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Kuwait Petroleum
How Q8 has innovated its loyalty program, improved their customer experience and created efficiencies within its organisation.
Overview
Kuwait Petroleum Italia (Q8) is a subsidiary of Kuwait Petroleum International, a company responsible for the refining and distribution of petroleum products outside of Kuwait.
It entered the Italian market in 1984 when it took over the Gulf sales network and in 1986 it launched its innovative and original Q8 brand. Since then it has grown rapidly through a strategy of successful acquisitions and operations.
With its widespread network of more than 2,800 service stations throughout Italy, Q8 is one of Italy's leading players in the transport sector.
Customer centricity is a fundamental mission in the operations of Q8 which, through its loyalty programme designed for the ClubQ8 community, offers rewards and discounts to the hundreds of thousands of its most active customers. Thanks to the ClubQ8 loyalty programme, customers have access to dozens of exclusive offers and items from various brands gathered in a single catalogue from which they can choose the reward they wish to receive.
Kuwait Petroleum Italia has therefore found Amazon Business to be the ideal partner to improve its customers' rewards redemption experience, as they can now access a catalogue of rewards provided by Amazon Business and receive them with fast and free Amazon shipping directly to their homes. With this partnership, Amazon Business has become the sole supplier and logistics partner for the physical rewards included in Q8's loyalty catalogue.
Customer centricity - the fundamental part of the project
Thanks to the partnership with Amazon Business, Q8 customers will now be able to:
1. Earn loyalty points when buying petrol at Q8 service stations
2. Browse the Q8 catalogue on the website and mobile app, or alternatively go to one of the more than
2500 service stations participating in the programme and be assisted by Q8 personnel
3. Find a hand-picked selection of 80+ items provided by Amazon Business
4. Use their loyalty points to redeem the desired reward
5. Receive the reward directly to their door with Amazon's fast and free delivery service.
The order delivery time for Q8 customers has decreased dramatically, from the usual 20 days to an average of 2 days.
In addition, through work on the development of the Q8 catalogue platforms carried out and designed by Amazon Web Services and its partners, all customers accessing the catalogue via a website or mobile app will be able to take advantage of an interface created specifically for the programme. Thus, the user experience becomes direct and even easier. Thanks to AWS, customers can also receive SMS alerts and updates for confirmed and shipped orders. Q8's goal was to encourage customers to take advantage of its all-round services, and in the case of points collection, the agreement with Amazon Business was aimed at minimising the waiting time between when a request is made and when the reward arrives at the customer's home, with the final step of delivery guaranteed by Amazon's expertise and familiar experience. And all this in a free and pioneering way within the specific sector.
“Understanding the daily consumption behaviour of our customers was the premise that prompted us to rethink the traditional way in which, until yesterday, Q8 managed loyalty-related matters.
The guaranteed expertise and success of a partner such as Amazon made the decision to streamline processes for the delivery of rewards from our catalogue to ClubQ8 members clear and simple. Speed, user involvement and control are the aspects that have driven our decision to reinvent the way we deliver loyalty.”
— Gherardo Bisi, Marketing Director, Q8
Benefits for business customers
The personalisation and customisation of Q8's loyalty programme meant that Amazon Business embarked on a unique initiative, bringing added value to Q8, acting not only as a procurement and logistics service but also as a B2B2C partner, able to reinvent the way companies manage their loyalty programmes.
Amazon Business' loyalty solution also enabled Q8 to revamp its ClubQ8 programme, creating significant efficiency within its organisation. Thanks to Amazon Business, Q8 will be able to eliminate the time it spends managing loyalty catalogue suppliers, purchasing and stocking products, shipping products and managing returns, so that it can focus on higher value-added activities directly aimed at customer satisfaction.
Amazon Web Services is supporting the two entities by supplying all the infrastructure behind the project, providing all the computing power to host the loyalty programme's end-user applications and to run the internal applications used by the programme administrators to manage rewards, points, user levels, payment details, and send SMS alerts and updates to customers. Amazon Web Services also uses its advanced AI/ML services to customise the user experience and for the recognition and reconciliation of billing systems.
On the other hand, while Q8's effort has been reduced, the end customer experience has improved significantly thanks to Amazon's wide selection, fast shipping and familiar experience.
“We are certain that this is just the beginning of a long-lasting business relationship; we are industry pioneers in Italy, and this has only been made possible by the trust we place in this new partnership.”
— Gherardo Bisi, Marketing Director, Q8
