Intangible
Assets
Personnel
Multiplus understands the pioneering role of its employees in achieving business goals, which is why it makes significant investments in personnel management. Efforts at this level are guided by the company's values and strategic goals.
All of the work done over the past years to define an organizational culture, the company's competencies and training of young professionals has guaranteed solid foundations for growth in 2012 of various initiatives geared towards increasing engagement and performance. Worth mentioning among them are the performance assessment process, organization of meetings with executives, commemoration of important achievements, and clear and frequent internal communication.
Promotion of quality of life also deserves to be highlighted for the year, with the launch of the Balance Program. This program is already a focus for priority action in 2013 and includes initiatives such as: flu vaccines, providing fruit in the office, implementation of flex time, performance of preventive exams for glycemia and high blood pressure, mapping of stress levels, posture education, and agreements with gyms in the region.
Practices that are already well established at the company – including continued training of employees and meritocracy-based pay that is competitive for the market - were maintained. This consistency and continual evolution in personnel management is reflected in the results of climate surveys and readings that are done periodically.
In 2012, overall favorability in the climate survey was at 74%, up 7 percentage points from the previous year. And an important perception was found: over 80% of employees are optimistic about the future at Multiplus and consider it an excellent place to work.
Brand
Creating brand recognition has been one of the main goals at Multiplus in these three years of operations. Initially, institutional communications were focused on clear and direct explanation of how this brand new coalition network model worked.
With the definition of a new logo in 2011, there was a series of resulting actions in marketing management that were employed throughout 2012 - which will continue to evolve in the coming years - to transform this brand recognition into a preference and desire to buy. One important initiative in this area, in 2012, was the establishment of a new language, made clear by a campaign launched in October.
The company went form a discourse of "accrue points in various places and joining them to more quickly trade them in for what you want" - which was fundamental to initially understanding the business model - to the theme of "exchange your points for times you wouldn't exchange for anything." This campaign was featured in the top communications channels, both online and offline, and showed experiences that participants could have with their Multiplus points in an emotional and fun way.
Multiplus executed an initiative within the campaign that deserves mention: a drawing to win 20 million points. When joining or converting points, members were given coupons to compete for 20 drawings to win 1 million points. This promotion also valued some partners - Accor, Droga Raia, Ipiranga, Oi, Pontofrio.com, TAM Fidelidade and Sky - which allowed members to increase their chances 10 fold. The initiative's microsite even offered suggestions on what to do with the 1 million points, creating even more interest among members.
For 2013, initiatives should keep this same theme and increasingly explore online media, always focusing on the Multiplus target audience.
Knowledge
Understanding the behavior of members and the positive impact of Multiplus on its partners' business – two objectives relevant to the company's strategy – necessarily touch on generating knowledge based on information developed with quality and agility.
In this field, Multiplus gathered some achievements in 2012, with various high-value projects. To gain better knowledge of members, it has begun a database qualification process. Up to now, the first phase of cleaning and updating the database has been finalized. In specific situations, segmented actions were also able to be developed based on the buying behavior of some groups of members through directed offers. The proposal for the coming years is to implement systems that automate the majority of this work, allowing for expansion of the initiative.
An important front of action to ensure member satisfaction is the call center. In 2012, this activity was fully incorporated by Multiplus – which up to that point had shared management with TAM. It has been enhanced through a series of initiatives, such as improving call receiver qualifications, implementing the automatic service satisfaction survey, creation of specialized service for those members who regularly use the network, periodic oversight of Multiplus managers – bringing the company's culture and values to all call center workers, employee involvement listening to calls taken by the call center, and close contact with the other areas to rapidly provide information (from technical problems to marketing campaigns).
Furthermore, Multiplus also implemented service via social networks – initially on Facebook and Twitter, which ensures agility in answering questions and strengthens the brand's relationship with its members.
The improved level of knowledge on members is ultimately aimed at achieving what is known as next best offer: presenting each member with the offer most suitable to that member's profile, which simultaneously meets a consumption desire and surprises the member with its assertiveness, creating engagement in the network. There are even plans to develop new products that serve this diversity of segments among members.
From the perspective of creating value for partners through knowledge, many advancements were made in 2012. Multiplus implemented so-called dashboards, which show online reports and graphs to support and streamline decision-making. Today, online redemptions, accrual and redemption loads of top partners, cancellations, registrations by partner of origin and transactions suspected of fraud are all monitored. All information can be visualized on TV screens at headquarters or on employee computers.
This project is, however, just beginning. Among the next steps are increasing the aspects monitored and developing specific dashboards for smartphones, geared towards support of commercial teams in the field. The availability of information facilitates relations with partners and allows performance reports to be created that explicitly show the impact generated by Multiplus on the network's business.
Information technology
Robust and reliable Information Technology (IT) systems contribute to the sustained growth of the Multiplus business, from aspects such as security of operations, agility in data processing and construction of reports, and improvement in relationship channels for members and partners. Therefore, investments in IT are fundamental to sustaining the three cornerstones of strategic planning at Multiplus.
The year of 2012 was notable for being a year of consolidation and strengthening of IT infrastructure and with these initiatives, the company is ready for the growth forecast for the coming years. One high-profile project during this time was implementation of a second authentication factor (2FA). This consists of a process where, after a member enters his or her password to redeem points, the member receives a confirmation code via text message or a phone call that also has to be entered to complete the transaction.
This project is highly relevant to combat fraud, since it significantly hinders criminal activity: merely sending fraudulent emails to gather passwords is not effective, since it would be necessary to also fraud the phone line registered to the participant on the Multiplus website to carry out the operation.
Another project that has begun and is still in progress is reformulation of the Multiplus website. In 2012, the webpage was given a new look that is in line with the new company's new brand and language. For next year, improvements in navigability and in members-only areas are planned, facilitating management of points.
Along these same lines of constant evolution, information technology has played a fundamental role in the construction of operational and business panels (dashboards), which have enhanced company controls and ensured better predictive assessment for revenue and redemption volumes. This line of construction and treatment of fundamental management information is essential to supporting business strategies and the tactical actions involved (Business Intelligence actions). For 2013, start-up on a program to expand penetration to accrue and redeem points is planned, aimed at allowing members to soon use Multiplus points in a scenario with greater mobility (POS machines, cell phones).