Loyalty glossary · 10. Marketing and engagement (20)
Omnichannel Engagement
Omnichannel engagement is the practice of running a loyalty programme across every touchpoint, so that earn, redemption, and communication behave the same in store, online, and in app. Members do not think in channels, and the programme breaks when the operator does.
Most loyalty programmes run as three separate businesses: the website, the app, and the store. Each has its own ledger, its own earn rules, and its own exceptions. The member sees one programme, but the operator sees three, and the member is the one who suffers when the three disagree.
Work the numbers, because the gap is arithmetic. A member who only shops online might earn 5,000 points in a year. A member who earns 5,000 points online and 5,000 points in store in the same year accumulates 10,000 points. At 1 cent per point, that is 100 dollars versus 50 dollars. The second member is not twice as engaged, she is on a different earning curve entirely.
Rewarding only one channel teaches members to stay there. A programme that gives double points for app orders and nothing for store purchases will see store transactions fall, not because the member prefers the app, but because the programme pays her to prefer it. The operator then reads the fall as proof that stores are irrelevant, and cuts store staff, which makes the store irrelevant. Accrual becomes the mechanism of the split, because the member learns where the points are.
An active member rate is the share of members who earn or redeem within a set period. Omnichannel programmes raise that rate because a member who can earn at the till and redeem on the sofa has no dead time. A programme limited to one channel hides the member for eleven months of the year, then wonders why she lapsed.
Activity based qualification is how omnichannel engagement becomes operational. A member qualifies for a tier by doing things, not by spending in one place. Omnichannel programmes count all of it: the store visit, the app order, the call to the call centre. Qualification that ignores any one of those is measuring only part of the member, and it will under-report the people who actually keep the business alive.