Postcards from Perkistan

Released yesterday the Virgin Flyer credit card is only the second card with a direct-earn option with Virgin Blue’s Velocity Rewards program. All the major banks have a link with Velocity Rewards, but this is so the user can transfer their points and is not direct earn.

The spending limits on the card are a little funny at first inspection but clearly define the target audience. Earn 1 Velocity Point for every $1 you spend on the card up to $1,500 per month, and then 1 Velocity Point for every $2 after that. Earning 1 point per dollar is in line with other credit card rewards programs when redeeming for cashback and gift cards.

Each time you purchase a Blue Saver, Flexible, Corporate Plus, or Premium Economy ticket you will be eligible for a second ticket in the same booking class free providing there is availability. Free doesn’t include any extra costs for baggage and credit card surcharges. Limited to four sectors worth of travel per year. A nice addition to the card and ties in nicely with a family holiday.

If you register now and use your card before October 15 you will receive a free Go! flight. This fare is limited to routes that are 1,000km or shorter and are on a specific list in the terms and conditions. Major routes such as Melbourne-Sydney are included. The value of this fare varies, but on some flights this will offset the first year’s annual fee.

A balance transfer rate of 6.9% for 6 months is hardly comparable to other available cards on the market, with some even offering 0% interest for 6 months.

$99 per year? The fee isn’t justified when only evaluating the Velocity points-earning potential, but with the buy 1 ticket get 1 free I can easily see a way for frequent flyers to be offsetting that annual fee each year.

Visit the Virgin Flyer Website

Cheers,

Graham.

‪We’ve just come across mozo.com.au, a pretty cool competitor for RateCity and other rate aggregators out there. They’ve been in the media this week as they have just launched a brand new tool to compare rewards credit cards.

The Rewards Revealer allows you to enter details about your credit spending habits and the type of reward you like. Then, based on the points you will earn and annual fees, the Rewards Revealer will show you the “highest rated” credits cards based on the dollar value of the redeemable rewards.

This is a great tool to start your research in to a rewards credit card that may be right for you. Keeping in mind that the tool is calculating rewards on the base earn-rate of the cards only.

In Mozo’s press release they knock rewards credit cards saying they are “Unrewarding” and that they “fail consumers”. They’re right on face value. The rewards don’t look too crash hot when reviewing individual programs with the Rewards Revealer. But utilising loyalty programs is much broader than just a $ value for point calculation.

The Rewards Revealer does not take in to account the complimentary services that come with premium credit cards, such as insurance and concierge services that don’t have a monetary value.

Though they are pretty open about not including bonus shopping days in their calculations, it’s these and other personalised rewards that consumers love – like access to pre-sale tickets and other ‘clubs within the club’. These are a critical part of the rewards credit card decision making process.

Use your credit card to earn points at the same time as using individual retailer rewards cards and you get even more advantage. Research we have conducted here at Perkler HQ reveals that an average family of four can save over $4,100 through the use of rewards programs in their everyday spending.

We agree completely with the Mozo conclusion that on paper credit card point scales offer little direct cash benefit, but we still maintain the broader loyalty redemption market is strong. As we always say – if you are going to shop there anyway, why not get some kind of benefit?

Classic example is Westpac Altitude. Here at Perkler Jus uses his. The direct points value is pretty low – but using points to fly him and Mrs Jus to Melbourne for a weekend away from the kids is worth more than a dollar calculation - though he does love his kids

Check out the Rewards Revealer

and read what SMH have to say

Over the past four weeks Everyday Rewards has been celebrating the one year anniversary of linking with the Qantas Frequent Flyer program. The core of the promotion was a different prize each day for four weeks, with a major prize draw of 5x $10,000 shopping sprees. In considering whether the promotion has been a success I have drummed up four or so key points to consider:

Good Points: Consumers
It was extremely easy to take part in the promotion. Simply swipe your card when making any purchase at a participating Woolworths, BIG W, BWS, or Dick Smith.

Bad Points: Consumers
The promotion was entirely draws to win prizes meaning there was no instant feeling of being rewarded.

Good Points: Everyday Rewards
The promotion would have revealed which consumers are most easily swayed by promotional products and those who are not.

Bad Points: Everyday Rewards
Perhaps a loss of positive sentiment for the program, but it’s hard to find much more than that.

How would I have done the promotion differently?
Well, if I was Everyday Rewards then perhaps I wouldn’t. They now have the power, or at least more than they had before, to target members based on how likely they are to respond to a particular promotion. That’s a pretty powerful piece of information to have as there isn’t a direct link between an active user and redemption of special offers.

How did you rate the First Birthday Bonanza?
(dislike) 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 (like)

Got a lengthy response? Leave a comment below.

Cheers,
Graham

A few months ago we covered cinema loyalty programs with the release of Hoyts Rewards, the last cinema to create a loyalty program. However, with this addition it meant that all major cinemas had a loyalty program that had some kind of frequency-based benefit… except Village Cinemas. Re-launched this morning the Village Movie Club has now added more loyalty-focussed offers. This is how the programs compare:

Australian Cinema Loyalty Programs

Taking a quick look at the table we can see that all the programs are very similar. This means we aren’t being forced to make another decision about where to take our money. This brings about a few observations and questions. If the programs aren’t competing with each other then the sole purpose can be to give something back to their regular customers, what a loyalty program should be from a consumer perspective. Given that all the programs are similar though, they aren’t gaining sales through the program, creating a low return on their investment, what a loyalty program shouldn’t be from a business perspective.

Are movie theatres wasting their time and money on their loyalty programs? Let us know below.

Cheers,
Graham.

While we quietly work away on our iPhone app here in Perkler HQ (yes it’s coming and yes it will be relevant to making your loyalty shopping easier), we thought we would take a look at a couple of loyalty apps that are on the market already and take them for a spin.

To be frank, the tie in between retailers and loyalty on the phone is pretty lean. While there are plenty of loyalty services companies developing technology, Australian retailers still seem reluctant to link perks to purchasing in the mobile space.

Let’s hope loyalty gets its act together and starts getting out there with the Lasoo and Get Prices of the world!

And if you’ve come across a loyalty app let us know all about it, we’ll happily take a look.

For the moment, here are a couple we’ve been impressed with.

Flybuys - iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad

In all honesty we’ve been really impressed with the work the Flybuys team have been doing over recent months. The launch of Everyday Rewards has really kicked the market along and the result is a revitalisation of competing programs.

The app itself has everything you would expect from a coalition points program. The basic menu covers stores, rewards and points balances.

Set up can take a little while as you need to establish a password to keep authentication secure - but that seems a small price to pay for an updated points balance. And that’s one of the great pieces of information - not just current points but importantly when they expire - critical if you want to make sure you use them effectively.

The wishlist section is clear and allows you to set up goals so that you know what you are ‘earning’ towards, and the store locator is a neat feature with so many brands available under the one program.

All in all a nice little package.

Choice Hotels - iPhone and PDA / “standard” mobile phone platforms

Hotel Chains are perfectly placed to take advantage of the app market. With multiple brands, multiple locations and last minute booking all the ingredients are there for a great app. Choice Australia utilises its international connections to bring you a comprehensive app across multiple platforms.

You can search hotels from 10 brands - that’s an enormous range to choose from - and then make reservations. Importantly from a loyalty point of view you can access your account (it throws you to a secure but clunky webpage) so that you can see point balance and redeem straight from that balance.

With the range of hotels these guys have this is GPS heaven - and the loyalty account tie in ticks all the right boxes for us. A bit more design work on the web pages and it would be the total package!

So that’s two…

I guess the development required for an app and tying in loyalty is a reasonable investment, but surely linking earn and particularly burn  to the point of purchase is a critical part of the modern retailer’s armoury.

I can only assume Everyday Rewards, Qantas and lots of others are working on their mobile malls now…Would be interesting to know what their thoughts on this channel and how it links to loyalty are.

As far as we go, we are putting the final touches to our app - which in true Perkler style will seek to bring your whole wallet to life, more on ‘Perky Shopper’ soon.