When Loyalty Programmes are well designed and well executed, they go beyond creating brand awareness and an alternative means to promote your products and services. Instead, excellent programmes drive tangible value that benefits both your customers and your business. Think Discovery Vitality, FNB eBucks or Clicks ClubCard – programmes that have stood the test of time in South Africa and have become household names in the process.

As specialists in the design, optimisation and ongoing tracking of loyalty programmes and how they drive consumer behaviour, we make it our business to keep informed about local and international trends and best practice in this space. These three pieces of recent research on Loyalty Programmes are important reads in 2021, whether you’re looking to improve on your existing programme or keen to start a new one.

1. Open Loyalty’s Loyalty Trends for 2021/2022

Open Loyalty is an international leader in Loyalty Software. Their annual Loyalty Trends report offers good insights for anyone who is focused on customer loyalty marketing and loyalty programmes. This year’s report highlights the ongoing importance of mobile payments and predictive analytics as planned areas of investment. It also includes interviews with some of the world’s leading loyalty experts. 

Access the report on Open Loyalty’s website

2. The Loyalty Report 2021 by Bond

Titled New Decade. New Norms, The Loyalty Report explores how consumer sentiment has shifted in terms of brand and programme loyalty over the last year. We expected that the Coronavirus pandemic would lead consumers to re-evaluate their values, and that this, in turn, would lead to changes in how they make choices, and which brands and loyalty programmes they use. In New Decade. New Norms, Bond affirms this assumption and offers insights into how customer expectations have shifted. 

Access the report on Bond’s website

3. The 2021 Truth & BrandMapp South African Loyalty Whitepaper

In its sixth year of publication, this whitepaper analyses South African changes in consumer attitudes towards loyalty programmes and highlights the top performing Loyalty Programmes in the country. This year’s whitepaper introduced some new entrants in the retail space, and highlighted shifts in the way consumers have been using their loyalty programmes through the pandemic.

Access the report on Truth’s website

As customers’ expectations of loyalty programmes shift, brands must stay on top of trends to make sure they are delivering value.

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