Leaders in Customer Loyalty, Powered by Loyalty360
- Leaders in Customer Loyalty: for those looking to deepen customer experience, engagement, and brand loyalty. Each episode features innovative brands, industry experts, and executive leaders who share actionable insights, proven strategies, and real-world experiences designed to help marketers and brand professionals stay ahead in the ever-evolving world of customer loyalty.
Leaders in Customer Loyalty, Powered by Loyalty360
#544: Leaders in Customer Loyalty: Supplier Voices | How Tillo’s Connected Ecosystem Helps Lessen Friction in the Loyalty Space
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For Bill Warshauer, the Chief Revenue Officer at Tillo, a reward can do much more than help a company complete a transaction. It can also produce measurable and meaningful value for companies by changing behavior, creating moments of connection, and strengthening relationships.
Tillo helps brands deliver on all these needs. The company, which is a global gift-card network purpose-built for both brands and buyers, represents more than 4,000 merchants globally.
These merchants form one corner of what Tillo refers to as the “power triangle,” which also includes the buyers/platform providers such as loyalty programs, fintechs, employee engagement companies, and more as the other corner. And at the top of the triangle sits the consumer and the consumer experience.
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Welcome And Bill Joins
SPEAKER_01Welcome to another episode of Leaders in Customer Loyalty Supplier Voices, where we bring together innovative leaders and industry experts to explore the strategies, technologies, and trends shaping the future of customer loyalty. Today we're joined by Bill Warshower, Chief Revenue Officer at Tillow, a company helping brands enhance their loyalty programs through digital rewards, gift cards, and innovative rewards solutions designed to create more meaningful customer experiences. Bill brings extensive experience helping organizations navigate the evolving customer engagement landscape, and we're excited to hear his insights on loyalty, rewards, partnerships, and the trends influencing how brands connect with their customers. In this episode, we'll discuss Bill's perspective on the loyalty industry and the opportunities and challenges brands are facing as they continue to evolve their customer strategies. Welcome, Bill. It's great to have you. How are you?
SPEAKER_00Thank you. I'm uh I'm doing great. It's great to be with you. Appreciate the opportunity.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, of course. It's great to have you
Bill’s Background In Rewards
SPEAKER_01here. Uh firstly, can you tell us a little bit about yourself, your role with Tillo, and your background?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, absolutely. So I've spent more than two decades in the incentives, rewards, payments, loyalty industry. Uh my career started all the way back uh with a company called Perigo. I spent more than 20 years there combined with uh Blackhawk Network, who acquired Perigo uh several years ago uh before joining Tillow, coming up on two years now as our chief revenue officer. Um, you know, my role here is to help accelerate our growth, obviously, particularly in North America. As I had shared, we were founded out of Brightonhove, UK, uh, just celebrated our 10th birthday. Um, but here in North America, just over two years uh in market, um, we are all about building key strategic relationships across the ecosystem. Um, and we really are focused on solving meaningful business problems for our customers. Um, you know, when I think about that tenure and how long I have been in this space, uh, it's crazy uh to think how passionate I still am about this industry and the opportunities that I think Tillow can bring forward here that would drive meaningful impact. Um, you know, a reward as a whole is good, but it can do much more than just help a company complete a transaction, right? It can change behavior, uh it can create moments of connection, it can strengthen relationships, um, it can obviously produce meaningful and measurable value for these companies. Um, and I think Tillow is uh truly an innovator and a disruptor in this space and delivering on all of those needs for market. Um so yeah, thinking about how long I've been in and around this, and I still wake up every day jazzed uh for the opportunity, and and we're we're doing some great things.
SPEAKER_01That's awesome. Well, you know what they say if you uh love what you do, you've never worked a day in your life. That's right. Um and I know you just briefly touched on it, but uh, for those who may not be familiar with how Tillow supports a brand's customer loyalty efforts, could you provide a brief overview of what you do and the industries you work with?
The Power Triangle Explained
SPEAKER_00Yeah, absolutely. So when you think about Tillow, um I I always like to think about us in the frame of um what we call the power triangle. So if you think about the power triangle, there's buyers, platform providers. Um, those might be loyalty platforms, fintechs, employee engagement companies, et cetera. Um, you also have this huge, you know, kind of ecosystem of brands, right? The merchants. Uh we actually represent about 4,000 of those merchants globally. Um, but at the top of this triangle is all about the consumer and the consumer experience. And what we really do is we provide infrastructure allowing the connectivity of all three of those to exist in a very harmonious way. Um, and by doing so, we feel that we have a responsibility by delivering value into each of those different parties equally. Um, so when you think about what you know a consumer expects today, that continues to evolve with every single one of their own personal shopping journeys or engagement with a brand. Um, they expect you know frictionless experience. They expect value to be delivered and realized. They expect it to be easy to do business with. I would say the brands equally, you know, they're they make a significant investment to come into this B2B ecosystem to allow their products to be taken through our infrastructure out into our buyers' platforms and out to these consumers. And we have to make sure we're delivering value for them as well. They don't want friction associated with their brand. They want to make sure that when their brand is offered, that it's a great experience. Um, and that's a huge component of loyalty is that experience. Um, they're always just trying to create this, you know, kind of repeat um, you know, environment and behavior of these of these folks. And if you're doing that and you're not doing it in a responsible way and you're creating friction in order for them to get to that gift card or get to that reward, that's a bad brand experience. Um and then lastly, these these platforms, right, the loyalty platforms as such, are always trying to create engagement, uh, you know, repeat uh experiences, and and by again allowing this to facilitate in such a seamless and frictionless way, we feel like our infrastructure is the best to breed globally of enabling all that to occur.
SPEAKER_01And how does Tillo help your clients enhance their customer rewards programs through reward offerings? Uh, and how have those offerings changed over time?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's a great question. You
Gift Cards Become Programmable Value
SPEAKER_00know, I think the biggest evolution, if we think about the space as a whole, is the gift card. It's no longer simply just, you know, an item sitting in a reward catalog alongside merchandise or anything else, right? It's definitely become a programmable, I would say, value layer that can be embedded directly into different customer journeys or experiences. You know, historically, I think a loyalty program might have offered a fairly static selection of rewards. They might have had gift cards, they might have hard good merchandise. But with the evolution of digital, with the you know, kind of exceeding, you know, kind of customers evolving expectations, digital is becoming more and more important. Um, so the ability for us to deliver these rewards at the right time, into the right hands, into the right environments, um, we're really impacting a significant amount of change and how members of these programs interact day in and day out with these types of platforms. Um, if you think about a consumer that might be a part of a bank loyalty program and they find themselves in a center of a Best Buy, and if they are kind of leveraging that Chase or B of A loyalty program effectively, they're gonna remember that they might have access to a Best Buy gift card. And in store, they might pull up that lat that application, click on a Best Buy gift card, buy it right there, turn it around and show it to the um to the cashier and pay with their points right there in store. Like that's the type of experience that I think consumers are are expecting and the way by which we're trying to evolve that in terms of delivery.
SPEAKER_01Nice. Um and and how would you define customer loyalty? Uh, and what does that mean to Tillow? And then also what does it mean to the brands that you work with?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, another good question. So listen, I define loyalty as a consumer, customer's willingness to choose a brand again, right? When they definitely have a lot of options and choice out there. Um you can't just buy that with points or discounts. It's definitely earned. And if you think, or if I think, of the brands that I'm most loyal to, um, it's that consistent combination of value, of trust, relevance, right? And again, that experience. So that means we're helping our customers create these moments that that they truly can demonstrate and understand the individual. Um that's curation of catalog, curation of content, timeliness of delivery and presentation of these opportunities. Um, and that's again why I think the referencing back to the power triangle, the consumer kind of sits at the center of this. So if we're all keeping our eye on that consumer or a targeted cohort of consumers that maybe a brand is trying to attract, um, it's presenting them those, you know, kind of real valued opportunities at the right time. Um, you know, again, I think these programs as a whole, they work best, not by, you know, creating a transaction, a reward transaction, um, but it's really just another way to allow these consumers to feel connected, right, to that brand or to that program.
SPEAKER_01And uh I I know you already talked about uh gift cards a little bit, so this may be a little redundant, but uh gift cards have been a staple reward option for years. Um how have consumer expectations evolved and what role do gift card rewards play in modern loyalty programs?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's a great question. I'll touch on it just a little bit further because I think it's important. I think while gift cards have always been a part of you know some of the most traditional loyalty programs and catalogs offered in the in the past, um, even today a lot of those programs are delivering physical plastic, which is just mind-blowing. That someone has to go in, select a reward, wait, you know, 8, 10, 12, 14 days to receive that physical piece of plastic in the mail. So it's all about like how do we digitize this experience? And then layer on top of that, the ability to kind of present it at the right time for the consumer, that member to actually take advantage and utilize that right then and there. That's that evolving expectation. You you and I, you know, when we step into an Uber and we exit an Uber, we don't think about how we just paid for that Uber, it just happens, right? I think that's the evolution of this consumer expectation and how digitalization and no friction is now delivering on that. Even when we went from physical gift into digital, a lot of the legacy program operators would say, Here's your gift card, click into your email, go to your email, click again. Now you have to enter some pieces of demographic information where they're trying to maybe capture some more detail on you as a consumer. Um, forget all of that. Like they've already signaled to you they want to they want to select this gift card, give them the gift card. Allow them to pull it right up in that screen, show the barcode again to that cashier, allow them to put it into their wallet, and they should be done. Uh, and that's the type of experiences that I think are continuing going to evolve. And and they're not gonna stop there. Like, you know, we we've spent a lot of time thinking about AI, personalization, um, you know, preference, uh, agentic commerce. That's all gonna start to come into play here.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think uh I think that Uber example is a uh a great metaphor for the for the uh reward industry. And and yeah, just because some places are going digital doesn't mean they're going seamless, and it's you know still kind of onerous uh to to get that reward. And and yeah, getting rid of those hurdles is extremely important. Extremely important.
Reward Strategy Mistakes To Avoid
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Um so when brands evaluate their reward portfolios, what are some common mistakes or misconceptions you see around reward strategy and member value?
SPEAKER_00Um yeah, another good question. Uh thanks, Sam. So I I would say the first mistake is assuming that the the breadth of the catalog is going to be the most valuable. Um, you know, everyone says choice is key, choice is king. I don't disagree with that, but I think these these platforms, these brands need to, you know, I think more effectively identify who their consumer is and what likely they want to be presented. Um they could click deeper or wider into the you know kind of digital environments that they're interacting with, but they should really be presented with you know a few options that make the most sense for them. And there's a lot of data mining that should be utilized in order to present and curate that particular catalog for those members. Um, you know, I think the second is designing the program around your organization's operating model instead of, again, the members' reality. So goes hand in hand with thinking about like this digital experience. Well, just because you know we know consumers want digital, it's sometimes hard for these loyalty operators to kind of pivot and change a legacy infrastructure and solutioning to move to this digital environment. Well, I think you have to really kind of think about those investments, realize the benefit you're going to gain long-term from that, and start to kind of challenge yourselves internally to kind of say, like, physical gift is old. Like, we need to be 100% digital, or we shouldn't be doing this any longer. We're kind of doing ourselves a disservice. Um, and I think at the end of the day, it's all about like proper measurement. Um, the thing that I think digital does provide you, it's like real-time feedback. So the data points that you can start to glean from leveraging these types of digital gift cards from distribution to redemption uh to maybe identifying that consumer who might have come in for the first time on a digital gift reward. Um, how do you look at their second purchase? How do you look at their total basket over the value that they might have come in and just spent normally? So there's a lot of good data, I think, you know, opportunity to be able to append to some of these, you know, kind of consumers. And it's a matter of like, how do you how do you pull all that together to make it the most valuable for uh for again those loyalty providers?
Partnerships That Multiply Member Value
SPEAKER_01And so uh what what role do partnerships play in helping brands connect loyalty programs to unlock value for customers? And do you think uh some brands are missing opportunities when it comes to leveraging these partnerships?
SPEAKER_00Uh absolutely. I mean, I I think listen, going back to the prior answer, I think you know, the volume of opportunity, the volume of brands that exist could be overwhelming. Um, but at the same time, you know, without proper partnership and bringing certain brands together that might complement each other, uh, that'd be a huge miss. You can't just assume that one brand's going to be the answer all the time. Um, and you think about, again, people's lifestyles and the prevalence of self-use for these types of programs, it's no longer leveraging your points to buy your niece, nephew, wife, son, daughter, grandparent a gift card. It's for how do I kind of put these, you know, kind of to use in my own, you know, daily routines, right? If I want to go to dinner, if I want to go see a movie, if I want to go check out a sporting event, if I need to go shopping, if I've got, you know, college kids myself going back to school. Like there's all these opportunities you can kind of put these types of products into play. Uh, and I think a lot of that is these different partnerships that are coming together to form that, you know, kind of value. Um, there are ways by which you can put themes together, you can put local content catalogs together, and all of those are developed via you know the different partnerships that we are, you know, facilitating and operating on the back end.
SPEAKER_01Um many brands are are looking to differentiate beyond traditional discounts and points. How can gift cards and partner rewards help create more meaningful value for customers while supporting business objectives?
SPEAKER_00That's a great question. So listen, I think discounts they they often just reduce price, right? Um a well-designed program, I think, can actually increase perceived value. Um so when you think about a closed loop gift card, um, we can give the customer no doubt additional purchasing power. Everyone is trying to figure out how to stretch every dollar. And when you think about that typical point-to-dollar value, you know, kind of formula, there's an opportunity leveraging these brands that are looking to acquire new customers, retain new customers, build longer lifetime value with these customers, leverage the investment they're willing to put forward and create more value spend opportunity for those members. Um I think if you think about, again, acquisition, retention, even service recovery, um, there's a lot of ways by which these investments that these brands are looking to bring forward can create even more value. I utilize a pretty simple experience that if someone has plans to do some type of a large, let's say, project in the backyard, um, and they're a member of XYZ loyalty and they know that you know they have, let's say, hundreds of thousands of points that are sitting in there, you know, based on that equation, you know, they might plan on spending five grand at Home Depot next weekend. Well, if they're gonna do that, go to your loyalty platform provider first, see if they offer the Home Depot, and do the math. And I guarantee in most instances, you're gonna be able to get, you know, maybe that same $5,000 worth of value for maybe $4,500. Right. And that's the type of you know, kind of ways by which members of these programs should be thinking about the utility and the value that these uh these opportunities can create.
SPEAKER_01Uh earlier you talked about uh breadth of rewards and and the portfolio being one of the most important components. So I think that'll kind of tie in here. But uh, how can brands avoid creating a uh a sea of sameness uh when many programs offer similar rewards and benefits?
SPEAKER_00That's a good question. Listen, differentiating yourself, especially when you're one of you know many that are offered is is not easy. Um I I think the the ways by which these brands are delivering these rewards and enabling the delivery of these rewards is a differentiator. Not all brands today are enabling their um their digital gift cards to be provisioned to the wallet. I think the ones that are are starting to recognize the value that it does create and the the speed and the you know, I would say the overspend opportunity that that creates. Um I think relevance and timing, like I said earlier, like the ability to present a gift card at the moment of purchase is something that is really valuable. And not all brands are always keen to do that. Um and I do think that, again, when we think about Tillow and our operating model and always wanting to kind of be the responsible bearer of these products and services and solutions to the brands, the platforms, and the consumers, uh I think the way by which we deliver in and of itself is a differentiator because there's no friction. Like consumers that are lucky enough to be tied into a platform that's being operated by us and we're serving up brands that we have access to, they recognize that difference. And we've heard that from market time and time again in the in the uh platforms that we are operating behind the scenes.
SPEAKER_01Nice. Um, and when you look at the the current state of customer loyalty, what is the biggest challenge or opportunity that you you see today?
SPEAKER_00Well, uh again, I think it's these these loyalty platforms, the infrastructure, um, not recognizing, you know, kind of their members, their their evolving expectations, and and where they should be trying to meet them versus just putting their operating model and reality onto those members. Um I think they still operate way too isolated and and way too transactional in nature. Buy this, get that, build up points, eventually you burn points. Um, I think it's an opportunity to turn that into more of this connected ecosystem. I think there's some really cool partnerships that continue to evolve that can you know dynamically present someone, even without being in an app, the the awareness and understanding that they might have stored value sitting in one of these loyalty programs, and they actually have the opportunity to pay with points at these uh at these different merchant locations, like therein lies a great unlock and an opportunity to kind of look at you know things in a lot different way. Um I think therein lies the key is just continually challenging themselves to say what are these opportunities that we can make our members' lives more valued, uh associated to our brand, to our platform, to our loyalty program, uh, and what are all the different areas we can go do that travel, shopping, online, in-store, etc.
SPEAKER_01Um, and then what do you think will separate the loyalty leaders from the laggards over the next few years?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I I kind of said it, touched on it throughout. I think it's it's the strategic, you know, kind of value layer that I think those that like really lean into that and understand the opportunities that that can create, I think those are the ones that will stand out. Um they're gonna understand their customers well enough. They're gonna continue to look at data um to drive you know relevance. Um I don't think it's gonna become intrusive. I I think it's, you know, we're not talking about geofencing and geo-targeting all the time, but it's it's the right offer at the right time to the right consumer. Um I think it's again all about partnerships, those that recognize that they're not gonna be able to do it all themselves, and there's some incredible technologies and service providers out there in this space that can help bring this all together. And it's no longer, you know, these large technical, you know, investments and lifts that need to happen. Um, you know, when you think about APIs, when you think about the different webhooks, when you think about AI, like there's a multitude of ways these types of programs can continue to evolve and come together that are going to drive meaningful value. And I think it's the the operators that really understand that and lean into that, those are the ones that are gonna come up on top.
Fraud Prevention Without Added Friction
SPEAKER_01Um, and then as as brands uh expand reward choices through gift cards, through partner offers and digital rewards, what fraud and security considerations should they be thinking about and how can they mitigate those risks?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, this is a great uh, you know, we're talking all these pie in the sky great ideas and things that can deliver meaningful value. But, you know, one fraudulent event, one bad actor, one account penetration can turn it all asunder, right? So um this needs to be thought of in the earliest stages of program development, uh platform development, and design. Um, and you can do this in such a way where you're not making the consumer, that member, kind of pay the price. Um again, I think there's a lot of good tech that can enable this to happen. Um, you know, I think account takeovers are the single largest, you know, kind of creator of fraud that we've seen in the past. Um it's all about your front end. Like how are you validating this member to be who they are? You know, people are getting even more and more, I would say, slick in and getting past 2FA, um, doing all the things that they're doing to kind of you know mimic an actual member. Um, we just need to continue to lean in there and and try to continue to prevent those types of fraudulent activities from happening. You know, on the back end, when when we do see uh or hear of these types of things, we do our part uh through our own infrastructure. You know, we we set household limits, velocity limits, we have sniffers and and you know, kind of alarms that are ready to go off so that if we start to see abnormal activity and crazy behavior, um we shut that down quickly. Um and we we need to continue to invest there. Um, because just when you think you've got it nailed, you know, there's some other you know kind of very sophisticated criminal ring or activity that starts to pop up and you've got to go chase that one down. So this is this isn't something that's going away. Um when you think about the you know the billions of dollars that are transacted and that are put through this ecosystem, that attracts that attracts a lot of bad actors into this space. So again, I I would say it's all of our responsibility. A lot of it is going to be through partnership. Um I think some of the um associations that exist in and around this space with IMA and um the RGCA, the GCBA, you know, I think a lot of those types of associations are continuing to bring a lot of benefit and value in terms of awareness and understanding. Um I think Loyalty 60, Loyalty 360 plays a big part in that. Um and we just all need to continue to work together as as if we do it effectively, um, you know, I think all ties will continue to rise.
AI Personalization And Agentic Commerce
SPEAKER_01And then how does uh AI-powered segmentation and personalization going to change the way brands uh engage uh reward members today?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, listen, I I I think the the data is gonna continue to be the data. I think it's how quick and how efficient these AI engines enable these platforms to be able to be that much more kind of rifle focused on a consumer. Uh and I think it's just gonna be the speed and efficiency by which they're gonna be able to segment their customer, identify you know, potential laggards or or maybe folks that might be soon attriting from their program. And and instead of it taking you know weeks or months to be able to do those types of analyses and create meaningful business, you know, kind of impact opportunities, I think it's gonna be more like minutes or seconds. Uh so I think that's where AI is gonna play a big part of that. Um, when I think about agenti commerce and and where that's all evolving to, I honestly know I'm not sure. I don't know how AI will or won't affect some of that. Um, but I can see a world where consumers are gonna kind of set their preferences and and allow you know certain shopping behaviors or reward redemption patterns to be driven by AI. Um, but but not for the ones that I think are gonna be those meaningful moments or the ones that are gonna really drive that that loyalty, you know, kind of behavior that they're all looking to drive.
What’s Next For Tillo In 2026
SPEAKER_01And then uh last question, what's next for Tillow as we move forward in 2026?
SPEAKER_00Um, you know, listen, we're uh we're focused on a lot of different things. Um the biggest one is continue to expand the value that we can create right across this ecosystem. Um this is an industry that's you know been around for over 30 years or coming up on 30 years. And I think there's been a lot of um greatness that has been realized and and curated across this industry. But I don't think we've challenged ourselves holistically enough to be more responsible uh for all of those parties that I've referenced in the power triangle. Um and we're doing our best to kind of change the hearts and minds and educate and create awareness on this, but it's it's a it's a long, you know, kind of, I would say, uh evolving story. Uh and I see the the customers that we've been able to secure here at Tillow, the conversations that we're having at the different events like Loyalty 360 and just got back from IMA, um, we're seeing a lot of nods uh coming from market, which is very reassuring. Um I think if we do this, um you're gonna continue to see brands lean into this B2B environment, into this loyalty environment. I think you're gonna see consumers recognize the value that's intended to be delivered to them because of these good experiences. And I think you're gonna see these platforms continue to evolve and say, wow, what are the ways by which we can be leveraging these types of uh these products and solutions to drive our business outcomes and bring value to our consumers? We're gonna continue to expand our network and partnerships, right? So strengthening our capabilities across these single brand, multi-brand cards, um local offers, prepaid products, uh different white-labeled solutions. Um, and we will be applying ourselves AI in very practical ways, right, to improve how we build, how we execute, how we operate. Um, at the end of the day, it's all gonna be grounded in the Tillow difference, right? Our technology matters, um, but so do our people, the customer service, our willingness to lead, our willingness to innovate, the continued investment that we're gonna be making. Um, you know, that's what really, I believe, sets Tillow apart. And it's again uh been recognized by many in industry, and uh, we're gonna continue to do our best to hold that leadership position.
Closing And Where To Follow
SPEAKER_01Well, Bill, thank you for taking the time to speak with us today and sharing insights into Tillow. Uh, we look forward to seeing what Tillow does next. Uh and then thank you to everyone who tuned in. Be sure to check back every Tuesday for a new episode of Leaders in Customer Loyalty, the Supplier Voices podcast. Don't forget to subscribe and follow us on our YouTube and across our social media channels listed below.