Travel Experience Redefine
As we all know, the pandemic has hit the travel and the hospitality industry hard. Really hard. It’s the first time in human history that almost 100% of all airplanes are just simply parked at airports while hotel rooms are left vacant during the lockdowns.
Even large corporations who have introduced solutions that challenged the status quo of travelling experience like Airbnb, Uber, Grab and a few others are also affected. Empires that have been built since the past decade has gone back to where they started.
Certain regions of the world are now going through the second or third wave of lockdown. It gets more complicated where statistics have indicated that 50 Million of people are left jobless.
Well that sums up pretty much of the current situation, but there is still hope that life would resume normal in the next coming years. However, there will be a shift and a drastic change of the new normal that people have to adapt. Masks is becoming an apparel and a new fashion statement entering the market. Pharmaceutical companies are releasing vaccines with funds flowing in like Niagara fall, the rise of e-commerce service business reliving the dot com days.
A new set of unicorns will rise in this coming years, a history that would be repeated and we wonder what innovation would be introduced to the world. Online travel agencies have to re-strategize on new technologies and methodologies to recapture the market and recover their losses. A struggle for every OTA business to find ways and compete the price comparison wars amongst them. Common areas to focus for the businesses still boils back to squeezing merchant rate discount from payment service providers and negotiating with hotel/property owners for better room rates.
However, there is an area that has been overlooked and need to be capitalized and that’s the Loyalty Points. More than US600 Billion of unclaimed mile points and hotel stay loyalty points have been left unclaimed. While the loyalty points have been neglected and almost forgotten, businesses are turning this one liability into an opportunity for them to secure loans from banks as a bank guarantee.
The struggle in a consumer perspective, it has been cumbersome how to manage your points and make the most out of it. Too many loyalty cards in wallet, causing it to be bulky and hard to find each card. Multiple loyalty cards from stores that you may not likely to patronize again, with points expiring soon. Points are not sufficient to convert to significant rewards. This issues has to be stopped.
An upcoming rise of a company based in Singapore has commenced to disrupt and resolve the above, they aimed to create a large community of likeminded people to be able to maximize their points’ potential. You may no longer patronize and do not need the points. However, someone in the community does. Rather than disregarding the points and letting it expire, why not sell it, or trade it with another points. While all companies have their own systems providing the loyalty solutions to their customers, Yucan targets to bridge and merge this gaps through Blockchain. Businesses will be able to leverage the loyalty solutions and drive user engagement for multiple industries such as airlines, hotels, financial services, and other businesses worldwide. With a single integration of the Loyalty Commerce Platform, consumer gain quick and full access to a full suite of flexible accrual and redemption solutions. With blockchain and Yucan participating in decentralized finance initiative (DEFI), aimed reducing the payment charges by payment service providers, it brings hope for consumers that there are still areas to get a cheaper flight ticket or a cheaper hotel room as compared to before.
What’s imperative for the possibility of this initiative is the growth of the community. The more people joining the community and as it gets larger over time, the more choices and flexibility a loyalty member would have.
Perhaps, the way consumers book a flight ticket or a hotel room in the future may change. Instead of going through all the OTAs and hotel sites and start comparing prices, consumers start capitalizing their points and trade in the marketplace and ultimately reduce their purchase price.
Interesting times ahead and looking at the bright side when market recovers, dynamics of travel experience changes, new unicorns would appear and another chapter of a new normal with a global reset. To many uncertainties but seemed a few companies are already seeing this unprecedented situation as an opportunity like Yucan, we look forward for the next decade and the way we would live our lives would change, no doubt.
Story by Raymond Chin / Nadhir A. Rahman
