscription is $49 per year.
Outdoor Retailer Evo launches new evo Membership program
Evo, an online and physical outdoors retailer based in the Pacific Northwest, is launching evoMembership, a new rewards program that turns points earned on purchases into adventure trips. The program is free to join and is tier based, with advancement through Green, Blue and Black levels determined by how much you spend annually with evo. “It’s so exciting that now our customers, by doing what they love, can turn a new ski or snowboard purchase into helping fund backcountry laps in Whistler or Japan, or new mountain bike,” explained Bryce Phillips, founder, and CEO of evo.
Drone Racing League launches new loyalty rewards program with PointsKash
The Drone Racing League (DRL) has announced the launch of DRL Flight Club, a new rewards program that would allow fans to aggregate, convert, and spend loyalty points on DRL experiences. DRL has partnered with blockchain-enabled conversion platform PointsKash for this initiative. PointsKash CEO Steve Janjic said “DRL fans are young, tech-savvy, and tend to have higher incomes than traditional sports fans, suggesting that they’re more likely to stack up points across various loyalty rewards programs. We’ll help DRL fans consolidate those benefits into one centralized PointsKash account and use them toward DRL’s incredible drone racing events, gaming products and swag.”
Wow Bao enters metaverse with a tiered NFT membership program
Wow Bao, a fast casual Asian concept that uses vending machines, has announced an NFT-based extension of its Bao Bucks rewards program and the launch of "metaverse vending machines" as part of its Web3 strategy. According to one source, Wow Bao joins an expanding group of restaurant technology giants trying luck with Web3.
Members can make purchases in three levels and each will offer several physical and digital rewards such as discounts and monthly giveaways. The initial level of the program will have NFT purchase, points and funds to be spent at Wow Bao. Double and triple point rewards can be earned from the next level up. Fans of Wow Bao can be a part of the NFT program’s waiting list starting from today though the program won’t launch before January 2023.
Quote of the Week
From Chui Xue, President of Industry Development and Operation Center of Taobao and Tmall, Alibaba Group: “11.11 is the most powerful engine for our merchants’ customer growth every year. Transforming consumer awareness into customer loyalty is key to generating the best return on investment. We will introduce technology and business innovations while enhancing supply-demand matching and loyalty membership management, to support our brand and merchant partners. Ultimately, we aim to turn customer assets into the most important driving force for merchants’ long-term business growth.”
Fact of the Week
Interbrand has released its annual ranking of the top global brands. Technology brands dominate the list and this year, Microsoft jumped ahead of Amazon as the second most valuable brand. In the press release, Emma Ellis, Managing director of Interbrand London said “Brands that lead with empathy at the forefront of what they do and how they do it are the ones that will forge greater connections and benefit from stronger affinity, and this is reflected in this year’s rankings.”
Miss the previous newswire? Stay informed: Loyalty Newswire – October 31, 2022
The Loyalty Newswire is compiled and edited by the hard-working, customer-centric, data-driven staff at The Wise Marketer.
