iFly Loyalty made a grand entry into the Latin American market recently, signing a multimillion dollar contract with one of the most prominent loyalty providers in the region. Latin America is an impressively mature market when it comes to loyalty. Customers (end users) in this region are well aware of the value provided by membership in a loyalty program, especially those tailored to suit their specific needs. On the business end, this translates into a very positive challenge for IBS, as we must keep up with the growing demand for innovative solutions that can support such a keen market. iFly Loyalty is designed from the ground up to provide an immense level of flexibility in managing loyalty programs. Providers can use this solution to tailor their offerings to target different customer segments, based on their unique earn and burn behaviour.

Broad spectrum coalition loyalty programs bring together multiple partner organizations, ranging from airlines, retail companies, fashion outlets, food service companies and more. Typically, the larger the number of partners, the greater will be the cost overheads associated with program operation, such as liaising with partner systems and tracking earn and burn data specific to each partner. Compatibility issues between IT systems can result in data mismatches and procedural delays lead to a deterioration in the customer experience. iFly Loyalty solves all these problems in a single sweep with the introduction of a Partnership Portal, where each partner can track and manage their own campaign data without assistance from the loyalty provider, thereby reducing management overheads. The system also gives each partner the flexibility to design and run their own promotional campaigns in realtime through this portal, without the need for disruptive reconfigurations. Such scalability in the partner landscape enhances customer experiences and directly translates to greater revenues for the loyalty service provider!

On the other hand, with such a diverse array of options at their disposal, different segments of customers may have different preferences regarding how to earn their points and which partners they wish to redeem (burn) those points with. iFly Loyalty supports multiple programs by the same loyalty provider to be hosted on a single platform, in order to tap into these diverse preferences of each customer segment. This is implemented effectively by using a customer centric approach to managing identity and transaction information.

The core entity in a loyalty program ecosystem powered by iFly Loyalty is the customer (end user). Each end user is internally assigned a customer level entity that stores his/her identity, credentials and transaction data. When the customer signs up for a loyalty program within that brand's ecosystem, a membership record is created within the confines of the corresponding customer level entity. This membership record stores all transactions and other relevant information regarding the customer's earn and burn activity specific to that program; but this is automatically under the umbrella of the customer level entity. The same customer is thereby given the flexibility to participate in multiple loyalty programs within the same ecosystem, each resulting in the creation of a new membership record on the platform. Earn or burn transactions by each end user is therefore directly characterized under his/her own identity, irrespective of the specific program it is linked to. This brings in greater integrity in customer data since, unlike in a program membership based organization of records, no reconciliation process is required to update customer-level data and transaction records. This reduces the possibility of errors in the data, and ensures integrity of each record.

To the end user, this would translate to a better scalable bouquet of options, without compromising on consistency across the range of programs under the brand. The user experience, as well as service levels that determine customer satisfaction, will now be consistent for the whole range. The combination of these features offered by iFly Loyalty gives the provider better visibility of customer responses across the platform. This results in loyalty service providers being able to understand their customers better, aiding in continuous improvement of the offerings and better targeting, thereby enhancing customer delight!

Jitendra Sindhwani, President & Head of Aviation Business Services at IBS, expressed his confidence in how this is merely a beginning for the large transformation IBS is going to bring to the business in this geography. "As a technology partner offering the widest bouquet of aviation software products, we hope to leverage our relationship with a proven airline to make IBS the most recognizable brand on innovation for the airline industry in the region".