Loyalty programmes, used as a tool to improve brand loyalty among consumers, have grown in popularity in the South African business environment. Loyalty programmes are essential in understanding customers and to keep customers involved while promoting a brand simultaneously. Although loyalty programmes are also being utilised in the pet food industry, information of the impact it has had on brand loyalty of pet food brands are limited. It is for this reason that the loyalty programme of a leading premium pet food brand, Eukanuba South Africa, has been chosen for the study, to establish how brand loyalty manifests itself in the pet food market. The aim of the study set out is therefore to establish what brand loyalty constructs are more important to loyalty programme members, assisting in tailoring the brand’s marketing methods to attract and retain loyal customers. Moolla and Bisschoff’s conceptual brand loyalty model and questionnaire were adapted and utilised to measure nine brand loyalty constructs through 38 questions. The nine constructs measured include brand relevance, perceived value, brand trust, involvement, family/culture, commitment, repeat purchase, brand affect and switching cost/risk aversion. The empirical study consisted of two independent groups, the Loyalty Programme members and the Breeders’ club members. A convenience sample of 1066 Loyalty Programme members were utilised, with 209 respondents. Access was granted to the entire database of breeders, consisting of 1047 breeders, of which 205 responded. The data was analysed utilising statistical calculations, including the Kaiser-Meyer- Olkin measure of sampling adequacy, the Bartlett’s test of sphericity, Cronbach’s Alpha coefficient, mean values and Spearman’s Correlation. The data was also subjected to a factor analysis with Varimax rotation, which resulted in two conceptual frameworks, one relating to Loyalty Programme members, the other to Breeders’ club members. The results indicate that there are variations from the nine factors adapted from Moolla and Bisschoff’s conceptual model, but that the new conceptual models are reliable. The new conceptual model consisting of nine factors could be established for the Loyalty Programme members, including brand relevance, brand trust, involvement, family/culture, commitment, repeat purchase, brand affect, switching cost/perceived value and risk aversion. These nine factors explain 66.61% of the cumulative variance, indicating that these nine factors are sufficient in explaining brand loyalty among Loyalty Programme members. The seven factors identified forming part of the conceptual model for the Breeders’ club members are brand relevance, commitment, involvement, brand trust, family/culture, repeat purchase and brand affect. These seven factors have also been found to be sufficient in explaining brand loyalty among Breeders’ club members, with a cumulative variance of 63.57%. It can be concluded that the Loyalty Programme members are not representative of the population due to the limited sample, whereas that of the Breeders’ club members are as the entire population formed part of the study. It is therefore recommended that a representative sample of Loyalty Programme members should be included in future research. This will also aid in the construction of a customer profile for both Loyalty Programme members and Breeders’ Club members that is accurate and reliable, aiding in future marketing endeavours. Managerial attention is also necessary to ensure adequate emphasis is given to different factors, as the two groups will respond differently to brand loyalty constructs. The study contributes to the body of knowledge relating to brand loyalty in the pet food industry, helping in understanding which brand loyalty constructs are vital in improving and maintaining brand loyalty. / MBA, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

Loyalty programmes, used as a tool to improve brand loyalty among consumers, have grown in popularity in the South African business environment. Loyalty programmes are essential in understanding customers and to keep customers involved while promoting a brand simultaneously. Although loyalty programmes are also being utilised in the pet food industry, information of the impact it has had on brand loyalty of pet food brands are limited. It is for this reason that the loyalty programme of a leading premium pet food brand, Eukanuba South Africa, has been chosen for the study, to establish how brand loyalty manifests itself in the pet food market. The aim of the study set out is therefore to establish what brand loyalty constructs are more important to loyalty programme members, assisting in tailoring the brand’s marketing methods to attract and retain loyal customers. Moolla and Bisschoff’s conceptual brand loyalty model and questionnaire were adapted and utilised to measure nine brand loyalty constructs through 38 questions. The nine constructs measured include brand relevance, perceived value, brand trust, involvement, family/culture, commitment, repeat purchase, brand affect and switching cost/risk aversion. The empirical study consisted of two independent groups, the Loyalty Programme members and the Breeders’ club members. A convenience sample of 1066 Loyalty Programme members were utilised, with 209 respondents. Access was granted to the entire database of breeders, consisting of 1047 breeders, of which 205 responded. The data was analysed utilising statistical calculations, including the Kaiser-Meyer- Olkin measure of sampling adequacy, the Bartlett’s test of sphericity, Cronbach’s Alpha coefficient, mean values and Spearman’s Correlation. The data was also subjected to a factor analysis with Varimax rotation, which resulted in two conceptual frameworks, one relating to Loyalty Programme members, the other to Breeders’ club members. The results indicate that there are variations from the nine factors adapted from Moolla and Bisschoff’s conceptual model, but that the new conceptual models are reliable. The new conceptual model consisting of nine factors could be established for the Loyalty Programme members, including brand relevance, brand trust, involvement, family/culture, commitment, repeat purchase, brand affect, switching cost/perceived value and risk aversion. These nine factors explain 66.61% of the cumulative variance, indicating that these nine factors are sufficient in explaining brand loyalty among Loyalty Programme members. The seven factors identified forming part of the conceptual model for the Breeders’ club members are brand relevance, commitment, involvement, brand trust, family/culture, repeat purchase and brand affect. These seven factors have also been found to be sufficient in explaining brand loyalty among Breeders’ club members, with a cumulative variance of 63.57%. It can be concluded that the Loyalty Programme members are not representative of the population due to the limited sample, whereas that of the Breeders’ club members are as the entire population formed part of the study. It is therefore recommended that a representative sample of Loyalty Programme members should be included in future research. This will also aid in the construction of a customer profile for both Loyalty Programme members and Breeders’ Club members that is accurate and reliable, aiding in future marketing endeavours. Managerial attention is also necessary to ensure adequate emphasis is given to different factors, as the two groups will respond differently to brand loyalty constructs. The study contributes to the body of knowledge relating to brand loyalty in the pet food industry, helping in understanding which brand loyalty constructs are vital in improving and maintaining brand loyalty. / MBA, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

Diploma thesis is focused on the topic of loaylty programmes. First part deals with the history, trends and future of loyalty programmes in general. Second part is devoted to the loyalty programme of L'Oréal Paris, which was analyzed. Based on carried analysis, proper recommendation were suggested in order to improve the processes and effectivity of the loyalty programme.

The master's thesis deals with the creation of the new concept of a loyalty programme for a particular company, which would be a strong competitive advantage focusing on the selection of benefits through customer survey. To fulfil this topic the thesis first outlines the theoretical knowledge on which the concept should be based and what are the methods and possibilities in the area of loyalty programmes. Furthermore, there is detailed analysis of the market situation and its players with an emphasis on points of difference. The main part of the thesis firstly sets objectives, the target group and principle of the loyalty programme. In the main part the benefits with the highest value for customers are chosen through a customer survey using a three-level selection method. The analysis also outlines the differences between travel classes, gender and age of respondents. In conclusion, there is also the economic rationalization and recommendations for the company.

In 2004, 6% of the Crowne Plaza Auckland Hotel's guests were Priority Club members. Two years later, this number has more than doubled to 13%. Are the Priority Club guests contributing to leverage the hotel's profitability? This research is aimed at answering the question if the continuous increase in the number of Priority Club guests staying at the Crowne Plaza Auckland Hotel is an opportunity for the property to effectively optimise its revenue generation performance. The study is essentially focused on assessing the ability of the loyalty programme to generate revenue to the hotel. The Priority Club Rewards is a demand-based, revenue-orientated marketing strategy which is predominantly aimed at 1) promoting and attracting its 30 million members worldwide to stay at the company's extensive portfolio of hotels as well as 2) to entice the club members to spend money on the hotels' services and facilities. In return for their loyalty, these customers are entitled to receive benefits that correspond to their membership level. From a revenue management perspective, the programme exists to strategically help hoteliers not only to achieve higher occupancy levels through repeat visits from the club members but to also leverage the hotel's revenue generating performance through encouraging its members to not only stay in suites and club rooms but also to use the property's services and facilities more regularly. In other words, the objective of the Priority Club Rewards is to help hoteliers attract customers to their properties and at the same time encourage them to spend money whilst onsite. It was found that the Priority Club programme is fulfilling its first core objective, which is to bring more customers to the Crowne Plaza Auckland property. Hence, this research is predominantly focused on assessing the rewards programme's ability to also assist the Auckland hotel to increase profitability. The objective of this project is to analyse whether or not the increasing growth in the number of club members staying at the property can also be interpreted as a growth in the hotel's revenue generation performance. Firstly, a thorough review of the literature was conducted in order to identify any previous academic work that specifically analysed the relationship between the areas of revenue management and loyalty marketing. However, no extensive previous research was found that effectively analysed how these two fields interact with each other, particularly in the hotel industry. Nevertheless, research from Internet articles and other web-based media resources was highly beneficial to the success of this research. There were two data collection processes employed in this research: a Priority Club Survey identified the needs and preferences of the club members when staying at the Auckland hotel and, secondly, a Spending Pattern Analysis was conducted based on the hotel guests' account statements. The results from these two research methods were then carefully analysed and interpreted in order to achieve an accurate set of resourceful conclusions and recommendations.

In 2004, 6% of the Crowne Plaza Auckland Hotel's guests were Priority Club members. Two years later, this number has more than doubled to 13%. Are the Priority Club guests contributing to leverage the hotel's profitability? This research is aimed at answering the question if the continuous increase in the number of Priority Club guests staying at the Crowne Plaza Auckland Hotel is an opportunity for the property to effectively optimise its revenue generation performance. The study is essentially focused on assessing the ability of the loyalty programme to generate revenue to the hotel. The Priority Club Rewards is a demand-based, revenue-orientated marketing strategy which is predominantly aimed at 1) promoting and attracting its 30 million members worldwide to stay at the company's extensive portfolio of hotels as well as 2) to entice the club members to spend money on the hotels' services and facilities. In return for their loyalty, these customers are entitled to receive benefits that correspond to their membership level. From a revenue management perspective, the programme exists to strategically help hoteliers not only to achieve higher occupancy levels through repeat visits from the club members but to also leverage the hotel's revenue generating performance through encouraging its members to not only stay in suites and club rooms but also to use the property's services and facilities more regularly. In other words, the objective of the Priority Club Rewards is to help hoteliers attract customers to their properties and at the same time encourage them to spend money whilst onsite. It was found that the Priority Club programme is fulfilling its first core objective, which is to bring more customers to the Crowne Plaza Auckland property. Hence, this research is predominantly focused on assessing the rewards programme's ability to also assist the Auckland hotel to increase profitability. The objective of this project is to analyse whether or not the increasing growth in the number of club members staying at the property can also be interpreted as a growth in the hotel's revenue generation performance. Firstly, a thorough review of the literature was conducted in order to identify any previous academic work that specifically analysed the relationship between the areas of revenue management and loyalty marketing. However, no extensive previous research was found that effectively analysed how these two fields interact with each other, particularly in the hotel industry. Nevertheless, research from Internet articles and other web-based media resources was highly beneficial to the success of this research. There were two data collection processes employed in this research: a Priority Club Survey identified the needs and preferences of the club members when staying at the Auckland hotel and, secondly, a Spending Pattern Analysis was conducted based on the hotel guests' account statements. The results from these two research methods were then carefully analysed and interpreted in order to achieve an accurate set of resourceful conclusions and recommendations.

The thesis is focused on the area of loyalty programme. Its aim is to analyse the loyalty programme of Ambiente restaurants called The Programme for Friends of Good Food and to compare it with the old method of rewarding customers that the company used to have before they launched the programme. The theoretical part of this thesis describes the position of loyalty programme in marketing and explains the basic terms as marketing and commercial communication, marketing mix, communication mix, sales promotion and its different forms. In connection with the loyalty programme, the terms as customer loyalty, satisfaction and value are explained. It is also described the customer relationship management and the ways how the loyalty programme can be measured. In practical part, there is an introduction of the Ambiente restaurants group and its previous method of rewarding customers and description of the new loyalty programme.

The effectiveness of loyalty programmes continues to be questioned, especially as their cost to firms increase together with their adoption rate across industries worldwide. Given the divergent industry specific findings predominantly focusing on the retail and airline industries, and the lack of previous consideration of important moderating variables type and timing of rewards, this study extended the research to service industries, investigating the effects of customer perceived benefits on loyalty programme effectiveness in terms of both attitudinal and behavioural loyalty. Hypotheses established the extent to which reward design elements (customer perceived benefits and type and timing of rewards) develop customer relationships (perceived relationship investment and brand relationship quality) which are market-based assets driving future revenue for the firm, and resulted in customer loyalty in the financial services industry. A quantitative methodology and survey approach was adopted with a randomly selected stratified sample of respondents. The results supported the validity and reliability of the construct measures and a satisfactory adjusted SEM model fit. The study provided industry-specific outcomes, indicating that social (integration with customer values), exploratory (exposure and access to relevant and timeous knowledge), monetary (financial value) and entertainment benefits drive customer loyalty in the financial services industry, with timing of rewards having no moderating impact and type of reward only impactful for consumers that prefer indirect (non-financial) exploratory and entertainment benefits. Importantly, the benefit of recognition was found not to have a significant influence. The study further supported divergent reward design elements as antecedents of customer loyalty across industries, as a result of the divergent nature of customer relationships between industries. Limitations of the research were consideration of customer characteristics, segments, and the relationship between attitudinal and behavioural loyalty. The study’s theoretical contribution provides for a more comprehensive conceptual model of loyalty programme effectiveness, leveraging customer relationships which are grounded in market-based asset theory, as well as an empirical analysis of previously untested relationships between important variables. The research also confirms the requirement for industry-specific design elements for effective loyalty programmes. For practitioners, the findings provide guidance on design elements of an effective programme within the financial services industry. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2018. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / PhD / Unrestricted

The average South African tertiary student spends more than the average South African individual each month, making them a valuable market to be understood by retailers. One technique retailers use to differentiate themselves from the increased competition is by relationship marketing through loyalty programmes. Research on the topic of loyalty programmes increased rapidly over the last decade. The problem, however, is that the majority of past research on the subject of loyalty programmes only focused on what happens after customers have already joined a loyalty programme. Little research exists regarding the factors that influence subject participation in loyalty programmes. Furthermore, to date no research study has investigated factors that might influence loyalty programme participation among South African students. The purpose of this study was to understand the tertiary student market by building on the research of De Wulf et al. (2013:69-83) as a vital study to explore factors that might influence them to participate in retail loyalty programmes. An exploratory study was conducted, in which data was collected from students studying at Pearson Institute of Higher Education/ CTI Pretoria by means of self-administered questionnaires. The study followed a quantitative research approach, in order to satisfy the research objectives. The results of the study indicate that the top four characteristics most likely to influence students to participate in a retail loyalty programme, include: a loyalty programme where you receive immediate discounts on certain items at purchase; a loyalty programme that allows you to use your loyalty card at more than one retailer; a loyalty programme with unlimited duration on the usage of benefits or rewards; a loyalty programme that rewards you by giving immediate benefits. / Business Management / M. Com. (Business Management)