Société Générale Cash-Back Offer Extended

Customer loyalty and cash-back offers are no longer meant for some Société Générale customers only. This French institution is in fact opening their cash-back program to all of their over 18 customers. This move further stresses their commitment to improving customer experience.

Société Générale is expanding access to Grande Avenue, their purchasing platform which includes 800 e‑merchants, enabling customers to buy items and be proposed up to 7% cash-back on their orders.

These refunds are stored to a money pot which can be used whenever they see fit: the amount is then transferred to the customer’s current account. In addition, promotional offers and tips are also proposed by the bank over the year.

From now on, all Société Générale customers may take advantage of this offer. They are invited to join Grande Avenue for free via a non-binding registration process.

Comments – A promising market

This extension may address 5.7 million over 18 Société Générale customers. They will still need to register on the Grande Avenue platform to benefit from this cash-back program but this choice remains noteworthy on the part of the bank: they are in fact opening their loyalty program massively.

Grande Avenue was launched in 2014. It used to be proposed to 3.7 million subscribers of the Jazz package. It, however, was used by 140,000 users only, who actually made 29 million euros worth of purchases, for 1.2 million euros cash-back refunded.

France still lagging behind

In 2016, the French union for marketing (Syndicat National du Marketing à la Performance – SNMP) and Xerfi released a study of the cash-back market in France. This sector grew by 20% between 2014 and 2015, and amounted to 600 million in business volume for e‑commerce sites. Stéphanie Vuillemin, head of Société Générale Grande Avenue, however, explains that the market remains to be built. Only 10% French customers use these types of programs compared to 60% consumers in the US. In France, LCL pioneered with Avantage +. This offer especially stands out as cash-back offers are directly added to the payment card (Card-Linked Offers). It does not require customers to visit a specific platform for their purchases (as is the case with Grande Avenue) or add a plugin to their Web browser (as with iGraal).