Incentives in the main stream

Change is inevitable and it seems like the start of a tipping point has arrived within the cluttered Loyalty scheme space. There has been much good work done in the quest to embrace and build a customer community around adding a values based basket, clustered around a brand. However these typical “me to” loyalty schemes are seemingly losing the plot. Brands are failing in their ability to innovate and bring a fresh dynamic product of their own to the customer community and failing to deliver an enhanced customer experience.

Buried under providing more and more so called benefits, of gym memberships, discounted flights, and so called cheap and easy access to other people’s products, brands get deeper into the mist of believing that what they are doing that is good for their customer base.

It’s time to challenge this thinking. 

Costs for administrating this foggy cloud of benefits to customers are spiraling into the hundreds of millions and not producing the results key stakeholders are expecting to see.

So do we propose throwing it all in or is it time to innovate and evolve?

I believe it’s time to evolve and innovate, get back to the core and slim down on the heavy weight admin bills that are only borne by the customer in the end. Let’s ask questions like, what can be done to help businesses and brands leverage the customer experiences to keep innovating, redesigning and revolutionizing in order to keep serving and engaging the customer in a dynamic and sustainable way.

The customer experience is alive in the brand’s products and services itself but also delivered by people in various outlets, channels and business units. This is where more dynamic, motivated and engaged sales and service teams can make a world of difference in delivery and experiential performance to the customer.

In today’s digital incentive world there are ways of not only inspiring channel sales to connect with customer needs at a totally higher level. But also the opportunity at the moment of truth to develop ongoing customer centric relationships that are not dripped in the sweet syrupy BS offers of free stuff and discounts, but in genuine care based dialogue with customers that will help in the cross sell of other products, repeat purchase desires and the acid test referral customer development.

These are the outcomes that brand leaders most aspire to:

• ·       Other products or services in the value chain being considered and purchased
• ·       Repetitive consumption
• ·       Positive referrals of products and services to other potential customers
• ·     Feedback that will assist business innovate and develop additional products and services to meet an evolving customer need.

Motivate your customer to stay connected, engaged and loyal to your brand, not someone else’s gym or low cost airline. Enter the incentive professionals please. 

From the Heart

The incentive industry is alive with people who are passionate about delivering with excellence. Over the years I have noticed that one of the overriding traits that people who are successful in this space have, is a great heart for others.

Seeing people win, seeing people enjoy the sunshine of qualifying for an amazing experience, helping people step up their game and designing a rule structure that energizes and engages people throughout a long competitive time frame. These are some of the things that Incentive professional can say they make a difference to in our world. We disrupt the average day and ask people to be exceptional, to live up to their full potential. We sometimes bring balance back into the game and make sure those that are doing the hard yards get more of a significant share, the recognition they deserve and the praise for jobs well done.

Its people who drive great brands forward, its individuals who wake up every day and give of their best or sometimes not. For me and many others in my line of work our purpose in life is to see the change in the commercial work place that we believe is essential for long term sustainable success. When it comes from the heart and it touches the human heart an incentive program will deliver results time and again.

Today’s digital age has had many professionals locked up in the understanding of what the tech can do for business and processed. I however have always believed that tech in our industry should serve the heart needs and help to inspire. Tech can be cold and grey but it does not have to be. We honing our skills and tech savvy minds to ensure that every person has a custom experience, delivered with creativity and heart. 

It’s amazing what can be achieved.

Keep Winning!

20 years young

20 years as an entrepreneur is quite a journey. A privileged life that I must say that I am totally grateful for and a road that has grown me in ways that I could never imagine. The first company I started in 1994, as a young 28 year old graduate with some corporate experience, Uwin Iwin Incentives is still my core business. The consistent focus, passion and perseverance has produced so much value for me personally beyond just the bank balance and value for many people, customer businesses and partners along the way. It's now a 20 year old business, with lots of stories to tell and many more to look forward to. I feel like we just starting to produce the real high quality and valued fruit that will multiplying in exceptional ways.

I hope that this blog will become a space where I share some of the great stories that as I pen them will remind me of the lessons learned. It will be as space that I can creatively think about the future and impact the people who read this in a positive way. A place where industry leaders will engage with me to design the future of our niche industry and collaborate to impact an ever bigger realm.

I'm learning so much more now than I have in the past 10 years about the power of the digital age, its tools and strengths. The opportunities it presents and the tremendous reach that it can have.

In 1999 I started experimenting with the power of internet technology and designed one of the very first systems to digitize the incentive industry. Many followed and great innovation and competition drove the growth of the online incentive and loyalty service providers. Today we still breaking new ground and delivering commercial value for customers and participants.

Digital leadership is in its teenage years where the energy and creative power is explosively fast. I look forward to every new day with optimism and enthusiasm.

Keep Winning

David Sand