11/03/2011

By Scott Thompson

Beanstalk Loyalty has developed patent pending technology creating a loyalty platform to deliver integration between the PoS terminal and social media.

"Our unique integration with Facebook enables retail stores and restaurants - with their customers' permission given during loyalty registration - to check them into Facebook Places, post on their wall and potentially influence their friends while at the same time leveraging the PoS information to influence their behavior," says Gilbert Bailey, vice president of marketing and business development for Beanstalk Data.

The integration of Beanstalk Loyalty, the PoS terminal and social media enables marketers to improve campaign performance by using the transactional data created at the time of the PoS order to trigger timely, relevant and personalised offers through social media, email, texting and direct mail. When the user swipes his or her loyalty card or provides his or her phone number at the register, the transaction checks into Facebook. The brand is able to optionally post on the customer's wall that they just ate at the restaurant or purchased an item at the store. The customer's friends see the transaction and can click on it to receive a coupon. Customers who influence their friends to become customers themselves can be rewarded with additional offers.

"Marketing is all about influencing the next sale," says Bailey. "Integrating the social network and the PoS with the loyalty engine provides the marketer with the ability to have an intelligent conversation both before and after the transaction to deliver true closed loop marketing."