Amazon’s New Loyalty Program: 5 Reasons Amazon Moments Will Change How You Shop

One of the greatest challenges in retail is providing what shoppers consider mutual value: Selling a product or service that the customer thinks is worth the time, money and data exchange. Amazon is trying to crack that challenge, however, and it is doing so with one of the most well-exercised models out there — rewards.

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Amazon’s new loyalty initiative, Amazon Moments, is designed for vendors, but its moment of truth depends on shopper reaction. After about 18 months of testing, the truth is coming out: The vendors that have used it seem to like it so far. But the concept’s real shelf life, the one with shoppers, depends on what they stand to gain in the long run.

Loyalty programs are growing massively as companies seek more ways to engage customers. According to LoyaltyOne’s Loyalty Big Picture Study, scheduled for release by March, the global loyalty industry is estimated to be worth $74 billion, of which $42 billion is loyalty programs, providers and platforms. The study also finds that companies invest upward of 2% of their sales in reward initiatives.

It’s not surprising, then, that rewards have to work harder to distract shoppers from their digital-enabled routines — 80% of consumers will buy whatever they need at the moment they see it, regardless of where they are, research firm WSL Strategic Retail reports.

If Amazon Moments wants to capture the consumer’s attention, it has to offer not only a different reward-earning model, but a literally different way of approaching shoppers all together. As in: Don’t expect them to do anything proactive, just thank them for merely showing up.

Rising Boats, Sevenfold Sales Gain

Amazon Moments attempts to remove the work for shoppers by first eliminating the work for its vendor brands: it provides the marketing platform, an online console for budgeting and managing each campaign, and reward fulfillment.

Essentially, these are the costlier operations of a reward program. Moments was developed so Amazon vendors could focus instead on the kinds of actions they want their shoppers to engage in, such as using an app or spending a certain amount of money. The vendor just has to determine which actions generate the desired results (revenue or word of mouth) and the rewards, physical or digital, it will give in return.