As a finalist in the finalist in the Technology & Trends category for the 2016 Loyalty360 Awards, Caesars Entertainment feels very much at home. Customer engagement is a huge part of Caesars’ overall success.
 
The 3^rd Annual Loyalty360 Awards will be held at the 9^th Annual Loyalty Expo, presented by Loyalty360 – The Association for Customer Loyalty. Loyalty Expo is slated for May 24-26, 2016, at the DoubleTree Universal in Orlando, Florida.
 
Michael Marino, Senior Vice President of Loyalty and Digital at Caesars, talked to Loyalty360 about why his company should win the Loyalty360 Platinum Award in the Technology & Trends category.
 
“Over the last two years, we’ve developed two ways to better engage customers through technology,” Marino told Loyalty360. “The first is to develop an app from scratch, Play by Total Rewards, which has the most functionality of any app in our industry and has seen over a half a million downloads. Customers can view property content, login to their Total Rewards account to check balances, view and redeem their Total Rewards offers, and request guest services at select resorts. Our app has allowed us to grow our Total Rewards membership through in-app signup, but more importantly has driven higher engagement from our existing members.  We’ve seen over a 20% revenue improvement from our app users vs. non-app users. We’ve proven that if we can engage people on a regular basis, we’re able to drive more business from them.”
 
What’s more, Marino said Caesars has built a loyalty program across the six social games it owns under the Playtika brand, which includes the No. 1 casino-themed game Slotomania and Caesars Casino.
 
“The Playtika Rewards program is built on the same principles as the brick and mortar Total Rewards program” he said. “We know that video game players play multiple games much like casino customers visit multiple casinos. The primary goal of Playtika Rewards was to encourage our Slotomania players to prefer Caesars Casino, House of Fun, WSOP or our other titles when choosing their second and third game.  Since inception of the program, the number of players who pay in multiple Playtika games has grown by almost 50%. Playtika Rewards is the only online loyalty program spanning multiple online games.  Other social game developers have multiple titles, but none of them provide incentives for customers to prefer their other games over competition. Our customers realize that if they stay in the Playtika Rewards system, they will get rewarded with a better in-game experience. Playtika has seen strong results from the program in the 18 months since it launched.”
 
To maintain a competitive advantage, Caesars needs to evolve with its customer base.
 
“We have worked hard over the last three years to expand from a gaming program to a comprehensive hospitality loyalty program,” Marino added. “Total Rewards now rewards members for everything they do within the Caesars network, period. Members still earn Reward Credits for gaming play, but also now earn for spend in our restaurants, spas, nightclubs, golf courses, etc. And best of all, these Reward Credits can be redeemed for all of these same experiences. Many people still view Total Rewards as a gaming program with gaming redemptions, but food is actually far and away, our top redemption category. Even our top gamers prefer to earn through their gaming play and reward themselves with a five-star meal.”