New Trends at the 2019 Loyalty Expo

The second day of the 2019 Loyalty Expo saw loyalty leaders from many industries gather to share the insights they’ve gained from working with their respective organizations. In a general session, Jennifer Leitman, Executive Vice President of Marketing for The Family Coppola, discussed how her company’s loyalty program has not only increased customer retention but also enabled The Family Coppola to better unify itself as a brand.
 
The Family Coppola’s program has connected the brand to its consumers across touchpoints. “Our program has a multi-channel approach for purchase and engagement,” said Leitman. “Members can earn rewards to buy products and participate in experiences. We now have direct contact with consumers who purchase in stores, restaurants, on our website, and also in our tasting rooms.”
 
Leitman also discussed how The Family Coppola has used strategic partnerships to connect to its audience. She noted that the partnerships are authentic to the brand. For instance, the brand now partners with the Oakland A’s, which fits because Francis Ford Coppola is himself a baseball fan.
 
Later in the day, guests heard from Tamara Camp, Vice President of Global CEM, Growth, and Loyalty Programs for Western Union, in a fireside chat with Loyalty360’s Mark Johnson. Their talk “Managing Stakeholders in a Customer Focused Transition” offered insight into how loyalty initiatives can play a key role in evolving an organization to keep up with evolving consumers.
 
Camp indicated that Western Union faced a tremendous challenge, as it changed from being a physical location-first company (it has 550,000 locations around the world) to an organization that is more digitally focused.
 
Throughout the transition, Camp and her team considered how the organization could retain customers in a meaningful way. In order to create meaning in customer interactions with Western Union, Camp made a focus on engagement a top priority. To learn more from the brand’s customers, Camp flew around the world in 11 days and had focus groups to learn what engagement strategies would prove meaningful.
 
Camp stated that Western Union is in a sense, “a one-trick pony,” as consumers come to the company for the same service. The key then to earning their loyalty was to engage consumers between interactions, showing them that they are a part of a community.
 
A self-described “agent of change,” Camp further stated that her long-term goal within the organization is “to build a world-class consumer engagement program” and that “loyalty is part of it.” The overarching objective is to bring value to the consumer.

Between Leitman and Camp’s talks, it’s clear that one takeaway from this year’s Loyalty Expo is that loyalty programs are now addressing challenges beyond rewarding and retaining customers. So much has changed in recent years.
 

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