Get Your Org Ready

Learning Objectives

After completing this module, you’ll be able to:

• Describe the relationship between loyalty programs and partners.
  
• Sign up for a special Developer Edition org for Loyalty Management.
  

Prerequisites

Before you start this module, consider completing the prerequisite to best prepare you to learn. 

Suggested

• Complete the Salesforce Loyalty Management Basics badge for an overview of Loyalty Management.
  

Meet the Partners in Crime

A successful loyalty program centers around one goal: to create the most value for program members. This means providing rewards and experiences to frequent customers and giving relevant incentives to the not-so-frequent ones. One way to deliver value is to offer external partner products or services as rewards. The reason? Customers may want certain types of products and services that your product portfolio doesn’t offer, so partnerships are a great way to deliver more value. 

So what are these program partners called? They’re called loyalty program partners, of course. A loyalty program partner is a company or brand that you collaborate with for your mutual benefit. 

With this in mind, the folks at Cloud Kicks want to evolve their loyalty program, Cloud Kicks Inner Circle, to include loyalty program partners. The current program has been up and running for a while, with rewards structured around Cloud Kicks products only. 

Mary Levy, the loyalty program manager, regularly tracks program performance. Recent performance insights indicate that members want to earn points for other types of products. Mary sets out to identify complementary program partners. 

After much deliberation, she narrows it down to two brands to onboard as partners in the loyalty program, Ursa Major Solar and Kacy Retail. Here’s a little background on the two companies. 

Ursa Major Solar

Ursa Major Solar sells components including solar panels, inverters, charger controllers, and batteries. The company also sells solar systems and service packages. Although Ursa Major Solar may seem like an odd choice for a partnership with Cloud Kicks, Mary has good reason for her selection. 

Customers today seek sustainability in all aspects of their lives, and they’re conscious of their everyday living and the products they use. In addition to its role in the renewable energy industry, Ursa Major Solar is deeply committed to environmental and social causes—an attractive loyalty partner indeed! 

By partnering with Ursa Major Solar to offer certain components as rewards, Cloud Kicks can appeal to its environmentally conscious customers.

Kacy Retail

The cosmetic and wellness industries are also big businesses, with consumers from many segments of the market. Kacy Retail, as the name suggests, is a retail company that sells beauty, wellness, and fashion products. 

By partnering with them, Mary hopes to bridge this gap in the Cloud Kicks product portfolio. 

Understand the Partner and Program Relationship

Partnerships can co-create value in loyalty thanks to new offerings and rewards, with the rewards sponsored by the partners themselves. Each time a member shops at a partner store, a liability is created. Let’s understand how partner liabilities work. 

When a member buys a partner product, the loyalty program gives them points, and the partner receives the revenue. Because the points have monetary value, the partner accrues what’s called a liability. The program bills the partner for this liability, and in turn, the partner pays the program. 

The reverse happens when a member redeems points. The liability for the redemption accrues to the program, and it has to pay the partner the monetary value of the points.

In this module, you follow along as Mary sets up partners in the Cloud Kicks Inner Circle loyalty program. 

Sign Up for a Developer Edition Org with Loyalty Management

To complete this module, you need a special Developer Edition org that contains Loyalty Management and our sample data. Get the free Developer Edition and connect it to Trailhead now so you can complete the challenges in this module. 

Note that this Developer Edition is designed to work with the challenges in this badge, and may not work for other badges. Always check that you’re using the Trailhead Playground or special Developer Edition org that we recommend.

1. Sign up for a free Developer Edition org with Loyalty Management.
   
2. Fill out the form. For Email, enter an active email address. For Username, enter a username that looks like an email address and is unique, but it doesn’t need to be a valid email account (for example, yourname@lm4ever.com).
   
3. After you fill out the form, click Sign me up. A confirmation message appears.
   
4. When you receive the activation email (this might take a few minutes), open it and click Verify Account.
   
5. Complete your registration by setting your password and challenge question.Tip: Write down your username, password, and login URL for easy access later.
   
6. You are logged in to your Developer Edition.
   

Now connect your new Developer Edition org to Trailhead.

1. Make sure you're logged in to your Trailhead account.
   
2. In the Challenge section at the bottom of this page, click the playground name and then click Connect Org.
   
3. On the login screen, enter the username and password for the Developer Edition you just set up.
   
4. On the Allow Access? screen, click Allow.
   
5. On the Want to connect this org for hands-on challenges? screen, click Yes! Save it. You are redirected back to the challenge page and ready to use your new Developer Edition to earn this badge.
   

Now that you have a Loyalty Management-enabled org, let’s find out how to set up partners. In the next unit, you learn how Mary adds a partner and products to the program and defines the partner billing type.