Leading brands are responding to the 4IR by pumping cash into digital marketing channels that promise to place their brand in front of customers in the Millennial and ensuing consumer demographics.

They spend millions of Rands on social media platforms like Facebook and YouTube to achieve fleeting exposures to these consumer segments. Success is measured based on how many 'clicks' or 'views' the campaign achieves; but to what end?

These campaigns have the unintended outcome of linking brands to customers' negative perceptions of invasive digital marketing. Besides, fleeting exposures no longer cut it in the fast-paced digital world.

An April 2019, a study by the Denmark Technical University suggests that our collective attention span is narrowing. Each Rand spent on securing a fleeting interaction from a prospective customer is a 'Pyrrhic victory'.

Yes, you had 'eyes on' your brand, but you offered nothing of substance to grab and keep the customer's attention.We believe that brands should repurpose their digital marketing budgets in favour of loyalty campaigns that are tightly focused on building direct and lasting relationships with customers.

Brands that engage with their customers through brand loyalty programmes are rewarded by lasting relationships that convert into lifetime sales. There are countless studies that support the value of customer loyalty.

Bain & Company and Harvard Business School report that "increasing customer retention rates by 5% increases profits by 25-95%," while Marketing Metrics, a 2011 text by Paul Farris et al, suggests that the probability of selling to an existing customer is "up to 14 times higher than selling to a new customer".

Imagine the benefit of redirecting your marketing expenditure towards increased customer loyalty rather than fishing for new leads in an increasingly crowded digital universe.

Brand Hubb proposes redirecting the flow of marketing expenditures to the end-customer and expanding campaign reach via customer networks. In that sense, the brand has introduced an e-commerce platform and an application programming interface (API) that allows brands to offer Brand Rewards on their own online properties.

Brand Hubb will also soon announce the 'Chip In' programme, aimed at expanding the reach of the programme among family, friends and followers of customers.

Brand rewards enables brands to compensate their loyal customers for interacting with them, instead of bankrolling Facebook, YouTube and other digital marketing agencies.

It is long overdue that brands stop doing things simply because everyone else is doing them, and ask: What makes sense in a new, digitally connected world?

For more information, visit www.brandhubb.com. You can also follow Brand Hubb on Facebook, Twitter or on Instagram.