bp Southern Africa Demonstrates How Loyalty can be an Enabler of Business Growth (#749)

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 hosted by Amanda Kromhout, the founder of Truth Loyalty, an international loyalty consultancy.

Paula: She’s also the author of the book Blind Loyalty, 101 Loyalty Concepts Radically Simplified, and the founder of the Blind Loyalty Trust.

Paula: Enjoy.

Amanda: Hi, I’m Amanda Kromhoed, CEO and founder of Truth and the author of Blind Loyalty.

Amanda: Today’s interview on Let’s Talk Loyalty and Loyalty TV is with Nokwanda Khumalo from BP South Africa.

Amanda: BP South Africa launched BP Rewards 18 months ago, and the success of this program is just phenomenal.

Amanda: Nokwanda shares with us how they’ve gained market share growth, they’ve seen fuel volume increase, and how it’s enabled them, obviously, to get closer to their customer.

Amanda: Reignite Laps customers and the list goes on.

Amanda: And she summarizes it absolutely beautifully in the words that loyalty has become an enabler for fuel and convenience growth.

Amanda: It’s always the greatest pleasure to interview on Let’s Talk Loyalty and Loyalty TV, a client of Truths.

Amanda: So today I have Nokwanda Khumalo.

Amanda: She is the General Manager of Mobility and Convenience for BP South Africa.

Amanda: Nokwanda, welcome to Let’s Talk Loyalty and Loyalty TV.

Nokwanda: Thank you so much for having me, Amanda.

Nokwanda: I’m really looking forward to this conversation.

Amanda: It’s super exciting because we worked together many months ago at the start of your loyalty journey.

Amanda: So I think that alone for me is exciting because I know what’s coming.

Amanda: I know the work that went into it and I know what you can share with the audience, the global audience of Let’s Talk Loyalty and Loyalty TV.

Amanda: So I think you know our very first question is a little off the beaten track.

Amanda: And it’s about what is your favorite book?

Nokwanda: My favorite book of all time is a book I read in 2018-2019 by author called Brené Brown, and it’s called Braving the Wilderness.

Nokwanda: And why I loved that book is it talks about finding belonging, but it also talks about having the strength to stand alone.

Nokwanda: And I think as a leader and as a corporate woman and a mom and wearing many other titles, it’s a book that’s just helped to shape a lot of what I do and how I think.

Nokwanda: And I always go back to it every few years.

Amanda: That’s amazing.

Amanda: Well, as a mom and a business woman and all of the above, all the superpowers that you need, so I’m sure many of us listening to that, I made a note exactly of the title of that book.

Amanda: So, Nokwanda, your route to loyalty is not a traditional one.

Amanda: You’ve got a lovely story.

Amanda: You’ve got great, great depth and experience, but across different industries.

Amanda: So let’s start with that.

Amanda: I think the audience would love to hear how, how has your journey taken you into the role that you’re currently in now?

Nokwanda: Right.

Nokwanda: Absolutely.

Nokwanda: My route to loyalty has not been conventional at all.

Nokwanda: So after finishing my first degree, my business science degree, I did it at the University of Cape Town back in the early 2000s.

Nokwanda: After finishing that degree, I started off in the FMCG sector, so fast moving consumer goods.

Nokwanda: My first employer was a company called Unilever.

Nokwanda: They are also a global company.

Nokwanda: And I spent about nine years with Unilever, did various roles from key accounts management, customer marketing, trade marketing, brand building.

Nokwanda: And my last job with them was in category management.

Nokwanda: After leaving Unilever, I joined Tonga Trulud Sugar as a marketing manager.

Nokwanda: After that, my last role in FMCG was with African Breweries.

Nokwanda: Absolutely loved that job.

Nokwanda: I was a channel manager there, and I was doing trade marketing for SAP.

Nokwanda: Late 2016, I then entered the energy sector.

Nokwanda: I actually started off at Shell.

Nokwanda: I did various roles at Shell, spent about five years with Shell.

Nokwanda: I started off in partnerships, then I went into convenience, and then my last role with them, I was heading up sales and operations.

Nokwanda: And that was probably really my first introduction of Loyalty.

Nokwanda: I was part of the team that executed their Loyalty program in the marketplace around 2019.

Nokwanda: After leaving Shell, I then joined Cecil as the vice president for retail.

Nokwanda: And it was during that 10 years, I helped Cecil to, I was part of the team that executed their Loyalty program as well.

Nokwanda: And in September 2023, I joined VP as the general manager.

Nokwanda: And then obviously, as you know, and we worked together very well, we’ve just recently come out in 2024 with our Loyalty program.

Nokwanda: That’s really been my journey with Loyalty.

Nokwanda: So I’ve come from FMCG, I sort of half my career is FMCG, and the other half of my career has been in the energy sector.

Amanda: Stunning, thank you for sharing.

Amanda: I mean, I think anyone in our industry or in the marketing industry at large knows that if you’re coming from FMCG, that’s a marketing pedigree of note.

Amanda: Not everybody in the audience will necessarily understand the significance of SAB, South African Breweries, but it’s an enormously successful business here in South Africa.

Amanda: And many professionals I’ve dealt with who’ve come out of the SAB stable have just been mightily impressive.

Amanda: And then what I really heard from you is across those different petroleum or fuel brands, is loyalty has never been too far away from you.

Amanda: So it’s obviously landed in the right place now at BP.

Amanda: So when we were chatting earlier, and obviously I know you, so it’s lovely to bring this together, but your role is so much bigger than loyalty.

Amanda: But what I particularly like about your approach to the business is how loyalty, how significant it is within your portfolio.

Amanda: Can you share a little bit about how all that comes together?

Nokwanda: Absolutely.

Nokwanda: So for me in my portfolio, I look after the mobility and convenience business.

Nokwanda: In simple terms, it’s the retail business for South Africa.

Nokwanda: There’s certain sub teams within my retail business.

Nokwanda: It all starts with the network team.

Nokwanda: The network team go out and actually find our locations where we’re going to ultimately build our sites.

Nokwanda: My second team is in the assets team.

Nokwanda: They do the construction and the maintenance and the upkeep of all of our assets across the country.

Nokwanda: Then I have a sales and operations team who business partner with every single franchisee.

Nokwanda: We run a franchise model in South Africa and every service station has a franchisee.

Nokwanda: That sales and operations team looks after that relationship for VP.

Nokwanda: I then have a convenience team who then look after our convenience stores, RPP Express, Pick and Pay Express, and any other partners that we bring on board.

Nokwanda: I’m a non-fuels, retail, income, quick service, restaurants, etc.

Nokwanda: And then I have a marketing and loyalty team.

Nokwanda: And this marketing and loyalty team for me becomes the engine.

Nokwanda: They become the integrator for our fields and our convenience business.

Nokwanda: So loyalty for me, I see it as it’s almost the entry way for a customer to engage with VP.

Nokwanda: Loyalty has become this enabler for both fields performance and convenience performance for us.

Nokwanda: And loyalty has really allowed us to truly start to understand the patterns of our customers.

Nokwanda: We have 500 service stations across this country.

Nokwanda: Millions of transactions happen on our forecourt every day.

Nokwanda: But when we don’t know who they are, how often they come, what they’re purchasing, it makes it very difficult to start developing fit for purpose future proposition.

Nokwanda: So going into loyalty for us was, I think, A, around rewarding our customers, obviously, but also for us to start getting to know who they are, so we can be able to develop a better business and proposition for them as we move forward.

Amanda: I love the words you’ve used there, like an enabler for business performance and fuel and conveniences.

Amanda: It’s a real lesson for organizations to realize, loyalty doesn’t just sit in marketing and sit in the corner, it’s enabling your broader entire retail business, for all the reasons you’ve given.

Amanda: I think before we get into the loyalty story, which is obviously very much part of what I want to talk about, given we work together on it.

Amanda: BP is no stranger globally and this is a global audience.

Amanda: BP is obviously a phenomenally successful global brand.

Amanda: How significant a market is South Africa for a brand like BP?

Nokwanda: So BP South Africa is very significant.

Nokwanda: So we have 500 service stations in the country.

Nokwanda: We have interests in about five fuel storage terminals, which are jointly operated with other energy companies as well.

Nokwanda: Our main import terminal is called Island View in Durban on the Guajorino coastal parts of the country.

Nokwanda: And strategically, South Africa serves the role of becoming the most integrated fuels and convenience player for BP in South Africa.

Nokwanda: So we’ve got a material interest in some infrastructure for fuel and our assets in the country.

Nokwanda: But really for us, it’s about the integrate.

Nokwanda: It’s about being South Africa’s most integrated fuels and convenience business for BP in South Africa.

Nokwanda: I hope that makes sense.

Amanda: Absolutely.

Amanda: No, but what it’s saying is it’s not just another market.

Amanda: It’s actually got real depth.

Amanda: And for an organization, it’s so globally well known.

Nokwanda: Yes.

Amanda: If you turn that question on its head, how big is BP in the fuel industry in South Africa?

Nokwanda: We are quite a big player.

Nokwanda: We hold about 13%, 14% market share in terms of our interest in the fuels business of this country.

Nokwanda: We have 500 service stations across the country, all spread out throughout South Africa.

Nokwanda: I think our greatest strength is in the urban metros of the country.

Nokwanda: And we are now starting to make investments along the motorways, the sort of the key national highways in the country.

Nokwanda: And we are also starting to make some inroads in specific growth regions in South Africa, particularly on the north part of the country, Limpopo, et cetera.

Nokwanda: You’ll start to see a lot of new strategic locations coming up in that part of the country.

Nokwanda: So we are a material player.

Amanda: I mean, from an outsider’s point of view, working with the industry but not in the industry, what I do know is it’s highly, highly competitive.

Amanda: I mean, let’s switch the conversation into loyalty now, given the main thrust of the interview.

Amanda: I know just a little bit of background and you probably can elaborate much more eloquently on this for the rest of the world, that loyalty hasn’t been a big thing in fuel in the past sort of couple of decades or the last decade.

Amanda: It’s simply because of legislation and restrictive ability from a marketing point of view.

Amanda: And therefore, it’s always led by a partnership approach either with banking or retail.

Amanda: So what we have seen, however, and that’s a point of view from myself in the market is an absolute explosion now of proprietary fuel-owned, branded-owned loyalty programs.

Amanda: So that’s a really significant piece because suddenly the market is awash with these phenomenal programs.

Amanda: Why did BP, apart from some of the things you’ve said already, which is super obvious around, you know, owning the data, understanding your customer.

Amanda: What thrusts the, what was the timing for you to come into the market?

Amanda: Why did you launch into your own proprietary program?

Nokwanda: So we launched in August 2024.

Nokwanda: That year also happened to be the year that BP was celebrating 100 years in South Africa.

Nokwanda: So as part of that celebration, we wanted to, you know, thank South Africans for trusting us with their fuel everyday journeys.

Nokwanda: And it was our sort of, it was one of the cornerstone messages for us in 2024, to give back to South Africa and to thank South Africa for walking the journey with BP for 100 years in the country.

Nokwanda: But obviously further to that, there were some serious business reasons for why we went that direction.

Nokwanda: I think I’ve mentioned it before.

Nokwanda: The first one really was to get closer to the customer.

Nokwanda: For many years, I think, as you’ve just articulated in your question, our program or how we’ve engaged with Loyalty has been led by partners.

Nokwanda: And we have had success in that, but it has made it difficult for us to get close enough to our own customer.

Nokwanda: So in 2024, we saw it fit for us to get into the market, get closer to the consumer, be able to deliver tangible material value with them.

Nokwanda: And why I say material value is that we didn’t stop our partnerships.

Nokwanda: We continued with the partnerships.

Nokwanda: In fact, we’ve enhanced the partnerships.

Nokwanda: But by coming up with BP rewards, it now meant that the customer had to swipe, swipe and by swiping twice, swiping the BP rewards card and the partner offer, they were able to get tangibly more benefit.

Nokwanda: So for us really, it was a positioning during our 100th anniversary to thank the country, but also we saw it as an opportune time to be able to add more tangible value.

Nokwanda: And also, if I’m honest, it was a way for us to get more competitive in the marketplace.

Nokwanda: As you’ve just outlined in your introduction, we’ve seen a lot of growth in this space.

Nokwanda: Loyalties become such a integral part of how customers make their decisions on where to stop.

Nokwanda: And we wanted to make sure that we enhanced our value and gave them the reasons why they need to stop at a BP.

Amanda: Absolutely.

Amanda: So, I mean, just my point of view from chatting to an Uber driver.

Amanda: So, I use the same gentleman when I travel to Johannesburg, who is also an Uber driver, but he’s a driver I know.

Amanda: And he is so excited by your program and your partnership program with Smart Shopper as well, Pick and Pay Smart Shopper.

Amanda: He gets so excited when I talk to him about the value he gets back, because his life depends on that.

Amanda: And we see in our annual white paper for South Africa, we write it every year.

Amanda: So, I’m currently in the process of writing the 10th edition, which will come out in March.

Amanda: And we see the impact of a loyalty program on the fuel decision, or forecourt decision.

Amanda: So, in grocery retailing, typically, we see that loyalty programs are the fourth reason why a customer would choose their first grocery store behind price, convenience and so on.

Amanda: But for fuel, it’s the second reason.

Nokwanda: Yes.

Amanda: It’s location number one.

Amanda: And number two, ahead of fuel, ahead of staff, ahead of everything else is the loyalty program.

Amanda: So, it’s really fascinating to hear you cement that, but we see it as well across the board with South Africans.

Amanda: I think it’s worth sharing how our journey started very briefly.

Nokwanda: I think so.

Amanda: I’ve never worked with a business that has been so determined to make this happen in such a record time.

Amanda: And normally, we see a process of the design, strategy design and getting into the detail of writing, for example, a business requirements document can take months, like three months, six months.

Amanda: This was achieved in three days.

Amanda: So BP was so determined to get this right, with time pressures to get it right, as you said, for your 100th anniversary, that you brought all of the people globally around the table for three solid days where we cracked it out and look where you are now.

Amanda: So it’s a real lesson when I talk to other clients, you can take three months or you can take two days.

Nokwanda: It really is incredible how we came together.

Nokwanda: And I think, as you said, both local and global stakeholders and the ecosystem of external technology partners that we’ve worked with.

Nokwanda: I think when the ambition and the objective is clear, it just made it so much easier for us to get through those three days.

Nokwanda: They were intense, but when I look back now on the success that we’ve had and the numbers that we see, I think my heart just, I get so excited about speaking about what loyalty has done for our business.

Amanda: It was super intense, but that leads us beautifully into it was all worth it because now you’re 18 months on.

Amanda: Thank you again from myself personally, because you invited me to your one year anniversary where you shared with the press and your partners the success of the program.

Amanda: So we’re even, I think, six months on from that celebration.

Amanda: Share with us as much as you can around how it’s doing.

Amanda: What is it doing for your business?

Nokwanda: Amanda, if I tell you, you know, I say it’s an enabler, maybe the word is not big enough.

Nokwanda: It really has become a bedrock of our business.

Nokwanda: It’s now 18 months post the launch.

Nokwanda: It demonstrated considerable customer engagement.

Nokwanda: As of probably a couple of days ago, our registrations now are just under 1.3 million users.

Nokwanda: To date, we have issued 175 million rand in cash back.

Nokwanda: So that’s about 10 to 11 million US dollars in cash back rewards that’s been issued to customers.

Nokwanda: From a redemption point of view, to date, we’re sitting at about a 55 percent redemption.

Nokwanda: And we rarely see the redemption peak at certain months.

Nokwanda: It was quite interesting to see in December, and as well as in January, how much that redemption peaked.

Nokwanda: People were looking for that extra assistance to fill up their tanks or to get additional snacks, et cetera, inside the convenience stores.

Nokwanda: For me, loyalty has become such a critical part as well of talking to lapsed users.

Nokwanda: We’ve seen so many former customers being reactivated.

Nokwanda: When I say former customers, I’d said before that in the past, our program on loyalty had really been partner-led, and we still kept all of our partners on board.

Nokwanda: But when you look at the data set, some of the customers had lapsed, even on the partner platform.

Nokwanda: So by coming together and be able to bring this tangible, better commercial value, we’ve seen so many, I’ll call them return soldiers, back in the program, back into our forecourt.

Nokwanda: We’ve attracted new customers, not just obviously on our own program, but even for our partner programs, they’ve seen some growth in the users.

Nokwanda: In this last 18 months, Amanda, we haven’t kept our foot off the pedal, because we’ve also consistently invested in value enhancements.

Nokwanda: We came out over 2024 just with the Plastic Card Mechanic.

Nokwanda: Last year, 2025, we upgraded it to a virtual card.

Nokwanda: We heard the cries from customers, that not everybody carries their wallets around.

Nokwanda: So now you can download the card onto your phone, either on like a Samsung Pay or an Apple Pay.

Nokwanda: So you can still be able to earn your rewards.

Nokwanda: We’ve added Coffee Loyalty as well onto the program.

Nokwanda: And I think for us, it’s important that we keep enhancing this program and keep creating energy around the program to keep driving the engagement.

Nokwanda: So 55% on redemption.

Nokwanda: I mean, my team gave me a statistic.

Nokwanda: We were closing the January figures.

Nokwanda: In January alone, we reached 94% of the points or the cash we had issued was actually redeemed.

Nokwanda: So people needed it.

Nokwanda: They needed those extra funds in January.

Nokwanda: That’s why I say it’s starting to teach us a lot about people spending behavior, but also buying behaviors, their pressure points.

Nokwanda: And I think for us in the world where we are dealing with millions of transactions every single day, this has become such a powerful tool for us to be able to surprise and delight customers as we go along, but also make sure that we hear and start to see their behavior and design our programs, our marketing campaigns and incentives along that line.

Nokwanda: So it’s really been successful.

Nokwanda: I think all of this has also helped to shape BP’s turnaround.

Nokwanda: In this 18 months, we’ve made a considerable turnaround in market share performance.

Nokwanda: I can’t share you that number, but we have made a considerable turnaround in market share performance, and we have seen a considerable turnaround in our volume performance, our field’s volume performance.

Nokwanda: So this has been a winning recipe for us.

Nokwanda: And we, I think the one thing I can promise you is that we’re going to keep enhancing this program.

Nokwanda: And more is going to come in 2026.

Amanda: Amazing.

Amanda: I mean, that’s exactly it, right?

Amanda: You’ve got to keep enhancing it because customers are waiting for what you’re going to do next.

Amanda: But I remember you speaking in August last year around how and ties back to your market share performance, how you grew faster than the markets and you attributed that to the loyalty programs.

Nokwanda: Absolutely.

Nokwanda: And I can share that because I’ve shared it before.

Nokwanda: You know, the South African fuel industry in the last, I’ll talk about 2025 numbers because those are out now.

Nokwanda: Four year industry performance has been flat in terms of fuel volume growth, but BP’s performance has grown.

Nokwanda: So we have grown ahead of industry, which is how we’ve been able to capture the market share.

Amanda: Thank you for sharing the results because I think at the end of the day, that’s what everyone wants to tie back to.

Amanda: I want to talk through something that I’m particularly very passionate about.

Amanda: So one of the things we always focus with anyone we work with from a brand point of view, or any companies we do an audit on is how do your staff love your own program?

Amanda: And it’s a key element that some organizations get and make it happen.

Amanda: And others just bypass and don’t really focus on it.

Amanda: And you can see that in the execution.

Amanda: I have not yet been to a BP service station where I haven’t seen ecstatically excited staff.

Amanda: Like they were so excited last time I was there.

Amanda: I wanted to video them to post on Instagram because they were like, this program has changed everything for us.

Amanda: This program is so phenomenal.

Amanda: This program is so great.

Amanda: How did you achieve that?

Amanda: Because that I don’t see across many brands, even outside of your industry.

Nokwanda: You know, Amanda, I think the formula for us has been, this is not a marketing and loyalty team’s responsibility.

Nokwanda: When we came up with loyalty, this became a business imperative and a business initiative.

Nokwanda: We took the entire business, the entire value chain through what we were doing.

Nokwanda: And we mandated, we mandated everybody to get involved.

Nokwanda: From BP office staff, to our retailers, to our partners, everybody got behind the initiative and everybody was clear what we were trying to do.

Nokwanda: At the very start of our launch, every single person who works in retail, so I have the privilege of leading about a hundred people in retail.

Nokwanda: Every single person in retail, myself included and the senior leadership team, all worked on the forecourt.

Nokwanda: So every Friday for six months, we were activating our forecourts across the country.

Nokwanda: We got out into the cold face together with the attendants and the side staff to firstly, help them sell the proposition and to show the commitment that we had behind this program.

Nokwanda: We invested a lot of money from a marketing point of view, so we really needed that the customer experience doesn’t slip at the end after everything we’ve done to get the customer on the forecourt.

Nokwanda: For me, it became about consistency.

Nokwanda: We consistently are engaging with our attendants.

Nokwanda: We do national roadshows every four or five months to engage with them, to role-play scenarios.

Nokwanda: We do all kinds of gamification and games with them.

Nokwanda: It’s also some incentives that we put together when we do big marketing campaigns to get them to still drive loyalty.

Nokwanda: Loyalty has just become the language.

Nokwanda: It’s become how we trade.

Nokwanda: For me, we had to win the hearts of those attendants.

Nokwanda: We had to win their hearts because every other intervention at the end of the day rests with them.

Nokwanda: It’s that moment of truth we always talk about.

Nokwanda: We had to win their hearts, but we also had to show them that we’re with them on this journey, and we are prepared to be on the forecourt to also execute this launch.

Nokwanda: Absolutely.

Amanda: It’s just amazing to hear.

Amanda: Actually, it’s probably worth us explaining for the rest of the world because South Africa is quite different, that it’s a serviced pump.

Amanda: You have attendants helping us.

Amanda: We’re very privileged that we can sit in our cars on rainy days.

Amanda: As the rest of the world, I always feel that when I go to the UK and it’s cold, wet and windy, but very few markets have that.

Amanda: That is a real advantage for you in the sense that if you can do what you’ve done, that you’ve got that human touch at the customer experience frontline and able to really help you sell and support the loyalty proposition.

Amanda: It comes through honestly so strongly.

Amanda: I didn’t know some of what you’ve just told me around you and your leadership team being actually on the forecourt at a regular basis when you launched it, which in its shows, it’s incredible.

Nokwanda: Thank you.

Nokwanda: Thank you so much, Amanda.

Amanda: That’s lovely.

Amanda: It’s great.

Amanda: It’s super.

Amanda: I guess it hasn’t all been a bed of roses.

Amanda: I’m sure there’s been lots of challenges.

Amanda: Please share with us some of the challenges of your loyalty journey.

Nokwanda: I think the first one is probably very obvious.

Nokwanda: I mean, we had set ourselves an ambitious target of being ready to launch in 2024 when we turn 100 years old.

Nokwanda: We didn’t have a lot of time to get ourselves ready, but we got ourselves ready.

Nokwanda: So challenge number one, I think for me was just the fact that we went into a plastic card.

Nokwanda: The market has, I think, somewhat evolved as well.

Nokwanda: There’s many applications.

Nokwanda: So us going into a plastic card was a challenge in its own because we knew it was going to be successful, Amanda.

Nokwanda: But I don’t think we ourselves also envisaged how successful it’s going to be.

Nokwanda: So managing the logistics of supply and demand of all of these cards across the forecourt was a serious challenge.

Nokwanda: So us migrating and moving on to the virtual cards last year has really helped a lot, and obviously reduced some costs as well.

Nokwanda: But it’s also helped a lot from a customer experience point of view.

Nokwanda: Getting the right capability in the business is also, I think, something that I would share with others who are going to go down this journey.

Nokwanda: You know, when you’re going into loyalty, you’re now dealing with data privacy, there’s so many regulations, so getting the right competencies and capabilities in the team, or even in your service providers to make sure that all those guardrails are ticked and you run your own assurances, and you test your own systems, if they’re able to handle different things.

Nokwanda: I think that has been a learning journey on its own, but I’m so proud of the ecosystem of partners and the investments we’ve had to make in our people to get them up to speed with what was required.

Nokwanda: I think the investment as well for me is a challenge, and I say this purely because BP was a last mover, or one of the last movers, let me say, in terms of going out with its own proprietary loyalty proposition.

Nokwanda: As last mover, you’ve got to make an impact, which means you’ve got to invest.

Nokwanda: You’ve got to invest and you’ve got to make sure.

Nokwanda: We literally painted South Africa green for a period of five months.

Nokwanda: You couldn’t miss our billboards, you couldn’t miss us on TV, you couldn’t miss us on YouTube.

Nokwanda: Anywhere you looked, you couldn’t miss us.

Nokwanda: There was a high investment towards going in as late as we did.

Nokwanda: And because of that, we made sure that we just were obsessed with one key metric.

Nokwanda: And our obsession with one key metric was number of signups, because we knew we were offering value.

Nokwanda: We knew we were offering one of the most competitive propositions from a value point of view.

Nokwanda: So if we could just get the signups, the volume would come.

Nokwanda: The business case would justify itself.

Nokwanda: And it worked, it worked.

Nokwanda: Obviously now we’ve evolved, there’s many other metrics that we’re looking at, but the customer signups and making sure that these customers are active.

Nokwanda: That was our North Star as we went in.

Nokwanda: So challenges will come, you’ve got to get flexible.

Nokwanda: And I think the last thing I’ll probably mention on this for me is that I’m so grateful and thankful for our partners, because many of them have walked this journey for many years before us.

Nokwanda: There was a lot of skills transfer as well, but that happened between our partners.

Nokwanda: That being NetBank, Discovering Sure and Pick and Pay.

Nokwanda: So having almost our quote like a big sibling on the journey as you’re going down this road was really also helpful for us as we navigated this new space as BP.

Amanda: And it’s great that your big sibling stood by you.

Amanda: Ian didn’t get jealous of the new kid on the blog.

Nokwanda: And really, they’ve seen the benefits as well.

Nokwanda: I think that’s why the Swipe Swipe mechanics were so important because it didn’t only just obviously help us to get our program solidified, but it also helped to reactivate Lep’s users, to get in new users.

Nokwanda: The mechanic created an incredibly powerful business case for ourselves and also our partners.

Amanda: You will, it shows.

Amanda: I love how you express that we painted the country green.

Amanda: I think the spring box might challenge you a little bit with that, but yeah, it’s super.

Amanda: So coming to the end of our discussion, which I don’t think any of the listeners even want to end, because it’s so insightful, but what is your overall feeling, broader than maybe even just BP, of the value of loyalty in the future of four-court retailing?

Nokwanda: It’s become a table stake, Amanda.

Nokwanda: It really has become a table stake.

Nokwanda: And I think you mentioned it earlier on, with some of the research you’re doing, or the paper that you’re going to come up with.

Nokwanda: It really has become a key decision factor where somebody is going to stop.

Nokwanda: And why is that?

Nokwanda: I’m also a South African.

Nokwanda: We are sort of plagued with a variety of different macroeconomic factors that are going on, that you necessarily can’t control.

Nokwanda: Customers are feeling the pinch.

Nokwanda: And at the end of the day, you need to stretch your wallet, you need to stretch your money and your income.

Nokwanda: So having loyalty programs that have tangible benefits, not just programs that are not going to make a serious dent.

Nokwanda: Programs with tangible benefits is really helpful for your ordinary South Africans right now.

Nokwanda: If I look at the way we’ve tainted our program, whether it’s the mechanic we have with our grocery partner, Pick and Pay Smart Shopper, where you can earn up to 30 cents, or the mechanic that we’ve got with our banking partner, NetBank Greenbacks, where you can actually earn up to 45 cents.

Nokwanda: And then if you add Pick and Pay, it’s 55 cents.

Nokwanda: That becomes tangible because you do that a couple of times, you could find yourself being able to earn a full tank within a short space of weeks.

Nokwanda: So I think what I’m saying is that loyalty now has truly become a table stake.

Nokwanda: Customers need it, not even just expect that they need it.

Nokwanda: They need it to help them go further.

Nokwanda: And being able to respond to that responsibly and in a way that also makes commercial sense for your business, I don’t see a world of how you can navigate and expect growth in this market if you don’t start playing in the loyalty space.

Amanda: And then just to back up your numbers even more on that is the last year in the annual white paper, we saw that the third thing that keeps South Africans awake at night is the rising cost of living.

Amanda: Unfortunately, one and two is corruption and crime.

Amanda: I think it’s quite unique for South Africa.

Amanda: But the third reason is the rising cost of living.

Amanda: And then the third way they combat the rising cost of living is through loyalty programs.

Amanda: So first is going out less.

Amanda: Second escapes me.

Amanda: Third is using loyalty programs.

Amanda: And we see that data repeat itself in this year’s research from BrandMap that we’re going to release in our white paper next month.

Amanda: So as you say, your customers and all the consumers, whichever the economy, whichever the industry, they don’t just want it.

Amanda: They need it.

Nokwanda: They need it.

Nokwanda: They need it.

Nokwanda: And I think in that need, though, there’s also a responsibility, Amanda, because, and I’ll speak from a BP lens now, we made the decision that our points won’t expire.

Nokwanda: As long as you’re an active user, our points won’t expire.

Nokwanda: But if you’ve been inactive for about three months or so, we start sending you messages, etc.

Nokwanda: But you also have to be responsible knowing that customers need this thing.

Nokwanda: And let’s not play on that vulnerability.

Nokwanda: Offer something credibly because you’re offering it, and give and communicate with your customers if you start to see that they could start to lose their benefits.

Nokwanda: I think it’s probably one thing I’d like to really add.

Amanda: It’s incredible.

Amanda: What a stunning story.

Amanda: I mean, I’ve loved watching it from the first few moments we worked with you through to seeing you now express such a powerful story and how it’s changed the entire business.

Amanda: You know, it’s not just about a few little swipes and a bit of marketing here and there.

Amanda: It’s deeply, deeply changing your business.

Amanda: So a huge congratulations from all of us at Let’s Talk Loyalty, all of us at Truth for the BP team and to you personally, because you’ve led the charge.

Amanda: I’ve seen your leadership either on stage or rolling up your sleeves on the forecourt.

Nokwanda: So thank you so much, Amanda.

Nokwanda: It’s been an incredible journey, but I think I’ll just say watch the space.

Nokwanda: More is going to come.

Amanda: That’s beautiful.

Amanda: Great.

Amanda: So Nokwanda, thank you for sharing your story.

Amanda: And if you are okay, I’m going to, as we discussed, I’m going to pop your LinkedIn link in the show notes.

Amanda: And anyone who needs to get in touch with you, I’m sure they’ll reach out.

Amanda: But thank you very much.

Nokwanda: No problem at all.

Amanda: Thanks for sharing and thanks for coming on Lets Talk Loyalty, Loyalty TV.

Nokwanda: Thank you.

Nokwanda: Thank you.

Paula: This show is sponsored by Wise Marketeer Group, operating the Wise Marketeer and Loyalty Academy.

Paula: For nearly 25 years, the Wise Marketeer is the industry’s longest-serving publication and source for news, information and insights, which now includes its own branded industry research, insights and advice.

Paula: For global coverage of customer engagement and loyalty, check out thewisemarketeer.com and become a Wise Marketeer member or subscriber.

Paula: The Loyalty Academy sets a global industry standard for Loyalty Education, with its Certified Loyalty Marketing Professional, or CLMP, designation, which has created a community of more than 1200 marketing executives and professionals across more than 50 countries.

Paula: Learn more about global loyalty education for individuals or corporate training at loyaltyacademy.org Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Let’s Talk Loyalty.

Paula: 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.

Paula: And we’ll send our best episodes straight to your inbox.

Paula: And don’t forget that you can follow Let’s Talk Loyalty on any of your favorite podcast platforms.

Paula: And of course, we’d love for you to share your feedback and reviews.

Paula: Thanks again for supporting the show.