Brief:
- Hilton is now letting the 89 million members of its Hilton Honors loyalty program earn points from riding with Lyft. Later this year, loyalty members will be allowed to redeem their hotel points for Lyft credits, according to a company announcement.
- Users of both services can link their Hilton Honors and Lyft accounts at a microsite to start earning points whenever they hail a ride from Lyft in the U.S. or select cities in Canada.
- Hilton Honors members can earn three points for every dollar spent on Lyft rides and two points for every dollar spent on Lyft shared rides, up to a maximum of $10,000 a year. About 90% of Hilton hotels are located in areas that Lyft operates in the U.S. and Canada, per the announcement.
Insight:
Lodging and ride-hailing are two industries that can mutually benefit from loyalty programs aimed at tech-savvy travelers, as the collaboration between Hilton and Lyft demonstrates. The partnership combines marketing powers of a traditional hotel company and a startup that, along with Uber, helped to define the "sharing economy." As Hilton faces growing competition from Airbnb, the lodging industry's biggest sharing-economy company, the hotel chain may strengthen its connection to millennial travelers by working with Lyft.
Lyft is more popular than rival Uber among younger adults who tend to rely on smartphones when they travel. About 78% of people who downloaded Lyft in the past six months are under age 34, compared to 66% of Uber users. Conversely, 22% of Lyft users are 35 or older, compared with about 34% of Uber users, per Similar Web data cited by Recode. Plus, Lyft has been quick to partner with brands, running campaigns with T-Mobile and Diageo's Captain Morgan line, among others.
Meanwhile, Hilton has added a growing range of services aimed at mobile users in the past year. In September, the hotel chain updated its Hilton Honors mobile app to give loyalty members access to employee suggestions of restaurants, attractions and neighborhoods to visit. The company has expanded its Connected Room features to more properties, letting customers use a smartphone to control TV programming, lighting and temperature. Hilton last year partnered with Showtime to let guests stream the premium cable network's content to specially equipped rooms at no extra cost.
