Offering rewarding experiences for customers and retailers alike

Multipartner bonus programs help businesses increase customer loyalty, target and reach different consumers, and increase brand awareness. With the right customer-intelligence strategy, they can be among the most effective marketing tools available. That's why the DeutschlandCard customer-loyalty program relies on SAS.

DeutschlandCard users collect points at participating businesses that they redeem for merchandise, entertainment and charitable causes. Using SAS^® Marketing Optimization and SAS^® Marketing Automation, DeutschlandCard reaches each cardholder with offers tailored to his or her unique preferences, ensuring valuable experiences for consumers and businesses alike.

Growing demand

Within two years of its launch, DeutschlandCard – a subsidiary of international media and communications service provider Arvato, a division of Bertelsmann – had grown to more than 6.5 million participants. They collect points from businesses like EDEKA and Marktkauf, Deutsche Bank, gesund leben-Apotheken, last-minute travel specialist L'TUR, Porta furniture stores, ABELE-Optik, Hertz car rental, Grand City Hotels & Resorts, Vergölst tire and auto service, and Bauunion 1905 as well from as regional partners and more than 200 online partners.

DeutschlandCard relied on its scalable organization and infrastructure to meet increasing demand from a growing number of customers and partners.

"On the IT side, we deal with a complex group of tasks," explains Dr. Clemens Schäffner, Director of Business Intelligence. "This is mainly related to the number of interfaces we have to support – the different points of sale used by our partners, for example."

When designing its IT landscape, DeutschlandCard sought a suitable campaign management solution.

"We were looking for a system that automatically drove the marketing cycle across all channels," Schäffner says. "We wanted a solution that could manage our campaigns both operationally and strategically – from a single source."

How it works

Individuals scan their DeutschlandCard loyalty cards an average of seven times per month. In addition, DeutschlandCard has launched a credit card that allows consumers to earn points from 28 million businesses around the world.
With each scan, DeutschlandCard's operational system merges the data collected from partnering businesses – transactions, point postings and account information – and prepares campaign results.

"Our campaign management system is based on this operative layer," explains Schäffner. "It accesses the data, analyzes the data and sets the necessary marketing steps in motion."

SAS automates processes such as initiating welcome letters and issuing PIN numbers. And SAS helps DeutschlandCard segment and evaluate consumer preferences by analyzing transactional data tied to discount coupons that accompany quarterly account statements. Such insights help DeutschlandCard understand which offers to extend to each individual cardholder.

"Thanks to SAS, we can use our transactional data to determine how our partners' offers are received by program participants," Schäffner says.

The transactional data flows directly into the campaign-management solution, providing an ongoing source of information for measuring the success and efficiency of each campaign.

"With SAS, we have closed our marketing cycle," Schäffner says. "This closed loop gives us a system that continues to learn more and more about our card users' preferences. Showing our participants that we provide the most attractive offers is the biggest measure of our success."