Awin’s Brand Partnerships consultant Nicole Bradbury speaks with Mark Camp, CEO & Founder at Propello Cloud, who have successfully supported several brands to solidify their loyalty propositions.
Customer loyalty is more valuable than ever for retailers, yet exceedingly, more difficult to earn and maintain in what is becoming an ever increasingly crowded marketplace of online advertisers.
What if brands could better incentivise their best customers and rapidly drive-up revenue through a specialised loyalty and rewards solution?
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Nicole:
Who is Propello?
Mark:
Propello is a leading reward & loyalty tech platform - specialising in helping enterprise clients grow through enhancing their value proposition, part of which is delivered via hyper relevant reciprocal brand partnerships.
Our no code solution seamlessly integrates into any CRM or ecommerce platform to drive engagement through each stage of the customer lifecycle, the result being more customers, who stay around for longer and are on average 5x more valuable.
We work with brands such as JD Sports Gyms, HelloFresh, Graze, Beer52, British Business Bank and Lebara Mobile. So, where clients have a subscription-based business model our solution is particularly strong, but equally we are seeing fantastic results with clients in the ecom space, where there is a membership component.
Nicole:
What are the benefits of a brand hosting a reward platform?
Mark:
Before we get into the benefits, it’s important to contextualise that first and foremost, your customers choose your brand because of the value proposition you already deliver. Our role in building a reward or loyalty proposition is to build on that existing value proposition, which comes from a combination of highlighting the intrinsic benefits you already give to clients, and crucially recruiting the right, hyper relevant brand partnerships to complement your brand.
Done right, the benefits are huge, and not just from a retention or acquisition perspective.
“Paid for loyalty” propositions are a huge growth area for us where we’re seeing 8 figure (£10M+) revenue streams being generated from a standing start directly from the advent of the programme.
On top of that the more indirect benefits we see would include:
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New customer spending 75% higher after introduction of Propello
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Propello users were on average over 500% more valuable than nonusers
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NPS score is 35-52% higher than nonusers
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Customers are 9x more likely to make referrals than nonusers
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84% they would likely remain a customer just to use the rewards and 3x as likely to remain a customer
Nicole:
Is there a difference in the value of customers who interact with rewards vs. those that don't?
Mark:
Yes, absolutely. Building on the stats mentioned above, we’ve done a lot of work analysing customer LTV pre and post implementation of a reward programme, and also between those who engage post launch and those who don’t.
On average we see customers are 5x more valuable, but we have seen 10x more valuable, especially where average customer value and purchase frequency is high.
Nicole:
What role does gamification play in incentivising customer loyalty?
Mark:
Gamification is absolutely critical in driving the engagement that incentivises customer loyalty. A “loyalty programme” can’t truly be considered a loyalty programme without clear games, or conditions, designed to help customers reach the desirable commercial milestones or objectives we set.
At Propello we have invested heavily in multiple different game types and features, such as tiers, points, unlocks, challenges, stamp cards, time-based games, scratch cards and spin to win.
Each game type has different applications and objectives, and by implementing these various different reward systems we can motivate customers to participate in ongoing activities to ensure they remain committed to the brand.
In the context of brand partnerships, the value from closely aligned partnerships can be used as leverage via gamification to motivate customer actions. This is not only hugely valuable for our clients but given that the cost is supplemented by the partner, it’s a very efficient way of rewarding customers.
Nicole:
Why should a brand utilise specialist tech like Propello vs. in-house built loyalty platforms?
Mark:
The three biggest components of why our clients choose Propello, even when they have already had in-house propositions come down to 3 factors: cost, risk and time - all of which are completely interlinked.
1) Cost
To develop proprietary in-house tech that does a good enough job at mid-market and enterprise level is hugely expensive - and it’s also a massive distraction. The in-house costs involved would typically exceed 6 figures just to get to launch, and then post launch will require 5 figure monthly upkeep just to be effective. In comparison, using a specialist like Propello requires no upfront investment and you only pay for adoption-based success. This leads on nicely to our next point, risk.
2) Risk
This hefty pre and post launch investment with an in-house team that typically doesn’t have the right level of experience in the space, is a massive risk for any business. Specialist loyalty vendors are professionals living the job day in day out, meaning they can provide high levels of expertise, advanced technologies, and best practices that massively diminish the risks involved.
3) Time
The third factor is time. We see in-house propositions stalling or taking too long to bring to market, often because of cost or risk, and the cost of inaction or the delay is often much greater than the cost of taking the initial risk. In comparison, using a specialist vendor will get you to market sometimes in as little as a few days with a very advanced programme.
So, if loyalty programmes or brand partnerships are on on your radar, contact us to arrange your discovery call.
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