Less magic, more points – Eagle Eye's Product Team delivers again.

Ah, points – the heartbeat of most loyalty schemes. Earn them, burn them, save them, boost them, donate them, gift them, argue who gets them in a divorce (yes really). The list goes on...

As customers, we rarely ponder on the intricacies of how points function; they just work like magic. Yet, behind the scenes, there's some serious cleverness at play, especially when you begin to think about the scale and value of points, along with the real-time balance updates.

Contrary to customer nonchalance, our brilliant product team live in the world of points, finding ways to enrich them for our retailer customers, providing them with more flexibility, and unlocking new use cases while maintaining the ironclad security needed to fend off intentional and unintentional fraud.

Let's dive into a few recent use cases that we've collaborated on with our customers:

Pending Points

A good one for the fashion industry grappling with high return rates – in this instance it was about finding the right balance between not penalizing loyal customers and protecting profit from people willingly trying to beat the system and others doing so without realizing it. To do so, we set rules that points could not be used for a set number of days. Typically, this is the refunds period (28 days) but their loyalty data showed that their most valuable customers return items within 7 days, so to reduce friction with these VIPs, they set 7 as the magic number of days it takes for points earned to clear and become usable. This move instantly shielded our customer from a barrage of fraudulent purchases while keeping their customers happy and engaged with the loyalty program.

In the B2B world, pending points as a feature has also proved to be very valuable. Large bulk orders translate to serious cash, and serious cash can be converted into stacks of points. Here, we've automated pending points for transactions meeting a set threshold (e.g. total value or number of units purchased). This allows for profitability and fraud checks before pending points are either manually released or automatically expired based on a set timeline.

Saving Pots Expiry

Talking about Christmas in February might feel odd, but it's the perfect example for this one. 'Save for Christmas' has been a hit worldwide. Customers move points to a separate pot at a boosted rate, gearing up for that pricey holiday shopping season. Retailers, in turn, secure customer loyalty during the all-important peak period, almost guaranteeing that these savvy individuals will be doing a large proportion of their festive shopping in their stores. The crucial detail? Retailers are able to set an expiry date for each pot, ensuring customers can't use boosted points after the intended event.

Auto Exchange Points to a Coupon

Now, not everyone is seamlessly connected in the digital realm – just ask my gran. Yet, non-digital users deserve loyalty rewards too (my gran would also agree). To bridge the gap, we collaborated with a customer to automatically print £5 coupons on non-digitally engaged customers’ receipts through our Message at Till feature once they'd earned 5000 points. This is our way of ensuring that even those less digitally inclined can still get their well-deserved rewards.

If you'd like to find out more about any of our loyalty capabilities, check out our Real-Time Loyalty product page or get in touch with one of our loyalty experts who will be more than happy to help answer any questions you have.