Welcome to Let’s Talk Loyalty an Industry Podcast for loyalty marketing professionals. I’m your host, Paula Thomas, and if you work in loyalty marketing, join me every week to learn the latest ideas from loyalty specialists around the world.
This episode is sponsored by Epsilon. Today I’m delighted to announce a unique opportunity for one lucky listener of Let’s Talk Loyalty to Enjoy a complimentary workshop with the Loyalty Experts at Epsilon. One brand every month will have the chance for a unique, independent loyalty lab, a review of your loyalty program, where Epsilon will share their expert ideas, how to drive your program’s performance to a whole new level.
This workshop is a powerful way for you to measure and then increase the return on your investment in your loyalty program. So to apply, head over to letstalkloyalty.com/epsilon and enter your details.
Hello and welcome to episode 291 of Let’s Talk Loyalty featuring FedEx Express. One of the world’s best known and most admired business and consumer brands. With annual revenues globally of 95 billion dollars. FedEx Express has been connecting people and possibilities around the world for the past 49 years, and it’s constantly evolving, including its impressive global loyalty program, which we’re discussing today.
Joining us on this show is Lynn Tan who leads the My FedEx Rewards Program for the AMEA region. With over 80,000 members in this B2B loyalty program across Lynn’s region alone. My FedEx Rewards is a global point space program that has become a powerful differentiator in an extremely competitive industry.
We are delighted to have Lynn Tan from FedEx Express joining us from Singapore today, and we hope you enjoy our conversation.
Paula: So Lynn, I am extremely happy to welcome you to Let’s Talk Loyalty.
Lynn: Thank you for having me, Paula. Very happy to be on your podcast today.
Paula: Yes. Wonderful. I know FedEx Express is doing some incredible work globally in terms of driving your B2B loyalty agenda. So very interesting topics to go through with you today.
So let me start off as usual, Lynn, by asking you our standard opening question, because particularly given that you’re based in Singapore, I think Asia has so much incredible work being done. So please do tell us what is your favorite loyalty program or programs?
Lynn: As you said, Paula, it’s really difficult to pick just one or two.
There’s so many, which are regional based or local based loyalty programs that we really use on a day to day basis. But if I have to just pick two, um, Grab Rewards as part of the Grab service that we have in in Singapore and in Southeast Asia. Okay. As well as. Yeah. As well as, um, ShopBack, which is also something that is homegrown and really up and coming with a lot more services included as part of the loyalty program itself.
Paula: Okay, so the first one then I’ve certainly heard of Grab, um, even be before it came such an extraordinary, I think it’s a super app now in Asia, if I’m not mistaken, isn’t it? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. So I remember going, I was very lucky to get to Bali actually a couple of years ago, for a few weeks. And I was asking people how do I get a taxi?
And they said, You just need a Grab, you just need a bike. And honestly it was life changing. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so excited. . So Grab has certainly done incredible work and I think their loyalty program, I know you don’t work on it, of course, but it seems to be one that’s fairly new, if I’m not mistaken. Yeah.
Lynn: Yes. I think the focus for Grab is still very much service oriented, so the loyalty program aspect of it is very much embedded in the usage. So, and which is what I love about it, it, it really doesn’t have to be an additional step that the customer, the user needs to take. It’s all happening in the background.
You earn points, if you need to use your points against, um, say a, a discount or even using the, the points itself to change for some rewards that may be, um, towards a charity. You can choose to do that. But again, it’s all the user’s choice and it’s, to me, it’s kind of seamless because I’m not particularly, taking, um, you know, taking much notice about the rewards program itself, but the points are there. It is just happening.
Paula: Amazing. Yeah. Yeah. There is something about, I know we call it removing friction, you know, as a bit of jargon I guess, but, you know, if a, as a consumer you can experience that it’s so easy and you don’t need to do anything, then why would you not kind of see what you can do?
So definitely one, we’ll try and get on the, um, on the show at some point in the future. . And, and just, what was the second one, Lynn? I didn’t catch the name of the other loyalty program you mentioned that you love.
Lynn: Oh, it’s ShopBack, shopping Shop, Shop back. Okay. So ShopBack started as, um, it’s an app so integrated with a lot of eCommerce websites where you can get cash rebates on where you shop. Mm-hmm. . So it, it started out as a, well, essentially it is a, it is a cash back, uh, application where they now have a lot more tie ups with brands, whether it’s in store purchases or online purchases. And then the cash back that you get out of the program, you can use it either as a cash out or you can use it against, whatever you wanna purchase within the platform itself.
Amazing. Quite similar to Grab. Yeah. Um, they have evolved over the years, obviously, and, and I’ve seen really good things come outta the episode and I use it very frequently. Oh dear.
Paula: That sounds like, Okay. Something I would exactly do, but that’s actually a great word as well, Lynn, and I think it’s probably a big topic that we’re here to talk about today in terms of your own program. You used the word evolve. And I know FedEx Express, uh, throughout the whole region, in fact, um, has gone on a dramatic, um, story of, you know, global development, success of course in certain markets, but actually a journey that did require a lot of specific customization for where you lead.
So would you maybe start Lynn by giving a sense of, you know, what is My FedEx Rewards and, and the history I guess, behind the program?
Lynn: Sure. Um, so my FedEx Rewards is a global rewards program led by FedEx Express. So we have this across the globe, um, in, in various region, including AMEA, where I’m based.
Mm-hmm. , Well, we started as FedEx Rewards Center more than I think almost, definitely more than 10 years ago, maybe 15 years ago. Um, one thing to find a way to not only engage with our customers, also to reward them for stay with us throughout the years, um, especially for our industry where it is primarily B2B.
Yeah, it is quite critical for us to have a differentiator because we are not selling a brand new product every other day. It’s not like retail, it’s not a FMCG. We pride ourselves a lot on the services. . So the reliability of what we can provide, but what else right to, to set us apart from the competitors.
So just to bring it back to how the brand for My FedEx reward has evolved, not just focus on the engagement piece, but also to look at how with technology changes, how does that experience also change specifically for the region itself. And, and I think for AMEA, where, where my team started to work on this program is we noticed that having a unique program for the region really does allow us to do some level of customization for the customer experience in each of the market.
So, for example, um, pr privacy considerations or, um, kind of experience that customers come to expect of a big brand like us. Yeah. Um, we do need to provide that in all aspects of the engagement. Um, in the US where the brand is also exists, it exists in a quite a different, um, manner. We have a lot more other service lines in the us so we have FedEx Express, we have FedEx, Ground, Logistics, and so on and so forth.
So the program itself is suited for the American audience or the US audience. Yeah, with obviously tweaks to fit your needs. So in AMEA we have that suited for our needs, which is primarily focused on the small and medium businesses. So we don’t just offer the program, we offer the program specifically designed so that the small and medium businesses who are our customers here are able to benefit from their relationship and engagement with FedEx as a brand.
Paula: Yeah. Yeah. And I think you bring up a, a couple of very important points there, Lynn, because Yes, first and foremost, a global brand like FedEx Express. You know, there is often an argument to have a, a globally consistent loyalty program, um, because at the end of the day, as you said, it’s. B2B, you know, there’s, there’s very clear services that, that you’re delivering.
But having said that, there’s so much variation around the world, and I think it’s only when you start, you know, building a program and I guess even comparing performance across regions. Which I know is something that you have done, Lynn, I think then it’s only that it’s super clear that you absolutely need to localize despite your best efforts.
And I don’t know what, you know, your sense is in terms of, is there, I don’t know, a certain amount, you know, a certain percentage that is global and then a certain amount tailored. What would you say that split is between, you know, localization and globalization in your experience? Just a, you know, a guess hard to measure.
Lynn: Um, I, I would say actually it, it, it is pretty straightforward because there are deficiencies we get from centralizing certain approaches. So for example, the technical build of the program, yes, we might be moving everything else to say cloud based or, you know, having a single vendor to help support all the technical aspects of it or requirements of it.
But the program design itself, the mechanic, may be differentiated by markets, by region. So, um, you know, I really just saying it, 50 50, you can look at it from the technical perspective. Yeah. And a program perspective. And definitely there, there is a way to, I mean, in a way have best of both worlds. We can get efficiencies by going centralized globally and then, you know, still have the flexibility to be able to customize it for our customers in the respective markets or regions.
Paula: Yeah. Yeah. And I was reading some fantastic, I suppose, um, you know, summaries, uh, from the recent award that you won, Lynn. So definitely want to congratulate you for winning Silver in the 2022 Loyalty and Engagement Awards. So you must be Thank you so much. Yeah, super proud because the shortest of finalists I said to you off air is one that, Oh my goodness.
Any of those brands, they’re all doing exceptional work, so you must be extremely proud.
Lynn: Uh, yes, I’m extremely proud of my team members, uh, just all across the region also because it is a collaborative effort, um, not just for a central team who’s working on the program, but everyone else who has chipped in. And then the customers have given us the recognition as well.
It is, Uh, . I always use the phrase that it takes a whole village and it does. Exactly. Yeah. Um, so, so the award, the recognition really just gives the team a boost of morale to know that, hey, you know, we are B2B brand, but we can go out there and share the story and share the success with, um, everyone else in the industry.
Yeah.
Paula: Yeah. Yeah. Cause for celebration of course. And having read through, I suppose some of the, the wonderful publicity that came through as a result of that, I think what impressed me Lynn was the fact that, you know, this award was based on, you know, an existing loyalty program, but one where the uptake actually originally had been slower than your revenue growth in the region.
And what seems to have happened, and you can share this kind of story, maybe is, there was an understanding that there was much more potential room to grow, but actually you would need a partner, as you said, the global technology based behind it. So tell us about the journey that you went on from, you know, having a program that wasn’t really performing in the way that you’d originally hoped.
Lynn: So maybe let’s start, um, let me go back a about years when we first started on this endeavor together. Um, excellence has been a key partner throughout the entire journey and being a global partner of FedEx, we have gone through actually quite a few, um, phases of just technical enhancements. Okay? The first few years was about making sure that the technical infrastructure is there, security, everything else is all, um, in place, but then, the real conversation started with the AMEA team. Uh, my team is some decentralized team members. Wanted to see how else we can position the program. Uh, and it’s really about, you know, identifying who the target audience is, really having a very focused drive around the acquisition piece also. So for this year, now, I’ll fast forward to this year where we now have a, a really solid program in terms of the technical, um, setup in terms of understanding what the mechanics are in place for the customers.
We can then zoom in and refocus on driving the acquisition, driving the engagement. And we have gone, I know the past two years haven’t been great for engagement because of Covid and everything else. Yeah. But what I’ve done with, um, Epsilon just prior to that is to do a full study around what the members engagement are, what keeps them going, what, uh, excites them, who are the best customers, and then be able to drive those insights into the acquisition work that we want to do. Mm. So. They’ve evolved, The relationship between ourselves and Epsilon have evolved from a technical one to one that’s much more insight driven and much more, I think, engagement and and tactics or campaign driven if, if you may.
So, um, and that shift is really quite natural, I would say, because once you have the house in place, you’ll be able to focus on the decorations and everything else, right? Yeah. Um, so, so, so that happened, um, quite seamlessly, I would say, because, um, we know who we’re gonna go after. Yeah. And as saw being a partner for so long, yeah. I understands the language that we use. So, so it was just easy peasy for everybody involved.
Paula: You know, that’s such a joy to hear, Lynn, because you know there are so few programs that you hear, you know, after it’s all kind of gone so well to somebody go it was easy peasy, actually. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anybody say it.
So , so congratulations. You obviously had a lot of the basics, right, and as you said, the, I suppose the relationship and the partnership that you guys have with Epsilon is, is fantastic to hear. Uh, I know we’ve talked, it’s, it’s going on many years now. The part I also loved is, you know, starting off with that, uh, study, as you said, it’s one thing to get the, the technical infrastructure in place and to give you something to start.
I guess what that gives you is a benchmark for, you know, what’s happening on the acquisition, what’s happening on the engagement side, and just in terms of how you did that study, Lynn? Because again, B2B can be a little more, I think, complicated, maybe just because, you know, for me, I’m much more experienced on the consumer side.
So for example, some of the countries I know your team covers, I was just looking up Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, Taiwan, Malaysia. I’m guessing Middle East is in there as well. So, So how did you do your actual study? Was it based on, purely transactional data, for example, in terms of, you know, who the shippers were or was it done, You know, I, I would just love to understand that study that informed the insights because that’s really where the, the genius seems to be coming through in terms of making it locally relevant.
Lynn: Hmm, sure. Um, let me just bring up, maybe split this up in a two points. So the, the relationship between the easy peasy relationship we were talking about, meeting requires, firstly the partner, in this case to understand where the business, uh, priorities are, and we are able to say that, Hey, we wanna focus on small and medium customers.
Yeah. Um, the nature of the business really looks at primarily transactional data. That we have from, we are in a shipping business express and business itself, it’s very much transactional. We don’t often look at the individual because like what you said, B2B is the company to company relationship. So do you look at individual and we don’t necessarily get the individualized information just from the shipping data.
Yeah, that’s where the prior years of engagement through a rewards program actually makes sense. We then can look at what the redemption data has been like. We look at what kind of rewards have been popular. We look at, um, both the transactional data as well as the engagement and behavioral data from the rewards program itself prior in order to put them through a model, to, tell us who are the most valuable customers, who are most likely to, um, churn mm-hmm. , or to lose them or add a, a potential risk, Oh, who has the most potential to grow? So, so, and it is a proprietary model that, uh, Epsilon has, and then internally within my team, we have also done some groundwork around just the customer life cycle value.
Um, Attribution and things like that. So I, I’m not gonna go too much into the analytics part, of course, but essentially, yeah, we’re looking at the customer life cycle, the value of the customers and with and rewards data is something that is really quite unique in itself. We, we are looking at data that is, um, not just about personal data, not just about individualized, um, engagement, but it’s about preferences.
There’s an emotional aspect to it as well. Mm-hmm. When a customer logs in to redeem something, he or she may not be just looking at, Okay, I have X amount of points and I’m gonna redeem something, but there is a level of preferences and you know, we now call this zero. Zero, uh, party data Right. Then they proactively tell us what they want.
Yeah. And we’re able to then derive some, some sort of like, um, build some idea about who this customer is, what their preferences are. Mm-hmm. , and then, but then feed that through model. So we are still very much driven by a structured way of digesting that data, using that to run through some analytics and knowing, how these behavioral data now then gives us an additional layer of understanding to what the customers might want from us. And I wanna emphasize on the second part, which is what the customers want from us. So it’s, we’ve always, I think as B2B marketers always looked at data and then try to solve it from what do we want to sell perspective. Yeah. And that, I think rewards, you have to turn it on the cell. You have to look at what the customers want or what the members want. So knowing what they want and what we can provide, mm-hmm. gives us a happy, happy balance of what we can actually offer, uh, from a program. So when I say, so, when I say, uh, what a most valuable loyalty member looks like may not necessarily mirror what my best customer looks like outside of the program.
Okay. So my best customer outside might be somebody who gives me tons of revenue, um, lots of profitability. But maybe on a very, um, high level discount because of the sure size of their pipeline on revenue contribution. Mm. But that’s not what I want to go after because the, the loyalty program is meant to also reward those who are loyal to us.
Who are loyal to us. May not be the highest revenue contributor. Um, and I can’t give them the discount that they need. However, because I still want to reward them for their loyalty with the business, with the brand, I wanna make sure that there’s some other ways that we can help them, um, keep that relationship, help them solve some of their business challenges with, by giving them these additional perks of value out of the relationship with us.
Mm. So so you see that. So just kind of summarize. I know I’ve gone on quite a lot about this. Oh, that’s, yeah. Yeah. But, but really it’s about value to the customers and how do we still come from a place of data insights and analytics driven decisions before adding on the human aspect of it. Really considering the customer at the end of day.
Paula: For sure. Yeah, no, beautifully said, Lynn. Thank you for that. Um, every, every word was valuable, so, so really, really do appreciate it. I do love, uh, particularly what I’m hearing is the simplicity and the relevance. You know, everything that I’ve seen, you know, preparing for our conversation today, you know, it is a straightforward points based program, as you said.
You know, it’s starting from a place of transactional, you know, relationship, you know, which I guess all loyalty programs do. But the fact that you have that very clear laser focus on what do they want from this program, and I know you told me last time we spoke as well Lynn that, you know, there is the opportunity for them to, you know, as an individual, for example, enjoy, you know, burning some points, for example, for something they may want.
Or I think you’ve got charity options or maybe something for the company itself. So sounds like you’re doing a lot of exploration to really understand how do they wanna use these points, because that’s the moment of truth after all.
Lynn: Exactly. Uh, and, and we have. We make sure that the catalog itself, or the offer that we have in each market is unique to the market.
So it’s not just about here’s all the FedEx shipping vouchers you can redeem for your business. But yeah, if I’m in Singapore, I would want to be able to redeem for something that’s unique to my market. And that, I think is the first step to letting the customers know and letting the members know that this is something just for you.
And, you know, it’s not just about what FedEx wants, it’s about what our customers need or find, um, useful for them. So you’re absolutely right. Um, the customer within the program itself can use it to re reward the, the business. And you can get shipping vouchers in return, or you can even get something that the entire team can enjoy. Uh, Yeah. Out of the program. Yeah.
Paula: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And the other piece that struck me as well, Lynn, is you know, a similarity with, you know, a consumer program that I worked on back in Ireland, which was the difference and the extra loyalty, in fact, that we could definitely measure when we did offer what we would’ve just called Third Party Rewards.
Because I think you make a very good point that, you know, it’s one thing for FedEx Express to say, here’s some discounts off a future shipment, for example. But the perception of a member, um, what we discovered is if you do offer something that’s not your own, you know, first party product, you do go and create a catalog.
There was a much greater appreciation, I think, of that reward because then the member knows actually, Yeah, it’s not just something that you’re, you’re doing casually or, or, or oversimplifying it, you know, with a, you know, let’s say a hidden agenda to drive another shipment. Actually what you want to do is give them something that they really want.
Lynn: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Um, and, and I think, talking about the relationship between the members and the brand. Um, an example, and just going back to Covid period itself, we wanted to ensure that it’s not just about points for rewards either. Um, during the period time when businesses was just trying to get back on board, you know, markets are opening up, we make sure that the customers within the loyalty program know that we have them on top of mind. So it was a simple campaign. It wasn’t anything about shipping, but a simple message to say, Don’t worry about your points, it’s not gonna expire in the next X number of months, because we know that you need time to get back into the game.
You need time to get your business back on board. Yeah, so even just that messaging, to the members to tell them that, Hey, you are still on top of mind, even though everything seems to be in a mess at the peak of everything happening, right? Um, yeah. So it’s just taking something else out of the way for them, removing that challenge for them that they don’t have to worry about, that one thing. Yeah. Uh, and focus on getting their business back on board. Um, and, and you know, it’s about timing also, right? Uh, so it’s about, the messaging is also about the timing. That was not a good time to tell them to ship more. We wanted them to ship more, but it was not the right time to sell. It was the right time to tell them that we are still here.
Yeah. You don’t have to worry about. When you’re ready, we will be right here for you. So that, that was one of the things that I think we, we did right. Um, during the height of the pandemic and the markets coming slowly coming back into play. Yeah. And making sure that the customers keep us top of mind too.
Paula: Totally, Totally. And again, in my experience, Lynn, it’s, it’s often a case where, again, a huge brand like you guys, you know, can afford to do that messaging for enterprise customers and they’ll probably have dedicated people and account managers who are reassuring them. But what you guys seem to be focusing on is SMEs who don’t get that level of, you know, attention in terms of account management and FaceTime.
But you’ve got the, My FedEx Rewards instead to actually build that, I suppose communication, the reassurance, and again, as you said, particularly the, the crisis we’ve just all been through, it feels like your program does have, I suppose, even a bigger responsibility in terms of yes, very much. I suppose driving that relationship, you know, rather than, again, just driving transactional behavior, as you said, and more shipments.
Lynn: Exactly, exactly right on point.
Paula: The other piece, I suppose I just wanted to touch on, Lynn. I saw lovely, um, ads that you guys did on YouTube. Um, and I, it might even have been a TV campaign. It certainly looked like it’s something that might have gone above the line, but it feels like, uh, My FedEx Rewards has a greater role to play in terms of building the brand.
Um, and again, you know, just, you know, I suppose the connection that the campaign itself was very much around taking your, you know, small business I guess, you know, whether it’s a jewelry business or something, shipping that globally to the world. So that overall messaging, I guess, and investment between brand, I guess complements the loyalty investment.
So I guess my question for you is, How do the two of those fit together? Because something Epsilon and I have talked about before is it’s not often that the, uh, the impact of the investment in your loyalty program can be measured or is measured because we’re so busy, I guess, with the day job. But do you think that your loyalty program is also building your brand in the same way?
Those kind of lovely, you know, TV campaigns might be doing?
Lynn: Uh, definitely. I think what the brand team, uh, and I know exactly the campaign talking about, which is Deliver Your Passion To The World. Yeah. Again, I think, I think internally for the brand team and our team and all the manager in loyalty marketing, we are very, um, aligned in terms of the business priority for the region.
We know that in AMEA there are so many SMEs or MSMEs who are making up a, a good base of our customers, whether it’s prospective or existing customers in the region, and, to the earlier point that you mentioned, they may not have, say, an account manager to service them. Yeah. So in terms of the messaging or in terms of what we wanna go after, firstly, and also to establish the fact that we see them, we know them, we know that the MSMEs in, in the region are, you know, um, important to us, important to our business, important to the entire ecosystem even, right? So how loyalty comes in here is, it is a very natural part of the life cycle. We don’t want the SMEs to feel that, hey, we are just gonna be a touching ball kind of, um, service provider, but really as a business partner. Mm. Um, years ago when I started disengagement, um, started working for FedEx. Um, I think the, the.
The impression of FedEx is still, yes, you’re a global brand and because of that you don’t really engage with the smaller businesses, or you’re not right for us. Yeah, but that’s not true. Is not true. So, uh, we, we can support, uh, small businesses and we do want to support them. Yeah, so it’s really also about, you know, just making sure that it’s not a, Hey, give me your shipment, and then that’s it, kind a relationship and loyalty programs, it’s nicely into that. Um, just to share what we can do and that this program itself is really focused to service and to serve, the SME community at large. So I think if it’s nicely in the entire narrative mm-hmm. , um, you’ll, you’ll definitely see more of the loyalty messaging as part of the bigger one.
I’m not gonna spoil myself. Okay. In the upcoming stuff. Um, but, but there will be more of this continued messaging that will help to, you know, really bring that attention to the, uh, the small, medium businesses in, in the AMEA, as a region, yeah, that’s our focus.
Paula: Okay. Wow. Well, I do love when there’s a little tease to say that there’s more to come and more exciting e evolution. To go back to the point that we started off with. Just, you know, final questions, and this is just me being very curious, Lynn. In terms of the scale of your program. I saw a global figure, for example, again, going back to your, um, I suppose awards, um, publicity that globally, there’s 72,000 members. I think that was back in June, 2021.
But I wanted to just get a sense of, you know, in your region, what kind of volumes of, of, of membership do you have? Again, B2B, it’s always a very unusual, very different and very exciting to understand and also just even to get a sense of the scale of your team to deliver these kind of, um, programs.
Lynn: Actually, Paula, that number, uh, is an APEC number. So is it? In Yeah, so in AMEA. Yes. Yeah, we have, um, I, I think year to date we’re aiming for 80,000 members by the end of Yeah, fiscal, uh, we are close to it. I think we are about 79,000 now. So, um, globally is a lot more , I can say that. It’s amazing. It’s like bigger.
Yeah. Yeah. So, um, we, we are, running out of a very lean central team. Okay. So, uh, within my own team members, there are three of them sitting with my team under the loyalty marketing. Okay. Um, we are well supported by obviously our, our agency partners like Epsilon and their servicing team. We have also representative in each of the markets that we’re present in.
So for the 15 AMEA markets that we’re sitting in, we have a marketing, um, executive who is trained and understands the program, who sits in the local market. Mm-hmm. , and also the customer service team who are trained as well on the program, who are, uh, you know, always kept aware of what’s going on with the loyalty program.
So that, again, to the core, what we want to do is to provide that personalized experience. So somebody sitting in Dubai can call a hotline and uh, and then MFR on, My FedEx Reward representative will speak to them. Yeah. So it doesn’t have to come all the way to Singapore where I’m set. Yeah. Um, but the message is consistent and the service. We do our best to make sure that it is delivered in the best way for the customer.
Paula: So, Lynn, with all of that wonderful context and the awards that you’ve been winning, and again, I suppose a, a fairly sophisticated, and dare I said, mature program now with them a decade behind you continuing evolution. You made the point at the start, that you know, this entire, uh, program is justified on the base of being a differentiator in what is clearly an intensely competitive industry. So I guess my final question for you is internally, how would you say The My FedEx Rewards Program has seen purely from, I suppose, um, you know, the hierarchy in terms of where attention is, um, is earned?
Because sometimes in consumer program, my experience is it’s seen as a very big investment with constantly having to justify. Um, but it seems like this is something that is quite core to your strategy. So yeah, just a, just a general sense in terms of how it’s perceived in the region by, by senior management.
Lynn: I think we’ve been very fortunate, um, to have the support of our management teams. They understand that, you know, as a differentiator in the industry, it, it is important and like I mentioned earlier on, within just the business itself. There is, there’s been a lot of support, um, from the management teams, from the other team members.
Frontline teams as well. Yeah. But it’s marketing, sales, CS just knowing and understanding what the program is. Yeah. And being able to also give us some very good ideas around what the market needs. Mm-hmm. ? Um, I, I would say that the, the management team is also very clear about how we have positioned the program as part of the life cycle.
Great. So it’s not like the ad hoc campaign per se. It is part of what an offering is to, uh, a FedEx customer in the region. So, yeah. Yeah, I would say very fortunate to have that top down support and, and also from, from our partner teams in the organization.
Paula: Wonderful. Yes. You’re very, very lucky that uh, I think that’s half the battle and you did make the point already that it does take a village.
So it sounds like a wonderful village , that you guys have going on. So listen, that’s everything from my side, Lynn. Is there anything else that you wanted to mention before we wrap up?
Lynn: Um, I think we’ve covered everything cuz I wanted to ensure that we talked about the ecosystem. The whole village thing. Totally. To spend as well as the presence of the, the program. So I, I think we’re good. Thank you so much for today. And the questions.
Paula: Not at all. Lynn, I’m absolutely delighted, and as I said, I can hear there’s plenty more to come. So all I would ask is we can, uh, hopefully go and do this again, maybe, you know, year to year, time to time, as in when you guys go on to continue to evolve the program.
So with that said, Lynn Tan, Lead Strategic Marketing and Demand Generation for AMEA, for FedEx Express. Thank you so much from Let’s Talk Loyalty.
Lynn: Thank you, Paula.
This show is sponsored by The Wise Marketer, the world’s most popular source of loyalty marketing news, insights, and research. The Wise Marketer also offers loyalty marketing training through its Loyalty Academy, which has already certified over 245 executives in 27 countries as certified loyalty marketing professionals.
For more information, check out thewisemarketer.com and loyaltyacademy.org.
Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Let’s Talk Loyalty. If you’d like us to send you the latest shows each week, simply sign up for the Let’s Talk Loyalty Newsletter on letstalkloyalty.com. And we’ll send our best episodes straight to your inbox, and don’t forget that you can follow Let’s Talk Loyalty on any of your favorite podcast platforms, and of course, we’d love for you to share your feedback and reviews.
Thanks again for supporting the show.
