April 14, 2015 // Franchising.com // InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) today announces exciting new enhancements to its award winning loyalty programme, IHG Rewards Club, focused on building more personalised relationships with its 84 million members worldwide.
IHG’s 2015 Trends Report showed that consumers are looking for more than an effortless transaction with their chosen brands. They want a rewarding relationship built on trust and respond best to efforts focused on building real brand loyalty over a sustained period of time.
Following extensive research into what members want from their loyalty programme, IHG Rewards Club will introduce a new membership level, to better reward its most loyal members with the most relevant benefits. The research also revealed the importance of ‘recognition’ to members who want to feel rewarded for loyalty. In response, IHG will enhance its ability to deliver a personalised experience for members, before, during and after their stay. Through personalising this experience, the member will feel valued, understood and this in turn builds trust.
Susanna Freer Epstein, SVP Customer Loyalty Marketing, IHG, said: “Our research shows us that members are looking for a personalised experience when they choose one of our family of brands – before, during and after their stay. We want to thank our members for their loyalty by responding to this at every stage of the guest journey, offering experiences that are personally relevant. And we want to say a special thank you to our most loyal members through the introduction of a new top membership level. These enhancements are just the start of a number of exciting new improvements we will be making to the programme in the coming months.”
IHG Rewards Club will evolve over 2015 and 2016 initially in the following ways:
All members will continue to have access to the industry leading benefits that make IHG Rewards Club the world’s favourite hotel loyalty programme. These include free guest Internet, value-priced Reward Nights with no blackout dates, no cancellation penalties, access to the wide breadth of offerings in the global reward redemption catalogue and digital innovations such as mobile check-in.
IHG (InterContinental Hotels Group) [LON:IHG, NYSE:IHG (ADRs)] is a global organisation with a broad portfolio of hotel brands, including InterContinental® Hotels & Resorts, HUALUXE® Hotels and Resorts, Crowne Plaza® Hotels & Resorts, Hotel Indigo®, EVEN™ Hotels, Holiday Inn® Hotels & Resorts, Holiday Inn Express®, Staybridge Suites® and Candlewood Suites®. In January 2015, IHG acquired Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants, the world's leading boutique hotel business.
IHG manages IHG® Rewards Club, the world's first and largest hotel loyalty programme with over 84 million members worldwide. The programme was relaunched in July 2013, offering enhanced benefits for members including free internet across all hotels, globally.
IHG franchises, leases, manages or owns over 4,800 hotels and more than 710,000 guest rooms in nearly 100 countries, with over 1,200 hotels in its development pipeline. Over 350,000 people work across IHG's hotels and corporate offices worldwide.
In January 2015 we completed the acquisition of Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants, adding 62 hotels (11,300 rooms) to our system size and 16 hotels to our development pipeline.
InterContinental Hotels Group PLC is the Group's holding company and is incorporated in Great Britain and registered in England and Wales.
Visit www.ihg.com for hotel information and reservations and www.ihgrewardsclub.com for more on IHG Rewards Club. For our latest news, visit: www.ihg.com/media, www.twitter.com/ihg, www.facebook.com/ihg or www.youtube.com/ihgplc.
SOURCE IHG (InterContinental Hotels Group)
Jovana Lakcevic
jovana.lakcevic@ihg.com
+441895512864
InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) is a multinational company which operates several hotel brands.