The importance of agile rewards programmes during times of economic uncertainty

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In this climate, loyalty programmes offering immediate rewards, like cashback, discounts or benefits that help with daily living costs, become more attractive than those that only offer longer-term or aspirational rewards. Customers want the ability to earn and redeem rewards that provide tangible value in their everyday lives.

Against this backdrop, agility is key. In the context of rewards programmes, agility means the ability to quickly and effectively respond to both consumer behaviours and external factors such as economic conditions, market trends and technological advancements.

An agile rewards programme is one that is able to adapt its reward offerings, redemption processes and customer engagement strategies in real time to ensure continued relevance.

Such agility is vital for both consumers and businesses. From the consumer’s perspective, an agile programme is one that acknowledges their financial situation and adjusts its rewards accordingly. For businesses, agility ensures that their rewards programmes remain competitive in a crowded market.

At Nedbank, our ongoing focus is on building this level of agility into our Greenbacks Rewards programme. Through this process, we have learned a number of key lessons regarding the principles that any loyalty or rewards programme needs to focus on to ensure agility.

These include:

• Flexibility in reward options - Consumers want choice. Offering diverse redemption options ensures that the programme can cater to a broad range of consumer needs. Nedbank Greenbacks provides a case in point. Recognising the growing financial pressures on consumers, we’ve made the programme more responsive to member needs by offering practical, everyday rewards. For example, members can redeem Greenbacks for essential services such as groceries or prepaid electricity reflecting the increasing demand for rewards that address basic household needs. We’ve also reviewed our earn rate to ensure that members receive up to 2% unlimited cashback when using their Greenbacks-linked card. This immediate return on spending is particularly appealing in an economic climate where every rand counts.

• Real-time adaptability - The ability to make real-time adjustments to a loyalty programme is essential. This includes updating rewards in response to technology or market trends and refining the programme’s capabilities to enable on-the-go access to information and functionalities like rewards redemption. Greenbacks’ digital integration allows members to access rewards seamlessly via the Nedbank Money app, thereby enhancing agility and ensuring ease of use and accessibility.

• Customer-centric design - A truly agile rewards programme is built with the customer at its core. Understanding what consumers value most at any given time and integrating these insights into programme design ensures that such programmes remain relevant.

• Leveraging data - Data is the backbone of agility. Regularly collecting and analysing customer feedback, transaction histories and usage patterns allows businesses to tailor their loyalty programmes to fit current trends. This data-driven approach ensures that programme changes are informed by actual consumer behaviour rather than assumptions. By tracking how members use their rewards and responding with relevant campaigns and value proposition enhancements, Greenbacks remains aligned with customer priorities, ensuring it continues to offer value, even in challenging times.

Building agility into loyalty programmes is not just a strategy for growth, it’s a necessity for survival. A programme’s success is no longer just about the size of the rewards on offer; it’s about how relevant those rewards are to a consumer’s immediate needs. When a loyalty or rewards programme is agile, it can pivot as needed, offering customers value that resonates with their current financial realities and adapt as those realities shift.