Fly Buys boosts reward point redemptions with data-driven creative

This article is part of a collection on data-driven creative. Explore the collection to see what's possible when data and creative come together to build more relevant and effective campaigns.  

With 2.5 million engaged users, encompassing more than half of the entire New Zealand population, Fly Buys is New Zealand's most popular loyalty program. Customers rack up reward points by shopping with Fly Buys partner stores and services, and can then use these points to purchase new products and travel deals. 

The company has seen that customers who redeem reward points are typically more engaged with the loyalty program than those who don't. Fly Buys' media agency, MBM, discovered through Google Analytics that while 38% of customers who viewed a rewards product on the Fly Buys site started the redemption process, only 12% completed it. This insight made the Fly Buys team think, "If the reward points are there for the taking, how do we encourage more customers to redeem them?"

MBM came up with a dynamic, data-driven solution with DoubleClick. The brand used Floodlight tags to build and segment audiences in DoubleClick Campaign Manager, DoubleClick Bid Manager for programmatic remarketing, and DoubleClick Studio to serve relevant, customized banner ads. The DoubleClick stack helped the brand optimize its ad spending, leading to the biggest point redemption week in Fly Buys’ history.

Fly Buys streamlines its remarketing strategy with DoubleClick 

In the past, Fly Buys looked to reach its loyalty program members with brochures, emails, and TV commercials. The new digitally led DoubleClick strategy allowed the brand to remarket relevant products in its customers' I-want-to-buy moments.

First, Fly Buys used Floodlight tags on its website to build audiences based on the products customers viewed online and whether they completed the redemption process. Then, the brand uploaded information about available reward products to DoubleClick Studio, including product names, images, and prices, to develop banner ads relevant to the products the audience viewed. To programmatically target customers who'd visited the website but hadn't recently redeemed their points, the brand used DoubleClick Bid Manager.

The dynamic banner ads showed products only if they were in stock and could be delivered on time, and they stated clearly whether points and/or cash could be used to make a purchase. The customized ads were served to customers based on their purchase histories and available loyalty points, as well as the time that had elapsed since they last viewed a product.

Dynamic remarketing led to record-breaking point redemptions

Fly Buys' DoubleClick campaign was a game changer. Along with winning two golds (Most Effective and Best Use of Data) and one silver (Best Use of Technology) at New Zealand's Media Awards, the brand saw a 95% increase in total reward point redemptions and a 392% improvement on cost per redemption.

In November 2015, Fly Buys had its biggest ever redemption week with 16.1 million points redeemed, which trumped its previous biggest week by 1.2 million points. 

Adele Fitzpatrick, head of marketing at Fly Buys, detailed the campaign's success. "For over 19 years we have been looking at and refining attractive, cost-effective ways to encourage reward redemptions. The work MBM did with DoubleClick to advance the tracking and measurement of the Fly Buys website, coupled with the tailored dynamic approach, has delivered the most cost-effective measurable digital reward redemption campaign that we have ever run, and it won't be getting turned off. In fact, we've up-weighted it to the maximum investment level available!"