During this year’s 2016 Loyalty Expo numerous leading brands will have the chance to compete for some of the industry’s most prestigious awards. The Loyalty Awards eXChange will see each nominee explain to an audience of their peers just what makes them the best suited to take home the top award.
Along with IHG, Ryder and Kellogg’s, Dunkin’ Donuts is nominated in this year’s Measurement Category, which highlights the importance of measuring and understanding the impact of loyalty strategies and initiatives. Recently, Loyalty360 spoke with Paul Murray, Senior Manager Digital Marketing and Innovation, about being a finalist in this category.
Dunkin’ Donuts is nominated for the Measurement Category this year, so what does measurement means to Dunkin’ Donuts?
Murray: Measurement means a lot to us, and to our loyalty program. As a QSR who hasn’t had a loyalty program and who hasn’t had a lot of identifiable member level sales for its entire history, it is really important for us to dig deep to understand our guests and to keep up with what they are doing, how they are behaving and to make sure that we can take that information and turn it into meeting guests’ expectations or even exceeding them. So it is really critically important. It is a new opportunity to measure this deeply with a loyalty program and through user levels, and it is something that we are incredibly passionate and excited about.
Do you feel like your commitment to these measurement efforts has changed over the last 18 months? Is it more important now than it was?
Murray: It is definitely more important. It has changed because the program is still new, and we are a little over two years old now. We have changed in the lifecycle of the program so we are thinking about different challenges, and we are trying to answer different questions, and we are taking some different measurement approaches to get at these new questions and answers as we mature as a program. We are doing more advanced modeling now. We are looking at more sophisticated analysis like predictive models and uplift models and really just changing the types of questions that we are answering.
As we begin to introduce our organization to more information, the more questions they have, which is leading to other interesting things to chase down. And our loyalty data represents ways to gain answers that historically we have never had. This has changed our approach to measurement and the types of things we are now looking to answer.
Do you have any specific examples of things that you are measuring now that you would not have done a year ago?
Murray: Anecdotally, we have a lot of questions about how customers engage with our product and, historically, we know very intimately how many of certain products we are selling. But because we haven’t historically had consumer labeled data, we didn’t necessarily understand how people were engaging with products, and how that basket mix looks different and changes over time. We are looking deeper into these questions, and we are going down a level or two deeper to get deeper understandings into how guests are engaging with our products, what they are purchasing, how they think about our products, and how they attach products.
Are you always trying to optimize the program? Or how are you staying relevant with evolving customer behaviors?
Murray: We are trying to stay on top of it. It is definitely a shifting landscape and technology in both the analytics and the consumer facing side with digital is changing quickly, so we try to stay focused on an innovation pipeline by looking not only at the here and now, but also looking out and trying to anticipate where digital and guest experiences are going for loyalty. We hope that by staying focused on innovation, and by keeping an eye on the future and what is the next technology, we can pair that with our focus on driving a good experience and making sure that we continue to evolve those experiences.
On the analytics side and the measurement side, it is making sure that we have that same approach to measurement tools and measurement methodologies to make sure that we are also driving innovation there, and that we don't get complacent so that we can continue to innovate in our understanding and learning of guests.
Why do you think your brand should win in the Measurement Category?
Murray: We have developed a really robust analytics infrastructure here at Dunkin’ and, in a really short period of time, we have been able to expedite the amount of information and the types of insights that we are getting through customer level analytics. That is really important for our loyalty program and our digital program, but it also has a really strong influence on the way the brand functions. We are a 65-year-old brand who is changing and evolving the way that we think about the business through analytics and this measurement.
In addition to developing quickly and developing something that is impactful for our core business of loyalty, we are also helping to influence the way the brand thinks about the business and the way the brand understands its guests. I think that really helps us to be smarter about the decisions that we make and how we move the brand forward to stay competitive.