Blind Loyalty Challenge with Quaniet Jakoet

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Hi there, I'm Amanda Cromhoe from Truth. Welcome to the Blind Laugherty

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Challenge.

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We interview world experts in loyalty blindly. We're hoping to create insight,

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spontaneity

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and a lot of fun through the challenge. The challenge is about promoting the

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Blind Laugherty

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Trust and my book called Blind Laugherty, a hundred and one loyalty concept

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radically

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simplified. All profits from the book go towards the trust. We hope you enjoy

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the Blind Laugherty Challenge.

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But today's Blind Laugherty Challenge, I have the absolute honour of talking to

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a really good

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friend of mine who we've worked together for many years or many years ago and

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he's just

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left my nest of loyalty people and flow and ever since. So today I introduce

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Conit Jakut

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and he's head of loyalty and payment solutions at Vivo Energy and he did

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confess to me just now he's terribly nervous. So hopefully he can't eat you not

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too nervous.

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No, I'm so glad to be chatting to you and yes, I mean I'm so excited that we

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are doing this as

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well because you've always been obviously a leader, inspiration individual from

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loyalty. In fact,

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you are the first individual that are engaged from a loyalty program

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perspective all the way back

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in our world's days. All the way back, even I was a lot younger then so imagine

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how much younger you were.

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All right, straight into it. So my first question in chapter 68 of Blind Laug

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herty I talk about fuel

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rewards. So obviously you're at the heart of fuel rewards with your fabulous

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role. So what would you

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say is the biggest challenge facing the fuel industry in terms of loyalty and

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rewards?

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I think it's the generosity sometimes that people assume because it's a fuel

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retailer that we make

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tons of money of course you know for the amount of fuel, the charge of fuel at

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the moment and

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people think that you know because of that they're going to be getting, or they

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should be getting at

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least, really high value rewards and ideally in the African market and what we

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see obviously is

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you know margins are margins of slim in fuel. So we really need to ensure that

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from a fuel

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retailer perspective in terms of a loyalty program is that we are giving that

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personalization to them

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in other forms and not just what they perceive in terms of a reward and points

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value as well.

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So it is a challenge in terms of changing that perception as to how much value

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we are able to

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give the individual but changing what it is that we are able to give them as

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well in terms of

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what is perceived value for them. Yeah it's super tough. I mean we've done a

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lot of work in the fuel

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industry and it's actually terrifying that the margins are so tight because you

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just don't expect

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until you're inside the industry so lovely answer great. Awesome so your second

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question

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is I know from your career that you've worked across many industries so we

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spent time together

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in retailing then you went on to a different retailer you've worked in

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financial services

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with old mutual rewards and now in the fuel sector probably missed something in

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between

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but which would you say out of all the industries best lends itself to loyalty

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like which is the

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most responsive. I think based on yes you said fuel retail and financial

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services I think

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the retail for me personally lends itself the most to rewards purely because of

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the way they

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are able to and in terms of the company that I've worked on in that regard

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being able to react

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off of value to the individuals and the engagement strategies that these

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channels have had or other

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this industry has had in terms of engaging the larger community. It's very

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tough as well you know

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I've also worked well now with Vivo Energy. In the African market we do find

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some constraints

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outside of South Africa. I shouldn't just say the African market but outside of

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South Africa.

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I've learned that technology infrastructure, data requirements you know those

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things

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have come at the challenge to some of the consumers that the marketing agents

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and that I engage in

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as well and South Africa seems to be quite different. So we are saying retail.

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I'm saying it from

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a South African market perspective because in Africa it becomes quite

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challenging even outside

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of the fuel industry even in retail even in financial services but in the South

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African market I've

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seen it from a personal perspective as a loyalty member of many programs. It's

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we

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I see a lot of value coming through. If I say second to that probably financial

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services will

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have banks in the South African market as well. And this market in South Africa

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there's no shortage

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of absolutely world-class retail and financial services, loyalty programs. We

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've seen it all over

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we've seen it time and time again so absolutely. Probably what I would advise

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from from my

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financial services background is that if in B I'm not yet to advocate them but

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I'm an avid

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if in B user and I see tons of value in terms of the personalization that they

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offer me as a

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loyal customer is absolutely phenomenal. I mean I know that they are one of the

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top programs based

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on the truth's awards as well and from my personal perspective I definitely

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advocate that as well.

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Yeah last year the 2023 South African loyalty awards they picked up seven I

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think I might have

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even missed one seven awards and they had so many they dropped their trophies

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and they broke

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and a little sound boat. So the 2024 awards will be announced soon so I wonder

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how they'll fare. So

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we've got the results we know what they are but I wonder how they'll fare. So

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okay my last question

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chapter 94 I do ask this question quite a lot because it's such an important

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question if you had

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one chance to present a KPI loyalty KPI to the board what KPI would that be?

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Give me on the spot there. That's some a lifetime value from a loyalty program

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perspective.

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I feel that this is something that is largely missed at the board level. And it

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's not really

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spoken of well enough and they don't see the value of rewards well enough from

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the

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from the arts. Let's put it that way and this is something that I would love to

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be able for them to

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see is that that value that the customer or rather that the member of a loyalty

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program brings

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to the business because I feel that this is missed at the board level.

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Yeah brilliant absolutely love it. I just listened to a webinar actually with

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Len Laguna who

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is extremely well known in program evaluation and liability evaluation. He also

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was

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just raving about the importance of measuring customer lifetime value properly

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so

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you're not alone there so well done. So you're done well done. Who do you want

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to pop into the

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hot seat for my next challenge? Well I'd actually love to to nominate Mark

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Center.

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He leads the loyalty and marketing program in the Kenya team for Vivo Energy

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and especially

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because Kenya is so it's a game changer in the African market as far as

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payments and

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the loyalty propositions are concerned and I feel that is an individual that I

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'd love to

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yeah on the topic. Amazing. Can't wait. Someone knew who I don't know and I don

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't think we've

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interviewed anyone in Kenya yet so that'll be a first which is wonderful.

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Fantastic. I need

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I knew I'd love chatting to you. Thank you so much. It's a pleasure. Thank you

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so much

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Amanda. I appreciate the time and look forward to engaging with you again.