From ‘belongings’ to belonging: Here’s what APAC experts say what’s next for the loyalty industry

Ask loyalty experts what they think about the future trajectory of the loyalty industry in Asia Pacific (and the world), and you would hear terms like delivering ‘the magic of joyalty’, avoiding ‘a sea of sameness’, making promotions fun through gamification and leveraging the power of AI and real-time data.

These statements were of particular prevalence during the recently held 2025 Asia Pacific Loyalty Conference, run by the Australian Loyalty Association. At the event, loyalty companies, brands, retailers, customers and more met for learnings, discussions and networking around the current state of and future of the loyalty industry.

The future of personalised experiences in the age of AI

The future of personalisation is exciting in the age of AI, but understanding customers at a 1-to-1 level is no small feat. However, experts are confident that this space will only get better as technology advances. 

For Chris Johnston, director for regional partnerships for Braze, data is the fundamental piece of the puzzle that can prove challenging to wrangle and utilise.  

“The challenge is making sure you’ve got all the data in real-time available to understand customers and what their needs might be,” he said. 

“Then it’s the ability to connect that customer no matter what channel they’re on, or where they are in their journey in engaging with your brand, to deliver moments of relevance to them. It’s also about going beyond messages for segments to true one-to-one, so every individual gets their own unique experience.”

Johnston points out that in his opinion, Foxtel is one brand doing this really well.

“We’ve just released a great case study where [Foxtel are] working with OfferFit, which has recently been acquired by Braze; it’s a decisioning engine. Through a combination of OfferFit and all those decisions and cross-channel delivery means they have something like three million-plus potential messages and versions that go to each individual customer at any point in the journey,” he said. 

“They’re using that to get people to keep engaging with their platform once they’ve subscribed. They are a fantastic example of where personalisation needs to get to.”

Jonathan Reeve, ANZ regional sales director for Eagle Eye, echoes the sentiment about hyperpersonalisation and AI, specifically noting how AI can take on the “heavy lifting” of data analysis to make this level of personalisation affordable for most businesses.

“What AI can enable you to do is to do the heavy lifting of all the analysis to come up with truly hyperpersonalised offers, where the product is personalised to you, the reward is personalised to you and also what you need to do to get the reward is personalised to you,” he said.

Nik Laming, founder and CEO of Loyalty ConnectOS, said he could see the influence of AI “all over” the industry, from the ability to deliver hyperpersonalisation to speeding up campaign execution . He notes that while AI could potentially be a “double-edged sword” for his resourcing business, he is generally optimistic about its impact.

“I think generally it’s not really a concern, it’s exciting,” he said.

Karl Deitz, head of customer strategy for Tall Bob, confirms that hyperpersonalisation is a major trend in mobile messaging, with brands now going deeper into smaller, more targeted segments. This approach of sending “less but better” messages leads to higher conversion rates because the communication is more relevant and personal.

“It’s going deeper and deeper into the history of buying patterns,” he said, explaining that hyperpersonalisation goes well beyond just a first name, factoring in things like recent product purchases or behaviour from the last year.

Gamification and omnichannel innovation

Gamification and omnichannel experiences are two additional discussion points that loyalty experts are regularly excited about. These strategies move brands beyond simple transactions to create more engaging and seamless customer journeys.

Susan Walsh, former director of operations (Loyalty) for Loyalty & Reward Co, defines a truly seamless omnichannel loyalty experience as one where a customer is automatically recognised regardless of the channel, be it digital, mobile, virtual, or in-store. 

“It could be card-linking, it could be a mobile number, whatever is identified it is done so across all channels and creates no friction,” she said. 

“This also means the fabulous team on the floor needs to be fully engaged in the loyalty program too. It isn’t all on the customer!”

For Jonathan Reeve, the biggest challenge for many omnichannel businesses is finding a way to digitally connect with customers in physical stores.

“Creating a digital connection online is relatively simple but finding a way to connect digitally with customers in your stores, that for us is the secret to a great omnichannel experience,” he said. 

“Where we’re really seeing the world going now is businesses that are able to engage in real time as customers are shopping in your physical store. That’s what sets great omnichannel apart.”

As for gamification, Reeve said Eagle Eye is observing it taking the world by storm, and that the Australian market is starting to adopt well also. 

“I think it’s turning loyalty programs from being quite transactional into something that’s more emotionally engaging, because people just love games,” he said.

Reeve added that UK grocery chain Asda, an Eagle Eye client, was achieving huge success with games. 

The future of loyalty is…

What do loyalty experts think of when they hear the term, ‘the future of loyalty’? Depending on their own interests and customers, the answer tends to bounce around some common themes, with a couple of surprises.

“The future of loyalty is joyalty moments of magic,” according to Adam Posner, CEO of The Point of Loyalty, This sentiment was also shared by Braze’s Chris Johnston, who also borrowed to joyalty term to highlight the importance of delivering magic “at every customer engagement on their terms.”

According to Susan Walsh, “The future of loyalty is sustainable, mutual value-driven fun!”, she said, while also noting that versatility would be critical though times of change.  

For Jonathan Reeve, the future of loyalty might be summed as being ‘real-time’.

“This ties into AI,” he added. “We really think that AI is going to enable more and more in-the-moment loyalty experiences as you’re shopping, as you’re browsing. That’s where we see things going in the next year or so.”

For Kim Walsh, managing director for Australia at TLC Worldwide, the future of loyalty is all about using data to create memories, not just discounts.

“The future of loyalty is really, really harnessing data and creating memories, not just discounts and not just a sea of sameness. You need differentiation,” she said.

Nik Laming sees the future as undeniably positive. He simply stated, “The future of loyalty is bright, most definitely.”