Recyclebank CEO Javier Flaim knows that when his organization’s mission is accomplished to any degree, that promotes customer loyalty.
Recyclebank is an organization that encourages green environmental practices through such strategies as education, content delivery, selling sustainable products, partnering with municipalities to drive recycling efforts, and rewarding members with points for green activities—which can be used for discounts and products.
Loyalty360 caught up with Flaim to talk about his company’s mission and attendant customer loyalty/customer experience initiatives.
What are you doing around CX/customer loyalty initiatives and how have they changed or progressed in the past year or two?
In order to address the question, it may help to review our business as we have a variety of different “customers” across our value chain, and thus our customer loyalty/customer experience varies according to the constituents for which we are driving to bring value and returns. Now in our 12th year of business, Recyclebank is a B-Corporation Certified program that strives to deliver a zero-waste future. As the first waste-focused behavior change program of its kind, we effectively combine education, incentives, technology and community engagement to make a real-world impact on waste and recycling goals. We work with multiple stakeholders to create effective public/private partnerships including: municipalities & cities, partners (including haulers such as Waste Management); businesses and brands, and residents (everyday consumers throughout the U.S.).
The industry in which we operate (waste and recycling) has witnessed some headwinds recently, including historically low global commodity prices (which affects value of recyclables), contamination issues (which hurt municipalities & hauler commodity revenue opportunities), and infrastructure needs (where by some estimates, there are $1.3 billion in infrastructure needs to modernize the recycling infrastructure.) But where there are crises, there are opportunities – and we find that a strong focus around driving value for our municipality and channel is critical to the solution.
At Recyclebank, we are singularly focused on driving expert education on waste/recycling, engaging residents in meaningful and rewarding ways, and driving value for our clients by affecting the key objectives that they are 
looking to accomplish. Accomplishing this ultimately drives customer loyalty as well as resident/member longevity – and ultimately a better, cleaner, waste-free future.
How has mobile impacted your business, and what is your outlook in this regard for the future?
Mobile is a critical channel in delivering our “Marketing-as-a-Service” platform to educate and engage residents on issues around waste and recycling across our 300+ communities. We realize that consumers are inundated with thousands of messages per day, have many competing priorities and we understand that (frankly) thinking about trash is not necessarily a top-of-mind issue relative to their everyday lives. As experts in behavior change and marketing, we need to continue to evolve, innovate and stay relevant – and mobile is a critical element of that strategy. Being “where the consumers are”, with the right message, at the time they are making a critical decision (whether purchase or disposal action) is core to our product development and customer/member value creation. Whether it’s a timely alert or notification, calendar reminders, or at some future state, scanning products/services to understand their environmental impact and responsible end-of-use disposal, mobile delivers a unique platform to provide these types of services for members and municipalities. Similarly, social media present another channel to be “ever present” with our residents, and provides a unique channel where our members can share, collaborate and network with like individuals in their communities.
It should be mentioned that our ability to leverage data to personalize the timing, content and type of information delivered to consumers only further the value we bring to our members and the experience we are able to bring them over time.
What is the key to effective customer engagement?
We believe the critical elements of effective member/resident engagement for waste/recycling include:
Making it easy: Whether subscribing, learning, redeeming for a reward, or interacting with us either online or offline
Making it fun: We believe that education related to our industry has to be rooted in reality, balanced – and yes, can be fun and engaging
Providing value/rewards: Both tangible and well as intangible rewards and experiences
Innovating/improving experience: Providing new and interesting ways, from how we present educational materials to the channels (such as mobile) that we deliver our content
Measuring/Data analytics: externally, to our members, providing feedback (leader boards, pounds recycled, etc.) we have the opportunity to present progress as a way to provide important feedback. And internally, we measure various metrics throughout the marketing funnel, as well as on-going interactions throughout the various potential channels, both online and offline to constantly measure, monitor and improve our customer experience pathways.