Blind Loyalty Challenge with Dr. Nejib Ben Khedher
Dr. Nejib Ben Khedher, Senior Vice President of Emirates Skywards, talks about the evolution of loyalty programs towards lifestyle integration, emphasizing the crucial role of partnerships in enhancing member experiences.
Hi there, I'm Amanda Cromhoe from Truth. Welcome to the Blind Loyalty Challenge
. We interview
world experts in loyalty blindly. We're hoping to create insight, spontaneity
and a lot of
fun through the challenge. The challenge is about promoting the Blind Loyalty
Trust and
my book called Blind Loyalty, 101 Loyalty Concepts Radically Simplified. All
prophets from the book
go towards the trust. We hope you enjoy the Blind Loyalty Challenge.
So we have Blind Loyalty Challenges and then we have Blind Loyalty Challenges.
So today I
have absolute, the absolute pleasure of welcoming Dr. Nadi Benkader who needs
no introduction
whatsoever to the loyalty award. So before I give the full title for Nadi, I
just wanted
to congratulate you personally on your award as one of the global leaders in
loyalty from
the International Lawty Awards and of course Emirates for their divisional
award of Best
Middle Eastern Airlines. So you're coming with a couple of awards on your
shoulders straight
away. Thank you Amanda. That was more pressure on me now to behave. Yeah, yeah,
exactly. So
for those of you who don't know Dr. Nadi Benkader, he is the divisional senior
vice president
of Emirates Skywards. Now I have a particular fond interest for the Blind Loyal
ty Challenge
with Emirates because you're the company has mentioned so many times, Emirates
Skywards
in Blind Loyalty, my book. And you personally, I mentioned in chapter 34. So,
and actually
chapter 100 is the top 100 favorite loyalty programs from the Let's Talk Loyal
ty Show
from Paula Thomas's show. And Emirates Skywards is featured as the third
favorite loyalty
program amongst loyalty professionals. So, Bledbak, I could just spend the
whole challenge
talking about all your accolades. Well, thanks, thanks, Amanda. I mean, tribute
also to Paula and everybody else who and yourself, offering platform also for
all of us to speak
about something we're very passionate about. And obviously, it's not about
ourselves, it's
also about our teams who are really doing a phenomenal job behind us to just
make all
of this happen. So I'm just the face of a great team behind me, who have worked
extremely
hard. They provide me with the content that brings me to talk to people like
you. You
know, and again, you know, the ranking that you had in the book really is
something that
we're very proud of here at Skywards because we're the top airline. So we felt
really good
about it, you know, just coming after Starbucks and Amazon. So it was good to
see that. Yeah,
without question, you definitely are the top airline. So, wonderful. So let's
get straight
into it. So chapter 23 of Blind Loyalty talks about partnerships. So I know
Emirates is
no newbie in the world of partnerships. So tell me, like, is it really worth
all the
efforts? Like, what is the power of partnerships in the airline industry?
A good question, Amanda. And well, first of all, I would just add to the 10 P's
and 11 P,
which is partnerships.
I'm going to convince you that it is important.
I'm going to quote you on that.
Yeah, the icing on the cake, right? Like the last three P's, you know, just
have partnerships
as well. So,
OK, I need to stop the challenge. I think you've already won the challenge
because I feel like
you've read the book more than anyone else. So, thank you very much.
By the way, I'm passing a thing book in terms of simplicity, but in terms of
bringing all
these concepts to everybody who works in the loyalty, but also somebody who's
actually touching
on loyalty, like our tech providers and everybody else and our marketeers who
work side by side
with us to provide them with a lot of these concepts, with a lot of simplicity.
But at the same time, very comprehensive, you know, with all the concepts that
you bring
to life. You know, for those of us practitioners, I think it's also a
validation of some of the
things we were, again, passionate about. But maybe the 12 P is passions.
We set off together.
So, anyway, so just on the topic of partnership, because I, you know, when we
decided to
transform Skywars, if you will, and take it from just a frequent flyer program
in 2015-2016
into truly a lifestyle program, we couldn't do it with other partners, right?
Like, I mean,
we could not really provide that access to lifestyle both earn and burn and be
in people's lives
on an everyday basis. If it were not for some of the partners we brought into
the program,
whether it's retail partners, hotel partners to augment the travel journey for
our members,
you know, retail, or port retail partners like Dubai duty free as well, to
again,
make that experience the whole travel journey, a rewarding one as well. But
also the airline
partners who, you know, an international airline like ours, we need to be also
very relevant in
domestic markets and to be able to offer everybody an extension of the Emirates
network above and
beyond, you know, whether it's in the US, in Asia, or in Africa, I think it's
important to have those
partnerships. So, I think of them as part of building that ecosystem that I
truly believe in,
you know, again, you have to be very selective around who you bring into the
program. They have to be,
and I use this word, "accretive" to the program, so they're adding something to
your membership. And,
you know, you have to have the member in your mind, first and foremost, you
know, we have,
this is not about making money, this is about also, you know, driving
engagement and getting
partners, getting partners again to be an extension of you in some way or
fashion.
I think the key, what you've said there, like in the in Blind Lorty in chapter
76, I touch on
FFP and how it's evolved. I mean, I'm an old airline girl, I used to be
traditional FFP airline
executive and how the airlines have evolved so dramatically from in the loyalty
space, from
airline to lifestyle, exactly as you've just said, and hence the need of
partnerships. And we touch
on that in the book as well. Okay, so, I mean, as you just want me to add one
thing on this FFP
to lifestyle, I think it was for us a natural progression, if you will, if you
think about
MLMs, also is a lifestyle airline, if you will, you know, it's all about the
experience. Also,
it's not just a transactional, we're flying you from A to B, it's all about the
experience,
you know, whether it's the launch, the check in, what we do on board, you know,
the bar in the
back of the 380 etc. So, so for us, it was important for us to take that, you
know, what the airline
stands for and try to just, you know, build something from a loyalty in the
loyalty space that actually
supports that as well. Yeah, absolutely. Amazing. Great. Well, thank you. Thank
you for sharing that.
Another chapter in the book is chapter 64 about gamification. So, this is one
of those words when
I touch on it in the boardroom of so many clients or partners, that it's either
gets a reaction of
"Yeah, this really makes sense" or "flip, please don't use that word". So, from
your point of view,
do you think it has impact in the loyalty world or is it a bit of a fad?
Well, we debate that, but for me, you know, eventually what we want is, is
engagement. So,
if gamification helps with the younger generation to be able to get their
attention, to be able to
spend a bit more time with them in terms of interaction and to have a way for
us to provide
them with access to rewards in a gamified way, again, I think it's, you know,
it serves a purpose.
But just not, you know, a fad where, you know, we're just going to jump on it
simply because
it's there, it's just how things are evolving, the engagement or the
interaction needs to be a
bit more lively and the creation of that gamification is important. We haven't
done too much out of this
in the SkyWords today, you know, within one piece around gamification for us is
in SkyWords
exclusives, the platform that we have for money can buy experiences. And the
bidding mechanism for
people, you know, for some of these, as I said, money can buy, you know, VIP
experiences behind the
scene experiences is really fun to see. And where people are really engaged,
you know, they're
bidding, you know, takes a week for them to know who's winning at the end of it
. And then, you know,
it's amazing. People really have a lot of, you know, miles in their balance to
be able to bid
350,000 miles on average. We've seen for the experience that we have with Din
mati in Sri Lanka
for a retreat, for three days retreat for a couple to go and do tea tasting,
you know, in the plantation.
But it's something that when you get the feedback, people, you know, the 350,
000 miles is one thing,
but what they got out of it was absolutely amazing. And I think when you win
them,
somewhat through this experience, and they're looking, you know, forward to the
next one,
we just done one in France with Moichon-Dao, you know, in champagne for tasting
as well,
where people stayed in their domain there. And then actually a couple of days
in Paris as well,
in one of the luxury hotels. That, again, those experiences, the bidding is a
gamified way. Now,
it's not, by the way, it's not targeting that younger population I just talked
about. This one
is targeting people with a lot of miles, which are, you know, people who have
more season travelers
who've been around us. I would have bid on that Moichon-Dao, experience for
sure.
Yeah. That's a good one. Lovely. So my last question. So for you personally,
and being, you know,
working with such a prestigious and successful airline in the loyalty industry,
where do you get
your loyalty inspiration from? That's a very interesting one. And always a
tricky one to answer,
right? A lot of people just go to another industry to talk about where they're
getting the inspiration
from. Well, first of all, I'm getting my inspiration from the brand, from
everything itself, as I
mentioned, you know, when we moved to lifestyle, it was almost due to mimic
what the brand was doing,
and taking this live better concept into the fly better concept to, you know,
travel better,
to live better if you will accept. So my inspiration comes truly from a greater
line. We're working for the service that we provide, the product that also we
provide to our
travelers. So, but from a loyalty perspective, again, I follow what my good
partners that I
have to talk about, two partners, Qantas and Air Canada. So Sarah on Qantas and
then Mark on Air
Canada. So, you know, we follow what they do. I think they're really, they have
kind of cracked the,
you know, the code on how to create a very, you know, engaging loyalty program,
of course,
and they're set up in a way where they can be extremely agile from a program
perspective in
terms of adding partners, you know, playing around with the program, the value
proposition,
access to rewards, you know, they really worked very well with RO for example,
which is something
we're learning from on our side as well to get access to rewards. So yeah, I
talk about these
two, but then I have to go to Starbucks again and then, and then, you know, use
your ranking to say
these are the most inspirational ones. But I'll stay with my with with our
domain and the airline
size well. I think that's a really good point, right? That loyalty doesn't
exist in isolation
of its mother brand. You know, it doesn't just float around in the in the
status fair on its own.
It just amplifies like again, to your point in the in the 10 piece is the icing
and the cake at
the end. The program brings it all together. But you've got everything else
lined up,
including the product right before you you put something around it. Otherwise,
it's, you know,
it's sitting on an empty shell and it's not it's not delivering that. Yeah, the
expectation.
I love the way you're quoting the book through and through. Thank you so much.
That's amazing.
So you were nominated to do the blind loyalty challenge by Xi Am Shah from Jag
adot. Who would
you like to nominate to take over the reins? I really thought about it very
hard. I have to say,
I'm on that come up with with one person that I think is maybe not your your
traditional
loyalty practitioner, but a fascinating individual to go talk to. His name is J
itandra Jane. He's the
VP loyalty and partnership at Marriott, another partner of ours and it's like
coincidence that's
a partner, but also I'm very, very blessed to have these these type of partners
that inspire you.
But Vijay and I really met when I was on the technology side and he was he was
on the hotel side
already in the loyalty space. And he's he's a tech enthusiast. And then he
calls himself
an AI tinker. He he experiments with a tinker, a tinker like buddy who
experiments with things,
right? Yeah. And he has published a number of really, I would call them white
papers that actually
are more like, you know, on his page on LinkedIn, he he he's been writing, he's
done a 30 day challenge
with AI. And he has one idea a day. So can I kind of kind of like you with the
concepts the 100
one? Yeah, talk about his done this 30 day challenge. And I really, you know,
would love to see him.
And of course, he ties it back to member experience. He ties it back to loyalty
. So he would be a
great person. I haven't told him about this. It's it. But I think I think you
will find him
fascinating as well. Well, I hope it I hope he accepts the challenge. Thank you
for the nomination.
Did you thank you so, so much. I've loved chatting to you and congratulations
again for all the
amazing accolades that you collect along your way. I have to command you,
Amanda, for everything
you're doing. And then hopefully we'll we'll be contributing as well. You know,
as we go,
the team is, you know, we shared the book with the team and hopefully we'll get
people to
not just borrow my copy, but which is my copy because it has. Of course,
I'm delivered by myself. So I delivered. Thank you so much. But having them
also,
you know, contributed to the cause as well. Yeah. And thank you for everything
you do and how
you're bringing all all this to life. Beautiful. Thank you. Thank you so much.