Loyalty 360 had the opportunity to hear from Sean Hutchison, Vice President of Product with Points.com. We asked Sean to share his insights current trends, loyalty and customer experience philosophies.
Loyalty 360: Tell us first a bit about yourself and your history in loyalty marketing …
Sean Hutchison: I’ve been working at Points.com on the consumer side of the business for about 2 years and have been fortunate enough to work closely with some of the leading loyalty programs in the world such as AAdvantage, Aeroplan, USAirways Dividend Miles, Best Buy etc.
L360: What are some trends you are seeing develop in e-commerce?
Hutchison: I think two big shifts are occurring in ecommerce; one is the consolidation of the payment and processing value chain (such as recent acquisitions like Visa and Playback and Paypal/Magento), the other is the advent of new platforms and currencies (such as Facebook Commerce and Credits). In both cases we are seeing dominant players emerge and it’s incumbent on the loyalty industry to determine which of these new distribution mechanisms are best to help them engage their consumers.
L360: What developments are you most excited about?
Hutchison: I’m excited about what’s happening in payment and ecommerce platforms. Companies like Paypal, Magento and Shopify are making great strides in how merchants and consumers interact online . We’re now seeing platforms, payment, and processing all merge under big brands like Visa, Google, and PayPal and it will be interesting to see which organizations will emerge as ecommerce leaders in the next few years.
L360: Why is it important that marketers today should invest in an e-commerce loyalty strategy?
Hutchison: Ecommerce is growing substantially (it was $230 billion in 2010) and we’re seeing new organizations form that could change the loyalty landscape in the coming years. Online commerce will be driven by organizations like Google, PayPal and Facebook and they’ll need solutions for loyalty. Right now many of those solutions are homegrown (ie. Facebook Credits). There’s a great opportunity for the major loyalty brands to get a foot hold in online commerce.
L360: What would you like to see devlop in the market’s approach to the customer experience, engagement and loyalty?
Hutchison: The internet is changing, and is now more tightly integrated with all the things that occur offline. From shopping, to booking flights or hotels or ‘checking in’ to locations, the on- and offline world are more closely aligned. People are also conducting transactions whenever and wherever they want, so the customer experience may not longer be fully under the brand’s control. Loyalty brands are going to have to think about how they manage their brand and their customer experiences in an third party ecosystem like Facebook, or Paypal.
On Thursday, September 29th at 1:00PM Eastern, Sean will be presenting the webinar, “Expanding Your Program’s Reach in the Complex World of E-Commerce.” Be sure to join in and discover the role traditional loyalty programs play in this complex and rapidly expanding world of online commerce.
For more information visit here or Register Now.