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South African Loyalty Awards

By Interviews, News

The 2024 South African Loyalty Awards, designed specifically to celebrate loyalty brilliance and innovation, announced the winning loyalty brands on Wednesday 11th September at the Truth International Leaders in Loyalty Summit, in Cape Town.

This was the sixth year of operation of the South African Loyalty Awards, which was initiated by Truth, a leading international loyalty & CRM consultancy, based in South Africa.

“The 2024 South African Loyalty Awards has highlighted once again that the South African loyalty industry is thriving in world-class innovation and excellence, driving loyalty performance which most definitely exceeds global standards!  What continues year on year is how our leading loyalty brands are truly helping South Africans in difficult times and their daily struggle to survive financially. The loyalty rewards help consumers meet monthly expenditures.”  Amanda Cromhout – Judging Chair of the South African Loyalty Awards and CEO/Founder of Truth loyalty consultancy. “I have the honour of judging loyalty awards in the Asia Pacific Loyalty Awards and The International Loyalty Awards, which offer a solid benchmark for our review of the South African market versus the rest of the world. It is for this reason that I can confidently say that South Africa yields some of the world’s most respectable loyalty brands, with world-class results and customer experiences.

In total, there are 24 categories where entries have been evaluated through a robust judging process by a well-established judging committee, made up of 14 loyalty & CRM professionals from South Africa and across the globe.

The headline awards “best programme of the year” are awarded to major industry sector leaders across retail, financial services, restaurant/QSR, travel, fuel, telco and leisure programmes in their sector. The awards also announce “best partnership programme”, “best newcomer”, “best relaunched programme” and “best long-term programme”, the latter of which announces the overall best and most established programme in South Africa.

Headline awards for “best programme of the year” were awarded to:

  • Best overall long-term loyalty programme: FNB eBucks
  • Best loyalty programme: Retail – The Shoprite Group Xtra Savings
  • Best loyalty programme: Financial Services – FNB eBucks
  • Best loyalty programme: Restaurant/QSR – Spur Family Card
  • Best loyalty programme: Travel/hospitality – Legacy Lifestyle
  • Best loyalty programme: Fuel – Shell V+
  • Best loyalty programme: Telco – Vodacom Vodabucks
  • Best loyalty programme: Entertainment/leisure – DStv Rewards
  • Best partnership programme of the year – FNB eBucks
  • Best programme of the year: Newcomer – The Shoprite Group Xtra Savings Plus
  • Best programme of the year: Relaunched – Africanbank Audacious Rewards

In addition, other distinct loyalty awards were also presented to recognise loyalty excellence across innovation in technology, community loyalty campaigns, supporting agencies and best loyalty marketing campaign, to name a few.

There is no question that one brand dominated the awards in 2024, as it did also in 2023.  FNB eBucks was awarded a total of five awards in various categories.

The South African judging committee also honours individuals and loyalty team leadership. Fionna Ronnie, Head of Customer and Loyalty at TFG Rewards is recognised as the “Loyalty Personality of the year” for South Africa for her ongoing approach, leadership and results in the industry.  The judges also honoured the Discovery Vitality team with “best loyalty team of the year” in recognition of its outstanding achievement across multiple markets, in creating a programme which changes customer behaviour for within its shared-value model.

The 2025 Loyalty Awards dates have been set with entries opening on 17 February 2025 and closing on 16 May 2025. Winners of the seventh South African Loyalty Awards will be announced in September 2025.

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Blind Loyalty Challenge – Aaron Dauphinee

By Blind Loyalty Challenge

Blind Loyalty Challenge with Aaron Dauphinee, Chief Marketing Officer at The Wise Marketer Group.

This insightful 13-minute challenge is definitely worth a listen and covers:
✅ Retail industry that is responsive to loyalty: “Clothing and footwear retailers & apparel.” A shoutout to Nike and the different interactions that they have created for customers such as using gelocation to only stock the colours and types of shoes that customers in that area are looking to buy.
✅ A big challenge in launching a loyalty programme: “Setting realistic expectations about customer’s behavioural change and what that looks like over time, and managing those expectations correctly.”
✅ Data privacy and are companies doing enough to protect data: “It depends on location, some are doing it very well and others are not, based on the legislation rules in their region. As loyalty marketers, we need to do better and protect the consumer first.”

Watch our #blindloyaltychallenge for loyalty insights with Aaron 💡

Blind Loyalty Challenge – Fionna Ronnie

By Blind Loyalty Challenge

Blind Loyalty Challenge with the South African Loyalty Awards Industry Personality of the Year, Fionna Ronnie. Fionna is the Head of Customer & Loyalty at The Foschini Group.

This insightful 9-minute challenge is definitely worth a listen and covers:
✅ Fashion & beauty retail rewards: A huge shoutout to Sephora: “Sephora almost becomes part of your lifestyle.” Another programme to admire and shoutout to is Emirates.
✅ Return on Investment through gamification: “Your intent needs to be clear on what you want to achieve.”
✅ Non-transactional activities to drive change: TFG drives covert offerings through non-transactional activities, as well as emotional loyalty.

Watch our #blindloyaltychallenge for loyalty insights with Fionna 💡

Ernie Harker – Blind Loyalty Challenge

By Blind Loyalty Challenge

Today’s Blind Loyalty Challenge is with Ernie Harker, Professional Speaker in Branding.

This insightful 7-minute challenge is definitely worth a listen and covers:
✅ An example of terrible customer experience while simply trying to buy a sandwich
✅ The power of loyalty in the broader brand & strategy space: “What can organisations offer as rewards that are unique to their organisation?”
✅ A recommended business read: “The four hour work week, by Tim Ferris.”

Blind Loyalty – 101 loyalty concepts radically simplified, is available now on www.amandacromhout.com/author or directly from Amazon.

Kia Abbott – Blind Loyalty Challenge

By Blind Loyalty Challenge

Listen to my interview with Kia Abbott, Chief of Customer Value, Virgin Active Group

1) Member programs makes the link between loyalty and the customer
2) Emotional loyalty is focusing on what the customer really wants and needs
3) Most important KPI = measuring events that would not have happened without the loyalty program

Learn about loyalty in this insightful 8-minute challenge and covers:
– Loyalty programs give you the ability to link intrinsic value back to the customer but if the fundamentals are not there, a loyalty program can not save you
– What members really want
– Creating behaviour and events that would not have happened if it was not for the loyalty program

The importance of having active members and interacting with your customers frequently
– Once customers redeem their rewards they tend to spend 5 times more with your brand and the frequency goes up!
– It is the little gestures that makes the impact and creates more loyalty from customers

Follow me for greater insights on how to gain loyalty from your customers.

#loyaltyprogram #customerinsights #loyalty #businesssuccess #businessgrowth #customerloyalty #marketingtips #marketingstrategy #businessstrategy #loyaltyprogramtips #loyaltyexpert #rewardsprogram

Quaniet Jakoet – Blind Loyalty Challenge

By Blind Loyalty Challenge

The Blind Loyalty Challenge with Quaniet Jakoet, Head of Loyalty & Payment Solutions at Vivo Energy.

This insightful 8-minute challenge is definitely worth a listen and covers:
✅ The biggest challenge in the fuel industry and in fuel rewards: ‘Margins are slim in fuel, so personalisation beyond points & rewards is key and conveying the perceived value for loyalty members.’
✅ The industry most responsive to loyalty: ‘The retail industry, because of how they can react and offer huge value to members’ and financial services with a shoutout to FNB eBucks for the incredible personalisation they offer through their programme.
✅ A loyalty KPI to convey to the board: ‘Customer Lifetime Value from a loyalty programme as this is often missed at their level, the board level needs to see the value that the members bring to the programme.’

Watch our #blindloyaltychallenge for loyalty insights with Quaniet 💡

Andy Choi – Blind Loyalty Challenge

By Blind Loyalty Challenge, Media Host

Today’s Blind Loyalty Challenge is with Andy Choi, Founder & CEO of Do Good Points.

As Amanda says in this challenge, this is one to watch and bottle up all the incredible insights!

This insightful 8-minute challenge is definitely worth a listen and covers:
✅ The role of loyalty in sustainability and social impact: ‘what it takes to build a better world is the act of loyalty. Being loyalty to our environment, to society and to humanitarian efforts.’
✅ The importance of non-transactional rewards: Programmes need to be intentional and genuine, whether it’s through transactional or non-transactional rewards.’
✅ Commercial return on non-transactional rewards: there is always a quantitative and qualitative element to be shown. Do Good Point’s philosophy is ‘ the business of doing good should drive profit with purpose.’

Watch our #blindloyaltychallenge for loyalty insights with Andy 💡

Loyalty Stories 18: The Value in Honesty and Simplicity- Amanda Cromhout

By Academic Director, Media Host

On this episode of the Loyalty Stories Podcast, Michelle Ellicott-Taylor, Global Head of Partnerships at Antavo is joined by Amanda Cromhout, Founder and CEO of Truth, Author of Blind Loyalty. During their discussion, they dive into Amanda’s favourite loyalty programmes, from British Airways and Vodacom, and all the reasons why these two programs stand out (including non-transactional rewards).

Key Takeaways from Loyalty Stories 18:

  • Why Amanda is super proud of the wiiv Rewards coalition programme
  • The reasons why simplification is absolutely mission-critical in loyalty programmes
  • Stand-out strategy moments from brands like Starbucks and Lacoste

Newscast 2 – Spotlight on GDPR, the UK market & Blind Loyalty – The Loyalty Podcast

By Media Host, Podcast

This episode of newscast features a look into the current state of General Data Protection Regulation compliance by Richard Dutton, of WPP.

Amanda Cromhout explains her motivation behind establishing the Blind Loyalty Trust, citing her personal medical journey as the catalyst. Through this challenging experience, she realised the profound impact of vision issues on individuals’ lives, particularly for those without medical insurance to cover necessary treatments.

Listen here:

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