Together with Foot Locker we developed their first NFT project, which was presented to the public for the first time last week. With the Virtual Stripes, Foot Locker not only manifests their brand identity in Web3, but also realizes their vision of the future of customer loyalty.
Foot Locker, a leading retailer of athletic footwear and apparel, already had an established loyalty program called FLX. However, in order to both reward existing members in a more innovative and personalized way than ever before, as well as attract new members to the program, we conceived of the Virtual Stripes project.
NFTs have resonated with the fashion industry in particular, offering brands the opportunity to showcase their products in a whole new way and form novel relationships with their target audience. Working closely together, it was fundamental to clarify the vision and purpose of the NFT project. We took an in-depth look at Foot Locker's business objectives and how NFTs could be used as a tool to achieve these goals. A detailed analysis of the target audience and their preferences was also critical to ensure that the project would generate strong interest and excitement.
Existing customer loyalty programs often suffer from enormous inefficiencies. The lack of differentiation and personalized customer experiences can be a key factor in reducing customer lifetime value and increasing customer acquisition costs. And while Foot Locker has established a successful loyalty program across Europe with millions of members, it was still important for the brand to look for innovative ways to continuously improve the customer experience despite its success.
Using Web3 technologies, specifically NFTs, it was therefore necessary to design and implement a project that would meet the goals of increasing new registrations and customer satisfaction.
The design was thus aimed at both attracting new members to Foot Locker's FLX loyalty program and rewarding existing members in an innovative way. Two factors in particular were key to achieving this:
1. A simple Customer Journey
During the concept phase of the Foot Locker NFT project, there were a number of adjustments to be made in terms of the user journey. Together, we set ourselves the goal of making the technical process as simple as possible for everyone, regardless of their previous knowledge, so that Foot Locker's existing target group can be addressed.
Anyone who has been in contact with NFTs for a while knows the hurdles that have to be overcome in order to create a wallet and also protect it securely from attackers. This is exactly where we already see the first jumping off points for brands, as they understandably do not want to confront their customers with this complexity. In order for Foot Locker to solidify the advantages of NFTs and especially the Web3 possibilities for the future today, steps were necessary that we would like to describe in more detail in the following lines.
A basic requirement when designing the project was, of course, to make all processes as simple as possible for the user. This means that it should not be necessary for the user to download and set up a wallet like MetaMask. Nor should it be necessary to mine the NFTs against cryptocurrencies.
It is extremely important for Foot Locker to strengthen the existing loyalty program, so the existing user accounts should be used. Also, in the long run, it is important to create a link between the loyalty program user profile and the wallet address. This link would be very cumbersome and error-prone if each user already had their own wallet or created one manually. Therefore, through single sign-on, we ensured that a wallet is only automatically generated once a user has purchased the box from the Foot Locker Redemption Center and subsequently logs in to. This way, we could ensure a 100 percent match between the user profile and the wallet address.This way, the usually anonymized wallet addresses at Foot Locker are directly assigned to a customer, making activation and identification a breeze.
2. a clear and direct benefit for the customers
However, innovative technologies and simple participation are not always enough to achieve the goals and build a sustainable Virtual Stripes community. Tangible added value for members is essential, in our view, to build a satisfied community around Foot Locker.
In addition to a limited Virtual Stripes membership, an entry ticket to Foot Locker's Web3 world, a unique NFT to collect and participate in future Web3 projects, each NFT includes a 100 percent chance to win with individual prizes and rewards. With Virtual Stripes, for the first time in FLX history, we are realizing that every participant wins. No losers, 100% winners, clear benefits and added value.
The Virtual Stripes box could be opened by owners from 30/06/2023. The contents? A Virtual Stripes robot as NFT for Foot Locker's Web3 world.
This robot plays an important role in Foot Locker's communication. Not only does it represent Foot Locker's brand identity with the Striper shirt, but for many participants it should be their first digital possession and thus their entry into the Web3 world. In this way, Foot Locker rewards its customers not only with a unique NFT, but also with a brand-relevant and everlasting digital art asset that brings with it an individual reward for everyone.
In addition, each Virtual Stripes Robot has a feature incorporated into its design that provides owners with information about the physical or virtual reward. This is because each robot carries a bag, which in turn contains different contents. A closer look reveals whether there are more loyalty points, a monetary value, or even physical rewards like high-heat sneakers in the bag. Depending on the content value, some NFTs are rarer. For example, among all participants, there are only eight winners who won the rare and high-value sneakers.
Just 48 hours after the box became available at Foot Locker, we were able to reach 80% of the target we had set at the beginning. On Deadline Day, 20 days after the start of the project, we counted 100% more buyers than planned, breaking the previous record for participation in a Foot Locker loyalty program campaign in Europe.
Although much of the communication took place within the FLX ecosystem, there was a visible increase in new registrations during the two months compared to the months before and after.
The Foot Locker community, previously enabled only on Web2, has been moved to Web3 and can be reached via their wallet for further Web3 campaigns.
Members who had been inactive at Foot Locker for an extended period of time - known as "silent members" - were successfully reactivated, resulting in an increase in customer lifetime value.
Are you ready to initiate the change? I look forward to a get-to-know-you conversation to explore initial opportunities for using Web3 in your business model.
Florian Suckfüll
Founder & CEO
florian.suckfuell@minth.io