People love rewards and discounts. Loyalty programs are the inspiration for my team (Cameron, Ruxy, Liesje and I) when we came up with BeeMe last year. We wanted to help small businesses get customers and buzz. It seems that after one year I am still enthusiastic about the idea of helping small business with the technology.

My task for this weekend was to think about possible directions for my thesis project at NYU ITP. I went to the Mt. Snow with fellow ITPers, and spent some time in a ridiculously quiet environment, thinking about my curiosity and passion. The more I thought about my interests, the closer I got to the heart of BeeMe. Shop, rewards, small stores, customers… I just could not get away from BeeMe. That told me something.

Using technology to augment the “shopping” experience.

In short, I realized that I’m interested in designing UI/UX for selling and shopping experiences. For some reason, I’ve been involved in designing something related to selling/shopping for the past few years. When I was a public relations consultant, I helped companies sell their services and products. My younger brother owns a small music store in Tokyo, so I’ve been helping him with desiging an e-commerce site and a storefront. BeeMe is a marketing tool for ultra small (1-5 employees) businesses. In summer 2009, I’ve learned how Apple helps customers decide what they want to buy (= Apple products). Last semester I developed ITPGuestbook, a web app for ITP shows, to create new museum visiting experiences, or “art-hopping” experiences. And I’m currently working at R/GA to learn new ways to use mobile devices for shopping (my client is a credit card company).

So what’s the idea? I want to explore the idea of a mobile phone-based communal points/rewards system to augment the physical shopping experience.  My focus will be UI and UX. I’m not exactly sure what I mean by a communal points system, but I will worry about this later. I think it will be an application that runs on mobile devices and keep track of purchase points when users buy something. The idea is that when you buy something, you get points depending on the amount paid, and you can use those points to get equivalent discount for other items at different stores. So it’s an all-mighty discount card.

The communal point system definitely falls within a range of BeeMe project. It can be an add-on feature for BeeMe. But the communal point system is not exactly the type of user experience my team is focusing on. Given the scope of work, I this is definitely a standalone thesis project. I will be discussing this idea with my BeeMe team tonight, so I’ll see where I can go from here.

Inspiration: Yahoo! Japan’s shopping site

I came up with the concept of communal points system this weekend when I was buying a flower basket for my mother’s birthday through a flower shop on Yahoo! Japan. I used my Yahoo! Japan points to get discounts. I had 12 points (1 point = 1 yen) from my previous purchase of a yoga mat, so I used them all to get save 12 yen for the flowers. The amount was not significant, but I at least saved something.

It was as simple as pushing a button says “Use My Points.” After clicking the button, I said to myself, “what did I just do?”

“I bought a yoga mat from an accessory shop, and got discounts at a flower shop.” They are different stores at different locations. But the reason why I keep coming back to Yahoo! Japan for online shopping, not the other e-commerce sites, is that I know I get points that can be used for anything and that the more I buy the more I save.

Treating a neighborhood as the physical version of e-Commerce site

Why can’t I get the same deal in the real world? I want to buy a cup of coffee at a corner deli, get points for my purchase, and be able to use those points to save money if I want to buy something such as a holiday greeting card at a stationary store or extra toppings at an ice cream shop. In my perspective, physical shopping and online shopping are talking about the same consumer behaviors. According to Wikipedia, shopping is “an activity of selection and/or purchase.“ Going to a virtual store is no different from visiting a storefront. Hypothetically, I can treat the real world as the physical version of giant e-Commerce sites and vice versa.

Creating a synergy through a communal points program

Does it make any sense to have a communal points system in the real world(physical) shopping experience? I do not have a solid answer yet, but I think there is a huge opportunity. For example, the community points program may increase point-of-purchase sales opportunities. If I’m at a deli, for instance, and find at the cashier that I can get extra points if I spend $2 more, the possibility of me adding a chewing gum or something cheap to my shopping cart goes high. Because I know that getting a $2 chewing gum doesn’t do too much harm to my wallet. Another possible benefit of having the communal points program is the synergy effect. With one points program that works throughout stores within a neighborhood creates a synergy among stores. A combined effect is greater than the sum of their individual effects. For example, if I buy a shirt at a small boutique store, and use gained points (let’s say… worth 2 dollars) to get discounts for dry cleaning my new shirt, two stores in the same neighborhood end up getting sales.

There are definitely many obstacles. One of them is the scaling of currency (store points). My understanding is that different stores have different pricing criteria. How much coffee is worth a free laundry? How many bagels do I need to buy before I have enough points for a glass of wine? Although I am not going to focus on the business plan development, I think it’s important keep those challenges in mind.

As a starter…

I will do more research about existing points system for both US and Japan. Here are some major online rewards system by Amazon, Yahoo! And eBay.

Services that accept Yahoo! Japan's points.

Services that accept Yahoo! Japan's points.