'How' is more important than 'How Much'

A few weeks back, I visited WellHome, the retail outlet of Welspun, to get some bedsheets. They were running a promotion based on the amount of purchase. Our purchase entitled us to a rebate coupon and a holiday voucher. We convinced the store manager to let us consume the rebate coupon in the same visit since we stay about 40 km away from the store. The description on the holiday voucher sounded very exciting. But when I checked out the procedure to use the holiday voucher, all the excitement faded away. Of course, as a default, there was a blackout period. Weekends did not qualify. With two school going kids, this meant looking at vacation period. That was peak period for most places I intend to visit and as such not eligible for the voucher. The next clause really amused me. I was supposed to call the call-center two months in advance to book my stay. And the confirmation will come in only two weeks prior to the date of travel. Let me refocus your attention... the first period is two months (for booking) and the second period is two weeks (for confirmation). A trip is not just the hotel booking. One needs to plan for travel. Also, what if the confirmation is not received and the booking cannot be fulfilled.

This is not a one-off scenario. Airlines often give out additional flyer miles. But ever try to redeem them. Credit cards give out extra spending points. But are silent on their redemption. My Amex cards often has constantly running campaigns where at certian outlets I get 5 times the normal reward points.

Sometimes the redemption is so cumbersome that I often wonder if it was even intended that a customer should redeem some benefit. A lot of times there fine print is designed to severly restrict the customer from redeeming what is rightfully his.

I have seen marketing programs that define their success by the amount of 'increased' sale due to a promotion or the number of vouchers given away. Rarely have I noticed slides describing the redemption of these vouchers. The success of a discount / rebate scheme is not the amount of vouchers given away but by the amount of customers finding the deal valuable to actually consume the offer. There is a recent trend among credit card companies and airlines to expire the points accumulated by the customer. Maybe they want to force the customers to redeem the points. If that is the case, then it is a good intention. In one case, I actually saw a slide that showed how much money was saved because of lapsed points that dont have to be redeemed any more.

A customer who has registered for a point accumulation program, has accumulated points but not redeemed them should be an area of concern. The company should critically review the redemption process. Is it convinient for the customer? Are the fine prints mutually exclusive from the customer's perspective? See the holiday voucher case. Eliminating weekends for a customer with school going kids is mutually exclusive with black out periods during vacation period.

Some time back, Kingfisher Airlines has sent a communique stating that one can use the flyer points to upgrade. However, the fine print said that the request for upgrade should be received by the airlines two days before the travel. Now, in most cases of business travel, the plans are often flexible and subject to last minute changes. The terms were silent on what happens if the travel schedule changes after the points have been used for upgrade. The airline should have ideally provided this feature at the check-in counter. Technically, that is the most appropriate moment for a customer to decide if he wants the upgrade or not.

So the next time you plan your promotion, give more weightage to the redemption process. Make is much easier for the customer to redeem than it was to do the purchase that got him the redemption opportunity in the first place. If you can achieve that state then you have a potential winner of a promotion.