Thanx has nearly quadrupled the number of app downloads across our portfolio of brands in the last 6 quarters. These types of growth stories are quite rare in restaurant tech right now. Two (perhaps unexpected) drivers: 1) Customer loyalty went from nice-to-have to must-have post-COVID; as we have seen in other industries amidst rapid digitization and third-party disruption, loyalty is the #1 tool for driving direct digital purchasing which itself is highly correlated with profit margin and same-store-sales growth. Yet, most brands have failing programs due to a) a stagnant capture rate — most legacy loyalty programs are stuck at ~10%, b) ineffective new customer activation (driving third purchase) — most legacy loyalty programs never see a second purchase from 75%+ of consumers, c) discount-dependent margin destruction — many legacy loyalty programs give away 15%+ in rote discounts without any traffic lift... a dangerous hidden cost. Thanx solves each of these with technological innovations — proprietary credit card tokenization, turnkey marketing automation (cart abandonment, A/B testing with control groups, etc), and an exclusive suite of non-discount rewards (like hidden menus). So part of this trajectory is driven by rapidly accelerating demand for Thanx and lots of new customer launches. But not all... 2) During this same period, app downloads per location INCREASED nearly 100%. So not only was Thanx launching more apps, but consumers were downloading more often. A few years ago a narrative took hold that apps were dead — no one wanted to download another app and the battle for the homescreen was too intense for most brands. This ended up being only partially true. Most consumers find apps on their phone today with search, not homescreen placement... as a result, consumers are once again downloading more apps. More importantly, while far more consumer place digital orders on web vs. app, the cart conversion, repeat purchasing, and lifetime value of app-ordering customers is significantly (50-200%) higher. If you get the right people to download an app, it's a major revenue driver. iOS users tend to be significantly higher disposable income than Android users. Of note, these numbers are all the more impressive because many of our new customer launches in the last year were transitions from legacy solutions such as LevelUp, Punchh, and Paytronix as well as brands outgrowing their SMB-scale partners (or the options included with their POS). In the case of brands with an existing app, our approach to loyalty transitions simply updates those apps overnight so these don't technically count as app downloads. If you're reading between the lines, yes our user growth numbers are even more insane — tens of millions of new consumers using Thanx-built apps during this period... all with an average of 4.85 stars in their app stores.
Glad we could be a part of this growth! 💪🏻🤘🏻
Great to see! Smart true brand loyalty programs often ramp up slower up front and over time deliver engaged subs at significantly higher profitability!
Now if you could just make some fixes to the maps UI...
Loyalty programs are a must for local shops.
Co-Founder at Forte | Co-Founder at Faith Driven Entrepreneur | LinkedIn Top Voice
1moI love my VIP treatment at Proper Food! 🍲 Of note - I didn’t know about the rewards there and they informed me after seeing me so many times. Fantastic way to get more loyalty for you and them!