What Is a Digital Loyalty Card and How Does It Work?
What Is a Digital Loyalty Card and How Does It Work?
If you have searched for “what is loyalty card”, the short answer is simple: a loyalty card records a customer’s progress towards rewards when they return to a business.
A digital loyalty card does the same job as a paper stamp card, but it lives on the customer’s phone. It can record visits, display progress and show available rewards without asking the customer to carry another piece of card.
For a small business, the basic idea remains familiar. The practical difference is that the programme becomes easier to track, manage and update.
What Is Loyalty Card Technology?
A loyalty card gives customers a reason to return by recording eligible visits or purchases and rewarding them when they reach a target.
A coffee shop might give a free drink after ten purchases. A salon might provide a discount after five appointments. Another business might place several smaller rewards along the way.
The technology does not need to make the reward more complicated. It simply replaces the physical card with a digital version that stays connected to the loyalty programme.
Paper vs digital loyalty cards
A paper stamp card is easy to understand, but it has limitations.
Customers lose cards, leave them at home or forget how close they are to a reward. If somebody starts a new card, their previous progress may be lost. The business also has very little visibility into how customers are using the programme.
A digital loyalty card keeps the familiar stamp-card experience while removing much of that friction.
The customer can see their current progress on their phone. When they earn a stamp or redeem a reward, the same card updates. They do not need to collect a replacement card or start again.
The business can also see programme activity instead of relying on a pile of anonymous paper cards.
Where does a digital loyalty card live?
With meed, the customer’s card can live in Apple Wallet or Google Wallet.
These are the same digital wallets people already use for payment cards, tickets and boarding passes. The customer does not need to download a separate meed customer app.
After registering, the customer is asked whether they would like to add the card to their mobile wallet. Once added, the card displays the business’s branding, the customer’s progress and the rewards available through that programme.
This keeps the loyalty card somewhere the customer already knows how to find.
How customers join, earn and redeem
Joining starts through one of three methods:
Scanning the business’s QR code
Tapping an NFC point
Opening a link shared by the business
Receipt scanning is not an enrolment method. It may be used to earn stamps after somebody has joined, depending on how the business runs its programme.
When joining, the customer registers with their name and phone number. They receive a one-time password, or OTP, to confirm their number.
After registration, the meed web app asks whether they would like to add the digital loyalty card to Apple Wallet or Google Wallet.
How customers earn depends on the programme the business has chosen. Staff may add a stamp using the meed for Business app. Some programmes can also let customers check in or submit an eligible receipt to earn progress.
When a reward becomes available, the customer can request to redeem it from their card. The business receives the request and confirms it through the meed for Business app.
The app has a focused purpose. It handles stamps and redemptions. It is not where the business goes for programme analytics.
What the business sees in the portal
The meed Business Portal is where the business manages its loyalty programme and reviews performance.
The portal can show activity such as:
New loyalty members
Rewards earned
Rewards redeemed
Member activity
Programme engagement
Performance across locations or campaigns
This gives the business more information than a traditional paper card can provide.
A coffee shop loyalty programme, for example, can show whether customers are joining, earning stamps and reaching rewards. The owner can use that information to understand whether the programme is encouraging repeat visits.
The distinction between the app and portal is important. Staff use the meed for Business app for stamps and redemptions. Owners and managers use the Business Portal to manage the programme and review its activity.
What does a digital loyalty card cost to start?
A business can start using meed free until the programme reaches 50 customer members.
There is also one additional test slot for the business owner. This lets the owner join their own programme, add the card to their phone and test the complete customer experience before inviting anyone else.
The test slot does not use one of the 50 customer spaces.
This gives a small business room to launch the programme, train staff and see how customers respond before deciding whether it needs a paid plan.
Launch your digital loyalty card
A digital loyalty card does not need to turn a familiar reward into a complicated points system.
It can still be as simple as buying nine coffees and receiving the tenth free. The difference is that the card stays on the customer’s phone, updates as they earn and gives the business a clearer view of how the programme is performing.
With Express Launch, a small business can build its card, choose its rewards, test the customer experience and prepare the programme to go live.
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