The Reward Playbook: Which Vouchers to Set Up, by Industry

Choosing the right rewards is the difference between a loyalty programme customers love and one they ignore. This guide shows which vouchers to recommend for each kind of business — grounded in what active Pixalink merchants run today.

Use it in two moments:

• Sales conversations — show a prospect the voucher types that fit their industry, with examples from businesses like theirs.
• Onboarding — give a new vendor a proven starter set instead of a blank reward catalogue.

The golden rule: start small, then layer up

The most common mistake a new vendor makes is building thirty rewards on day one. The healthiest programmes launch with three or four rewards that cover the whole customer journey, then grow once points are flowing.

Every reward answers one question about that journey:

• "Why should I sign up?" → a Welcome gift
• "Why come back?" → a Cash voucher or a Free item
• "Why stay loyal?" → Birthday, Tier perks, Win-back
• "Why tell my friends?" → a Referral reward

Start with the proven core

Across active reward programmes, four voucher types lead by a wide margin. Recommend these first — they are the backbone of almost every successful programme.

Lead with the Starter Set in a sales call. Treat the advanced features as the upsell once the prospect is sold on the core.

The voucher catalogue

Every reward a vendor can create falls into one of these types. Keep this handy as a reference when matching a business to its options.

A few field notes:

• Always pair a cash voucher with a minimum spend. A RM10 voucher on a RM12 bill gives away most of the sale.
• Prefer free items over cash where margin allows. A free drink feels generous but costs cents.
• A Welcome gift is the strongest conversion lever — it turns "scan to join" into an instant reason to return. Set it first.

The two kinds of "third-party voucher"

When a vendor says "third-party voucher", they mean one of two very different things. Getting this right opens two separate upsell paths.

• POS-synced voucher — the reward applies a real discount at the vendor's own till, through a connected point-of-sale system (Eats365, Zeoniq, StoreHub and others). Recommend it when the prospect already runs a supported POS.
• Partner-brand voucher — the reward is another brand's gift voucher (for example a coffee or fast-food e-voucher). The vendor pre-stocks the codes and members redeem points for them. Recommend it for membership organisations, associations, and partner networks that have no retail outlet of their own.

A retail brand can run both. They are not mutually exclusive.

Recommended mix by industry

A complete starter programme

For most vendors, a strong launch looks like this:

1. Set the earn rule — how points are earned (for example, one point per ringgit spent).
2. Add a Welcome gift, auto-issued on join.
3. Add a Birthday reward, auto-issued on the birthday month.
4. Add two cash vouchers — a low rung and a mid rung, each with a minimum spend.
5. Add one free item — the signature product, to showcase the range.

Four or five rewards covering join, return, celebrate and showcase. Everything else is a layer added later.