Elite Rewards sets out five stages for planning a retail loyalty programme in its Incentives 102 guide, first published on November 18, 2016. The guidance connects reward selection and qualifying customer actions with system costs, point-of-sale or email integration and enrolment.

The reward examples include redeemable points, gifts, discounts, delivery benefits and access to selected products or sales. The guide recommends choosing the structure around a business need, such as encouraging visits during a quieter trading period.

It also calls for assessing whether customers see value in the programme. Elite Rewards suggests offering an appropriate range of rewards and keeping the rules understandable to both shoppers and staff.

System selection is a separate step. The guide advises comparing setup and ongoing costs, ease of use and integration with existing point-of-sale or email tools.

For enrolment, the company describes using store signage, websites, social channels and staff explanations at checkout. These are proposed implementation steps rather than evidence of results from a particular retailer’s programme.