Launching Shoppers Drug Mart's Optimum: Learnings from a Loyalty Operations Lens (#671)

PAULA: Hello, and welcome to Let’s Talk Loyalty and Loyalty TV, a show for loyalty marketing professionals.

PAULA: I’m Paula Thomas, the founder and CEO of Let’s Talk Loyalty and Loyalty TV, where we feature insightful conversations with loyalty professionals from the world’s leading brands.

PAULA: Today’s episode is part of the Wiser Loyalty Series and is hosted by Aaron Dauphinee, Chief Marketing and Business Development Officer of the Wise Marketer Group.

PAULA: The Wise Marketer Group is a media, education and advisory services company, providing resources for loyalty marketeers through the Wise Marketer Digital Publication and the Loyalty Academy Programme that offers the Certified Loyalty Marketing Professional or CLMP designation.

PAULA: I hope you enjoyed this episode brought to you by Let’s Talk Loyalty and Loyalty TV in partnership with the Wise Marketer Group.

AARON: Hi everyone, welcome back to another edition of the Wiser Loyalty Podcast Series.

AARON: This series continues to be brought to you through partnership between Let’s Talk Loyalty and the Wise Marketer.

AARON: I’m Aaron Dauphinee, the CMO of Wise Marketer Group.

AARON: And a quick reminder that throughout 2024, the Wise Marketer Group CEO Bill Hanifin and I shared our insights on loyalty constructs and topics inspired by one of the core courses in the Loyalty Academy’s Certified Loyalty Marketing Professional curriculum.

AARON: We also use the acronym CLMP.

AARON: This year, we’ve been shifting our focus from the academic to the practitioners by seeking out insights from the loyalty discipline trade, similar to those that we find in our CLMP community, as well as those who are leading from the C-suite.

AARON: Twice a month, we’ll bring you an interview with a C-level executive or CLMP who has transformed strategy into practical application and generated strong business results from customer loyalty.

AARON: Today’s guest is someone I know quite well.

AARON: In fact, very well.

AARON: Having first met some, oh gosh, 20 years ago in the hallways of Alliance Data Systems, which now most people refer to as Loyalty One.

AARON: So welcome to Nadine Rubin.

AARON: Thank you for being here today, Nadine.

NADINE: Thank you.

NADINE: I’m looking forward to it.

AARON: Great.

AARON: Great.

AARON: Before we hop into our conversation, let me first share a few details for everyone who’s tuning in about you and specifically set the stage for our conversation.

AARON: So Nadine first entered into the world of loyalty at Canada’s largest drug store and pharmacy operator, Shoppers Drug Mart, where she was part of the small team that actually launched the Optimum Rewards program.

AARON: From there, she spent time with another Canadian institution, Hudson’s Bay Company, before arriving at Loyalty One, which is where we met.

AARON: After Loyalty One, she spent time growing future Loyalty Group, the Digital Agency DAC Group or DAX Group, and Star Metro Media.

AARON: Each of these roles, I should preface a little bit, predominantly loyalty operations and product specific and focused.

AARON: So Nadine is actually a recognized loyalty leader, specifically as a subject matter expert in loyalty operations.

AARON: More recently, she was the vice president of operations at RewardOps, the engagement commerce platform providing redemption experience infrastructure for major brands such as US Bank, AeroPlan, AeroMiles, and very recently, WestJet.

AARON: RewardOps was acquired by Jonas Technologies and has been recently integrated with the former Carlson Marketing Proprietary Loyalty Division, and another loyalty tech firm to become Core Loyalty.

AARON: Post-RewardOps, Nadine has been actively advising technology companies through her own consulting practice, Adderby Research Labs and Lucent and Tech.

AARON: As well, she’s actually built a brand new platform for conversations that are focused on mentorship and the sharing of professional and subject matter experiences with others.

AARON: She’ll talk a little bit about that, which I’m excited about as well.

AARON: Plus, she finds time to help us at the Loyals Academy, obviously, where more recently she took on the role of the CLMP Community Directorship.

AARON: It’s a new role that we created this year to advance the professional development, our networking and business opportunities for the nearly 1,100 CLMP designees around the world.

AARON: My favorite way to sum up Nadine is to use her own words, actually.

AARON: She is, quote, a future-focused problem solver, end quote.

AARON: Nadine, maybe I’ll pause there.

AARON: Is there anything that I missed in terms of the preamble to get set the stage for people today?

NADINE: Thank you for that.

NADINE: Actually, no, I don’t think that there’s anything that you missed, to be really honest.

NADINE: I think you reminded me of some of the things that I’ve had a great opportunity to work with people programs.

NADINE: So no, absolutely nothing that you’ve missed.

AARON: Thank you.

AARON: My pleasure.

AARON: My pleasure.

AARON: That’s the professional angle.

AARON: One of the first questions we ask in the Let’s Talk Loyalty series podcast, which many of long-time listeners will know of listening to other hosts as well as ourselves, is we ask a question as a bit of an opener to get to know you as an individual a little more as well.

AARON: That question specifically is, what book are you currently reading and why, or what’s the most fruitful takeaway that you have from that particular book?

NADINE: It’s okay.

NADINE: I want to answer with more of what my favorite book is, because it’s a book that I reread a lot.

NADINE: My favorite book is actually one that’s on my shelf here, in my little office, and it’s called The Invitation, and it’s written by a woman whose name is Oriah Mountain Dreamer.

NADINE: She’s actually Canadian, so that’s really cool.

NADINE: I first read this book about 20 years ago, and it’s actually a book based on a poem, and the poem is The Invitation, and it invites people and the readers to be their true authentic selves, to share who and what they really are, not so much as who you want people to believe you are, but who you really are, who you are in your soul, and the person that you really are on this planet.

NADINE: And so it’s a book that I reread a lot, and it really resonates with me and continues to resonate.

NADINE: So it’s my favourite book.

AARON: Oh, that’s awesome.

AARON: I like that idea of getting to an authentic self.

AARON: You know, lots of conversation on social media and in the press around that idea, which I think is a good thing for us as a collective community to be thinking about and, you know, as we think about an authentic self, one of the things that I like purporting is strong women who are leaders in our industry.

AARON: And certainly I think of you as one of those.

AARON: So let’s dive into your thoughts a bit more on your early career, because I want to build this out a little bit if we can.

AARON: I know you’re quite proud of some of the things that you’ve accomplished while you were at the Shoppers Drug Mart Program Optimum that was built out of the Canadian marketplace here.

AARON: I think I’d like to turn it a little bit to say, we want to hear, how was your experience there, what you accomplished, and maybe some of your thoughts on what the impact to the industry was for that particular program.

AARON: But let’s hone in on that, the kind of authentic self then, and perhaps just tell me what it was like being the, quote unquote, the woman on a loyalty team at Shoppers some 20 years ago.

AARON: You were the female face of building out that particular program that’s become such a success in the Canadian Marketplace.

AARON: Can you talk a little bit about that experience?

NADINE: Sure.

NADINE: I mean, first, I find it really interesting in myself.

NADINE: I didn’t think of myself as the woman on the team or the woman in loyalty.

NADINE: Going back all of those years, I didn’t really look at it that way.

NADINE: I looked at it and thought of it as a person, a contributor who had this great opportunity that was presented to them.

NADINE: So I think for me, it would be more interesting to find out if they saw me as the woman on the team, because I never thought about it like that.

NADINE: But I will say that it was probably only about 10 years or so ago that I really recognized that being a woman 25 years ago, being able to have that experience in this industry, not just in Canada, but internationally, was really a huge thing.

NADINE: So I look at it differently now and I think, wow, like, wow, what a great experience that that was.

NADINE: I think now I promote more that I’ve been a woman in loyalty for over 25 years and had this amazing experience as a woman to go from soup to nuts.

NADINE: I was able to be involved in the planning, the development, the build.

NADINE: That’s an experience that not a lot of us get, man or woman, in this industry.

AARON: No, I love that answer and obviously I think we’re a little bit biased as we think about gender constructs here at the Wise Marketer because we have the Women in Loyalty series which purports and talks and rises up the conversation about what it was, as you said, like to be a woman a number of years ago and what that can be passed on in terms of today’s leadership in organizations.

AARON: Thank you for sharing that.

AARON: It was only later that came to the fruition of recognizing the importance and the leadership role and now the mentorship role that you’ve taken on with your most recent venture as well too.

AARON: So that’s a cool perspective.

AARON: I love opening with that.

AARON: Maybe let’s transition a little bit to the actual program yourself because it is such a stalwart program out of Canada that people look to as a marker of success.

AARON: So what was your most endearing accomplishment and why while you’re at your time at Shoppers?

NADINE: Well, I think ultimately the most endearing accomplishment was being a part of this great opportunity that was given to me and for me the accomplishment was I didn’t set out to go into loyalty.

NADINE: I don’t think 25 years ago that anyone did.

NADINE: I also don’t think that people ever raised their hand and said, I want to be in operations and I want to be an operations leader.

NADINE: I mean, you wanted to be a doctor or a lawyer.

NADINE: Nobody stood out and said, I want to be in operations in a national retail store or retail company.

NADINE: So, I mean, it was an opportunity that was given to me, and I thank those that gave it to me, because they saw a mindset, they saw a way that I thought.

NADINE: I originally started out with giving the portfolio to train Shoppers Optimum to the corporate and the retail side of the business.

NADINE: When that little pilot project, ASA that we called it, was going to become an actual part of the business, and I was then asked to be the trainer for the program when it went to a full launch.

NADINE: Based on how my mind works, I said, if I’m going to be the face of this and I’m going to have to convince 30,000 employees and corporate and board of directors that it’s going to work, I really, really, really need to understand how it works.

NADINE: And so because of my mindset, I integrated myself.

NADINE: I knew every system, every system interaction, whether it was our point of sale, whether it was a printer at a store, printing off shelf talkers, health watch, the new bags and the size of them and how that was going to impact.

NADINE: So because of my mindset, which I think operations is a mindset, I don’t think it’s something that you can really teach someone.

NADINE: I became so integrated in the program that I knew all of the intercepts and I was offered the position to take over the operations of the program as we went into the launch and then build it out from there.

NADINE: So it was this great opportunity that I do realize not many people have.

AARON: I love that conversation, if you don’t mind me hopping in, around the idea of loyalty operations starting at a mindset as opposed to and then getting into all of the nooks and crannies within anything and everything that happens with the marketing.

AARON: Like people sometimes go into operations and I don’t think they know what they’re getting into until they actually have lived it and understand it and it’s people like yourself who are future forward problem solvers as you described.

AARON: This makes a ton of sense as to why you’ve become a SME in this particular section of the loyalty marketing discipline.

AARON: That’s great.

NADINE: I look at it and I think every single thing that we do, which I learned back then, which I still hold today, everything that you’re going to do in a program, what is that impact on the absolute end?

NADINE: What is the impact on the customer?

NADINE: If you want to put one more line on a receipt, that’s two seconds to that interaction at the cash or at the self checkout.

NADINE: What does that do that keeps that customer in the store by the total volume of your customers that adds to stress, that adds to traffic, that adds to volume.

NADINE: I still think that way today.

AARON: Wow, that’s fascinating.

AARON: Hey, let’s talk about that kind of idea of what’s transitioned a bit of a to and from and move it back to shoppers a little bit.

AARON: So the program has obviously changed over the past what, 2025 plus years now.

AARON: What you were doing earlier in the program was obviously very successful.

AARON: In your opinion, what standard did Shoppers Optimum set for others to follow in this industry out of the Canadian marketplace?

AARON: And I know it extended into the international marketplace as well too, but what are some of the markers that you think shoppers did better than others?

AARON: And overall, but then also from an operations perspective?

NADINE: Yeah, that’s actually a really great question.

NADINE: I guess I have to think back 25 years.

NADINE: One of the things that was really paramount to us when we launched the program, because we were essentially the last in the marketplace.

NADINE: There were other programs, mostly coalition, but we were really the last in the marketplace.

NADINE: So we were very fortunate to be able to study and look at, and really dig deep into existing programs, not only here in Canada, but internationally.

NADINE: But one of the things I do believe was the pinnacle to be the success that it was and continues to be is, we were very focused that we would show that reward and how it was tangible really quickly.

NADINE: So we built up promotions, we built up bonus point offerings, and we had members that after one transaction, we’re at a redemption level.

NADINE: And that was really, really important to us to be able to immediately show the value and how easy and quick that it was.

NADINE: And I definitely think that it set a standard.

NADINE: And still today, I really, really do believe that you’ve got to show the value immediately because a lot of programs work so differently that it takes time or you have to jump to a level or you’ve got to accumulate to even get to that first level where something is rewarded or something is given back to you.

NADINE: So we really, really work to show that value immediately.

NADINE: The other thing that we did, and I don’t know of a lot of companies that have done this since is we had a pool of ambassadors of thousands and thousands of people in our stores and our corporate offices and our regional offices.

NADINE: And they were all using the program behind the scenes on their transactions for months before we launched.

NADINE: So on day one, when our employees and our staff were promoting this and standing there and saying, would you like to join our program?

NADINE: They had all redeemed.

NADINE: They all saw how truly simple it was.

NADINE: They had all been users and members for months.

NADINE: So they were immediate ambassadors of real true experiences.

NADINE: Oh, I love that.

AARON: I did not know that you soft launched to employees in advance.

AARON: And then that earned velocity being so quick.

AARON: It was like they had something tangible already, you know, in their back pockets, so to speak.

AARON: Oh, wonderful.

AARON: Well, that’s a really strong share as a bit of a, something that others can consider because I mean, maybe I’m a bit naive because I come from the corporate planning and the strategy and the business development side of the loyalty business and spectrum, but to get into that tangibility of ambassadorship, we’ve often talked about it, it’s actually paramount.

AARON: You have Ask for the Card programs, things like that to reward actual frontline staff for getting people to take up the card initially and or to utilize it.

AARON: But this is very intriguing in terms of, so incredibly obvious now that you’ve put it out for us to say, like if you want your folks to be invested in the program, well, make sure that they can get a reward and hey, why don’t you do that first as a trial and get all the bugs and kinks with them and then showcase that there’s value at because they’ll just start to be the word of mouth advertising for you.

AARON: Oh, I love that.

AARON: Hey, listen, you talked about coalition and in Canada, we’re coalition crazed at times, or at least we certainly were 25, 30 years ago and onward.

AARON: We trained Canadians to think that way.

AARON: But Shoppers was unique, right?

AARON: It was one of the first proprietary based programs that was going its own way that wasn’t caught in the coalitions that were rising up.

AARON: We won’t get into the reasons for that.

AARON: But, you know, can you talk a little bit about some of the differentiations between the proprietary model and the coalition model that you knew you had to put into place to kind of stand out and be different than what was in the marketplace?

NADINE: Absolutely.

NADINE: I think, again, Canada was so coalition focused.

NADINE: And that’s how all of the programs were really known.

NADINE: I mean, there were other programs that were maybe a punch card or here in Canada, you know, Canadian Tire Money was absolutely one of the first loyalty programs, if not the first one, but it didn’t have any tracking.

NADINE: So really everything was about coalition programs.

NADINE: But all of those coalition programs had some sort of a travel base, whether it was an airline, a hotel, however you wanted to look at it.

NADINE: So we weren’t that, we weren’t travel.

NADINE: And we also had another thing that I think allowed us to go the proprietary route versus aligning with a coalition or immediately building out a coalition.

NADINE: Shoppers Drug Mart was one of the very, very few national brands in Canada, coast to coast.

NADINE: And a lot of the retail players that aligned with travel coalition programs were not national, they were regional players.

NADINE: So they needed kind of more visibility, more ability for their members to earn rewards, collect rewards on a lot of different things.

NADINE: So for us, because we were number one in Canada, I mean, Shoppers Drug Mart, PC, still huge, huge top brands with top recognition.

NADINE: So we knew we had all of that.

NADINE: We didn’t need a program around us to give us that.

NADINE: We wanted to give something really, really great and maintain the loyalty of our consumers.

NADINE: So we went out with a proprietary program.

NADINE: We also went out with, I mean, now it’s the word, but we wanted to create another brand for the company.

NADINE: We didn’t name it Shoppers Rewards or Life Brand Rewards.

NADINE: We really, really wanted to create our own niche program that would be recognized on its own.

NADINE: And we did that, the Shoppers Optimum.

AARON: That’s intriguing as well too around the brand element.

AARON: But I mean, let’s just go tie back to that, going out and going your own way as a proprietary program in a coalition heavy constraint market.

AARON: Certainly things have morphed now with Loblaw as the largest grocery chain purchasing Shoppers Drug Mart.

AARON: And effectively what we call a proprietary coalition or conglomerate coalition, where one company owns a house of brands and so you’ve seen this transition.

AARON: In your opinion, is the program better now or is it worse?

AARON: What’s your thoughts?

AARON: I’d love your perspective.

NADINE: Better or worse?

NADINE: Well, that’s an interesting framework to give me that question.

NADINE: So look, I do think that it’s better because ultimately, what a loyalty program is supposed to do is give greater benefit and rewards to your members.

NADINE: Also on the company side, you know what?

NADINE: Here’s the reality, you want the data, you want to see the analytics, you want to see what’s going on.

NADINE: So the larger scope that you have to pull information on what your consumers and your members are doing is hugely beneficial to the organization and to the member.

NADINE: I think that it’s really important, especially in today’s world, to continue to give something more.

NADINE: So when President’s Choice, when Loblaws purchased and acquired Shoppers Drug Mart, I think it was inevitable that somehow the program would expand into the two brands.

NADINE: And it was shortly thereafter that PC Optimum was launched.

NADINE: So I think it’s better because it does kind of create that coalition with many more levels and many more opportunities of data collection for the organization.

NADINE: Again, that is the truth.

NADINE: And for the member, greater opportunities.

NADINE: So aligning with Loblaws and joining the programs, you now have PC Financial.

NADINE: So you’ve got that financial or that banking component already built in under the ultimate same umbrella.

NADINE: There’s PC Insurance.

NADINE: So the members, it’s better.

NADINE: You have a lot more opportunities to accumulate and to redeem.

AARON: Oh, I love that answer because it really takes the two, you know, traditional structures of programs from a proprietary and coalition perspective and kind of trades the best of both worlds is what I’m hearing if I paraphrase a little bit of what you’re talking about.

AARON: So that’s lovely.

AARON: That’s lovely.

AARON: Hey, you know, Canada, as we think, is a fairly mature market at this point, obviously.

AARON: But for a number of years, many of us in this sector just thought it was a bit B-O-R-I-N-G, right?

AARON: Nothing was happening.

AARON: But the last five plus years, maybe it’s even been a bit more than that.

AARON: Canada has become a bit of a hotbed again with a bunch of significant changes in loyalty.

AARON: What are your thoughts of where it’s headed and what can other markets learn from Canada as we see a resurgence and revitalization and just overall change in terms of different programs and different program partnerships?

NADINE: I think that’s a really great question because I think a lot has changed.

NADINE: For me, I think that that’s a really great question because as you said, you and I have known each other for a really long time and a handful of years ago, I was a little bored of this industry to take on the fact that you brought up the word a little bit.

NADINE: I had this great opportunity to go into a startup organization over a handful of years ago, where something new and exciting at RewardOps was being put into play for loyalty.

NADINE: So it re-energized me and I really wanted to be back in full time in and be a part of differences and new and exciting technologies or frameworks in the industry.

NADINE: I also think what’s happening is even was just yesterday, I read about Canadian Tire, Triangle Rewards and WestJet partnering for a future partnership.

NADINE: So I think the industry is changing and it is really looking at what it can do to stay new, to elevate offering and to give people something different in an industry that in Canada especially is a really old industry, older than many other countries or regions around the world.

NADINE: So I think that it’s changing, it’s not as boring anymore.

NADINE: I think that the organizations are really looking for different ways, different ways to redeem.

NADINE: I mean, one of the things that RewardOps really, really did, which was really exciting.

NADINE: Again, why I wanted to jump back into this was it took away the weight, it took away the warehousing of products, it took away the, we no longer have that inventory, it used a real-time and uses a real-time model for redemption, and that’s what people are used to.

NADINE: I think how you stay relevant is looking at how people and their needs have changed.

NADINE: People now, everything can be delivered within 24 hours.

NADINE: I think you have to have your redemptions doing that as well.

NADINE: People are traveling less for a number of reasons.

NADINE: So in the WestJet and Triangle Rewards or Canadian Tire Example, how can WestJet stay totally relevant, continue to give more as people might be traveling a little bit less?

AARON: Oh, I love that.

AARON: One of the questions I had on the docket here was to talk a bit about your time at Reward Up, so I’m glad you dove into that.

AARON: I think you touched a little bit on obviously the redemption experience and rewards and how it’s changed, and you’ve got this balance between tangible rewards and aspirational rewards, and that’s why we’re seeing some of the partnerships, and I would add experiential rewards kind of fits in that, too.

AARON: Outside of the recent example you just cited with WestJet and Triangle Rewards at Canadian Tire, what other brands seem to be doing the reward redemption option flow of things quite well, in your opinion?

NADINE: Well, I think, and I will take this back to the most recent programs that I worked on.

NADINE: So, an e-store.

NADINE: The e-store is really what people are used to now.

NADINE: I think that it is commonplace.

NADINE: I think that you have to have it.

NADINE: I think that it allows the breadth and the scope of everything that people want.

NADINE: To me, it kind of easily follows a little bit of how we’re also used to shopping on Amazon or having our food delivered, everything so quickly.

NADINE: I think I was very fortunate to be a part of Reward Ops when we did launch AeroPlans e-store.

NADINE: With Reward Ops, WestJet has most recently, a couple of months ago, launched their e-store to go along with it.

NADINE: I think that those are the things.

NADINE: It’s that you’ve got to have all of the things that people want, understanding that people want to be able to quickly go online.

NADINE: They quickly want to be able to determine what they want, what they can redeem for.

NADINE: They want to see it and they want it quickly.

AARON: Yeah, that immediacy effect that you’re talking about, I think, has certainly risen up as a societal norm, for sure.

AARON: Hey, let’s transition a little bit towards you specifically and talking about your subject matter expertise as a loyalty operations leader in the industry.

AARON: So you talked a little bit about your mindset.

AARON: What type of persona really thrives in the role of a lot loyalty operations specialist?

NADINE: Well, me.

AARON: Of course.

NADINE: Good or bad?

AARON: No, but talk a little bit about those characteristics, and I’d love that we can use you as an archetype.

NADINE: Well, I’ve always said this, you know what, I’m the exact same personality in my personal life and my professional life, because I think that operations is absolutely a mindset.

NADINE: It’s a way of thinking.

NADINE: Even in my career, I’ve hired people based on their mindset and how they think and how they see things versus what they’ve actually done.

NADINE: I think that you can teach about loyalty.

NADINE: You can teach that kind of a thing, but you can’t teach operations in how you look at things.

NADINE: For me, it’s all about seeing the ultimate endpoint, the ultimate impact.

NADINE: What does that look like from the customer experience?

NADINE: I think my role in loyalty as operations is not to be able, not to say we can’t do it, but tell me what your goal is, and I will figure out the best way to do that with the least possible impacts.

AARON: I like that the problem-solving mindset coming back into play that you talked about at the onset of the conversation here.

AARON: Hey, I know I’ve been privy to some weird and wacky stories that you’ve shared with me.

AARON: Are there anything you can share for our listeners and watchers out there about some of the weirdest or craziest problems that you’ve had to solve, that some people in multi-marketing just could never imagine or predict, but you’ve had the pleasure or maybe non-pleasure of having to sort through?

NADINE: Well, a couple of things, and again, this goes back, you know what, for the craziest stories, I think, have to go back to Shoppers Optimum, because 25 years ago, if we think about it, technology was very different.

NADINE: The lack thereof technology and how we did things.

NADINE: I mean, we didn’t have smartphones.

NADINE: We were very fortunate to be able to text on our phones while things were happening and going on.

NADINE: I think one of the most interesting things was we, again, we were really lucky to be able to learn from others.

NADINE: And so we were really clear when we went out with people saying, we know what things you’re going to do to try to scam the program as employees.

NADINE: We know what things the consumers are going to try to do to scam the programs.

NADINE: We were continually shocked.

NADINE: I was continually shocked by the innovation.

NADINE: And I remember thinking, these are the people we need to hire in our fraud department.

NADINE: But that was really exciting.

NADINE: You know, again, this goes back before we had the technology.

NADINE: You know, you would have people maybe putting like fake ink tattooed barcodes so that when they were scanning, they were scanning numbers that weren’t the consumers.

NADINE: I mean, this to me was absolutely ingenious, things that I never could have thought about.

NADINE: I mean, I can also go back to the best and worst problem that I have within the first week or so of launching the program.

NADINE: We met our six week enrollment goal numbers within a week again, completely unheard of.

NADINE: And we were really unbelievably proud and shocked, but we ran out of cards.

NADINE: And this was a card based program.

NADINE: I mean, I remember standing at my actual card production company here in Toronto and taking boxes of cards hot off the presses, putting them in taxis, giving taxi drivers my credit card and saying, drive four hours.

AARON: Wow, wow, that’s crazy, something.

NADINE: You would never have that kind of a thing happen to you today.

AARON: Yeah, that was the story of the Internet, where you built an Internet site and so much traffic happens is really happening to you in real in-person reality.

AARON: So that’s crazy.

NADINE: There’s nothing like seeing a taxi driver look at you absolutely insane as you give him your credit card and say, I know it’s going to be four hours each way.

NADINE: Just go.

AARON: Well, I mean, if anything’s evolved in the industry, certainly from a digital element, we don’t have the physical classic anymore.

AARON: So that’s kind of removed out of it, thank gosh.

AARON: But to hear a heritage story like that, of that’s the type of problem solving that you had to think about with the technology, as you say that we didn’t have the luxury then, but that we do have now to make our jobs easier.

AARON: That’s perfect.

AARON: Say, hey, listen, we’re nearing our time.

AARON: And I want to keep this nice and tight in terms of a conversation for our listeners and watchers.

AARON: But I mentioned earlier that you are a CLMP, and in the introduction, obviously, that you’re now helping us at the Loyals Academy as our CLMP Community Director.

AARON: Maybe can you just give me a quick synopsis of what your aspiration is for being in this role?

NADINE: For sure.

NADINE: And first, you know what, with you having said that, I definitely want to thank you and Bill for this opportunity.

NADINE: I’m actually really excited about it.

NADINE: And it, again, is something else that re-energizes me in this industry that I’m a part of.

NADINE: So, I’ve been a CLMP since 2019.

NADINE: And in this loyalty community, I’ve always believed that we are not competitors, that we shouldn’t be strangers.

NADINE: And I think you probably feel that, too, because I have known you for a few years.

NADINE: I think that we together are stronger.

NADINE: And I think that CLMPs, we are all experts in our own component of loyalty all across this world.

NADINE: So, I think having the ability to create this amazing community that is truly open internationally, we’re already in 52 countries.

NADINE: And I think that that is an amazing feat for you and Bill and the Loyalty Academy, something I’ve just been able to join.

NADINE: So, creating this community, I really want it to be that it’s a community that people can communicate, people can share, people can coach and mentor.

NADINE: I think whether you’ve been in the industry for 20, 30 years or you’re new to the industry, you have a viewpoint which is really excited for us all to truly take advantage of.

NADINE: I mean, I think there are opportunities also for all of us to provide insight.

NADINE: I’ve been in this industry for 25 years, you’ve been in it for just as long.

NADINE: We have information that is really, really valuable for different regions that are just now starting or are seeing things differently or are facing the problems now that we’ve already faced.

AARON: I’ve extended learning, I like that.

NADINE: And I really also think that we have the ability to help each other with our careers in this industry.

NADINE: And that’s something that I really want to be able to open up with our community.

NADINE: So, right now I think we’ve got almost 1,100, I think that you mentioned almost 1,100 CLMPs internationally.

NADINE: And I think that knowing that we can rely on each other, knowing that we can go to each other with opportunities or saying that we want a different or a new challenge or opportunity, I think that this community can really, really take off and offer really great value and benefits to each other and the industry as a whole.

AARON: Yeah, I know obviously we’re aligned and we’re agreed and we think you’re well positioned to be the lead and inspiration for that version and community to get a lot more professional development, a lot more networking opportunities and certainly even sales and business opportunities and career advancement as you noted.

AARON: I want to hone in on something you talked about which is mentorship.

AARON: You talked about the length of our careers here.

AARON: Thank you very much in this industry.

AARON: But if you could talk to a younger loyalty marketer of today and give some key advice, like what would be that advice based on your experience in the industry and certainly the diversity of companies that you’ve been a part of?

NADINE: You know what, as I think about that and as I think about, I guess what I would say, maybe if I think about it to a younger me or a younger you, I like the word that you used in the question, which is industry.

NADINE: I remember saying this on a panel a few years back.

NADINE: Loyalty is an industry.

NADINE: It has all of its own unique components and divisions.

NADINE: It has finance, which is very, very specific when you’re in Loyalty that you really, really have to manage very specifically.

NADINE: It has systems, it has technology, it has staffing, it has HR, it has developers that have to be very, very focused.

NADINE: What I would say is that Loyalty is not an add-on.

NADINE: It’s not just a marketing program.

NADINE: It’s not something new this week that isn’t going to be there next week.

NADINE: I think what I would tell my younger self is that it is truly an industry and it needs to be, in my opinion, seen that way in any organization that has Loyalty.

AARON: I love that because what you’re basically saying is taking that problem-solving mindset and saying, Loyalty is a mindset.

AARON: Loyalty is a mindset for industry as well, as an industry sector as well.

AARON: That’s a really good share to frame people to think like, I can make a career in this industry.

AARON: It is, as you said, and maybe not as lucrative as our parents would have liked in the medical profession or a legal profession, but certainly it is fulfilling.

AARON: I know we both had strong careers and then here’s what’s led us to having this conversation today.

AARON: Hey, Nadine, I love your time and I want to, before you go, ask you one last question that Bill and I ask of all of the folks in the Wiser Loyalty podcast series, which is, can you share one example, and this can be from either your business or professional life, or sorry, your professional or personal life.

AARON: What was a bit of an epiphany moment, when where you just thought, this is why customer loyalty works.

AARON: Here’s the reason why I’m in this industry.

NADINE: Let me just think about this.

NADINE: I think because it’s emotional, and as a consumer, it’s emotional.

NADINE: I guess I’m going to pause for a second and really think about how I see that.

NADINE: I think the world is continually getting more difficult and harder.

NADINE: I think creating an emotional bond, and I see this as anything that I do in my personal life as well as my professional life.

NADINE: I think it’s really about that emotional bond and making your consumers, making your members, because it’s about people.

NADINE: They are fundamentally people.

NADINE: So making them feel that they’re a little bit special, that you’re giving them something.

NADINE: I think we all want to receive something.

NADINE: You know, we all love that sample or we all love that extra large pour in the cup of coffee or something like that.

NADINE: So I think, you know what, what loyalty really is and what makes it successful is that emotional component that you just feel a little bit better about yourself.

AARON: Oh, I love that.

AARON: I love that tying through the emotional component or that little bit of an extra pour because you know, because you go there every day or something like that.

AARON: That certainly pays off.

AARON: I mean, you’re right.

AARON: We oftentimes think of loyalty from a programmatic perspective, but it can it’s bigger than that.

AARON: It’s infused in all of the touch points that a brand has across its various channels and from a branding perspective, to get into the emotional side of it, to say, hey, this is why I choose to be alongside this brand for status or habit or reciprocity or whatever.

AARON: The terminology, three attributes that you want to talk about and there certainly is more.

AARON: But that’s a lovely way to end office, to say that it’s much more than programmatic.

AARON: It really gets to the emotive component.

AARON: So hey, Nadine, I really want to thank you for your time.

AARON: It’s been a great conversation.

AARON: I was not surprised when we set this up that this wouldn’t go in a very intriguing, interesting and lovely way.

AARON: And so thank you for that.

AARON: And then also I want to say thank you to our listeners and watchers.

AARON: We really appreciate you tuning in to our podcast, The Wiser Loyalty podcast series on Let’s Talk Loyalty, but also the other podcasts that our other series hosts have as well throughout the course of each month.

AARON: So with that, I’ll say adieu and wish everyone the best.

AARON: And as always, stay loyal.

PAULA: Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Let’s Talk Loyalty.

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