Qiibee - A decentralized loyalty ecosystem

monajam (70)in #cryptocurrency • 6 years ago (edited)

“Do you have the customer card?”; “Do you have the bonus card?”; these are the questions I have always been asked at the counter in a grocery or a cosmetics store.

One of the best ways to increase sales is to focus on existing customers because acquiring new customers is not always easy, and also invariably expensive. According to a research, it is 70% more likely to sell to the existing customers than to the new customers. Moreover, existing customers are 50% more likely to try the new products of the brand they are using and spend 31% more than the new customers.

Loyalty programs are one of the most effective ways to get more business from the existing customers. Brands or business owners set loyalty rewards to encourage repeat purchases. Empirical research has shown a direct connection of the loyalty program with customer retention.

Typically these programs aim at building a strong brand-customer bond by offering financial rewards, exclusive access to new products or special discounts and bonuses to the customers in order to maintain the current customer base. Loyalty schemes can take different forms, such as, (i) the point system, where the customer gets points each time they make a purchase; (ii) the tier system, where the more the customer buys, the greater their loyalty reward will be; and (iii) refer-a-friend, where the customer gets points each time they refer someone to the brand.

Some example of loyalty programs include hotel points that could be applied towards a future stay; Airbnb.com offers hotel-point-type loyalty programs for its users; (ii) restaurant points, that can be applied towards a future discounted meal, and flier miles, that is offered by different airlines to get discounted airline tickets.

Drawbacks in the current loyalty sector

For brands

Fragmented market

Fragmentation is a major issue for the brands. They spend money promoting and implementing a loyalty program that may not be an efficient option. They fail to understand which programs are genuinely appreciated by the customers. Thus they may hold onto a reward that doesn’t interest the customers.

Redemption experience

According to the annual loyalty report by Bond Brand (2017), $100 billion worth of loyalty rewards remained unredeemed. The report has proposed that the anticipation of the reward and the ease of redemption are as important as the reward itself, therefore brands should focus on changing or improving their loyalty strategies.

For customers

Difficulty in redeeming points

According to a survey conducted by Maritz Loyalty Marketing, customers abandon most of the loyalty rewards programs because it takes them 6 to 9 months of spending to accumulate enough points which can be redeemed for rewards.

Preference for a cash-like rewards

Maritz Loyalty Marketing survey found that 52% of customers wanted to receive cash or cash-like loyalty rewards which they can spend in any store/ for any brand, and which is not tied to one specific brand.

Fragmented market

The current loyalty sector is fragmented and scattered. Customers have various loyalty cards from different companies or brands, and they cannot use the points accumulated from one loyalty scheme in another one. Moreover, customers have to choose from a variety of options, and they find it overwhelming and difficult to understand which programs they should discontinue. Therefore, the current loyalty programs are not very effective.

This picture shows some of the loyalty cards I have. Of all these cards, I am regularly using only one that belongs to the grocery store, and the loyalty points in the other cards are just sitting there, as I don't visit some of these store often such as cosmetics and perfume shops.

Qiibee

Qiibee, which has entered into loyalty sector in 2015, offers a blockchain-based loyalty ecosystem where every brand can build their very own decentralized loyalty app that can be used by customers to collect loyalty rewards. Qiibee aims to consolidate the loyalty programs available, thus, the loyalty tokens earned by the customers from different schemes can be stored in one wallet. In this way, qiibee promises to provide the customers full control and security they need.

The qiibee ecosystem has been founded on public Ethereum blockchain, however, it has its own private qiibee blockchain as well which is based on Ethereum. The qiibee tokens, QBX, exist on the ethereum blockchain, while the loyalty tokens in the private qiibee blockchain.

Qiibee has already worked over 900 brands in less than 12 months!

Benefits and products qiibee offers

For brands

Firstly, using the qiibee platform, while in full control of the interface, the brands can setup their loyalty program, by first setting the budget, which is then converted into the loyalty tokens of the brand on the qiibee platform. The brand is able to decide how to reward the customers and which loyalty program to implement.

Secondly, because the brand’s tokens can be traded and exchanged to FIAT currency, it is more likely to achieve increased customer engagement with blockchain-based loyalty programs, such as qiibee. Moreover, because the tokens will have real value, they will not go to waste, thus eliminating liabilities.

Thirdly, because of the advantage of building the program on a blockchain, the setup costs would be very low; moreover the risks of data breach will be minimal, as customers will have their wallets on the blockchain.

Finally, customer acquisition would be easy. Customers can send their loyalty tokens to family members and friends, thus boosting the brand’s customer reach.

The developer kit

Qiibee offers an open-source developer kit which can be used to develop and run the desirable loyalty app on the blockchain. Qiibee will offer every type of support including guidance, educational materials and tutorials on how to develop the loyalty app, thus saving time and money otherwise used for app development outside the blockchain. The brand owners can also move their existing loyalty app from off- to on-chain, or join an existing multi-brand app.

For customers

The most desirable benefit the customer would get while using the qiibee ecosystem to participate in a loyalty program is that all of their loyalty tokens from different brands will be stored in one place. The brand tokens would be tradeable as these are cryptocurrencies tied to QBX, the qiibee token, and customers can trade them, or sell them for fiat or other cryptocurrencies outside the qiibee ecosystem.

The qiibee app

With the qiibee app, the customers can create one wallet to which all of the loyalty programs will be connected, and where they can store all of their loyalty tokens from different brands. Once they create their wallet/ join the platform, they will get information about all the existing and new loyalty programs that are within the qiibee ecosystem.

The users will see the total FIAT value of their tokens through the app in the “Overview”. They can exchange loyalty tokens from one brand into the loyalty tokens from the other brand; they can also exchange their tokens for QBX or FIAT. Also, they can send and receive the tokens, and trade them as well, thus they have great control over their loyalty programs.

To conclude...

Qiibee offers a blockchain-based loyalty platform where both companies or brands and customers can benefit; the brands can develop their own loyalty app using the developer kit, and can reach their customer base and new customers; and the consumers can accumulate and manage their loyalty tokens from different loyalty schemes in one place using the qiibee app. They can trade them for other cryptocurrencies or FIAT without investing anything.

Customers will be more motivated to use their loyalty tokens, as they would provide them real value. In this way, the businesses that use the qiibee platform, will also grow.

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