Payments Are No Longer Just Transactions. They’re Signals of Loyalty.

Common Mistake: Treating All Markets the Same

One of the biggest mistakes regional brands make is assuming payment behaviour scales uniformly across markets.

It does not.

Each market has different:

• Banking access
• Wallet adoption
• Cultural comfort with QR payments
• Expectations of speed and convenience

As Aditya shared, brands need to “unlearn” what worked in one market before entering another.

Payment localisation is no longer an operational detail.

It is a growth and retention decision.

What Payment Choices Reveal About Intent and Lifetime Value

Patterns seen across markets include:

• High-value purchases tend to favour cards or BNPL, driven by rewards and instalment flexibility
• Low-ticket, high-frequency purchases lean heavily toward QR and real-time payments
• Daily habits favour the most familiar and fastest option

These behaviours matter because frequency often drives more lifetime value than single high-value transactions.

Payment convenience reduces friction.

Reduced friction increases habit.

Habit increases retention.

Why Loyalty and Payments Are Converging

One insight that stood out from the conversation is how closely payments and loyalty now intersect.

Merchants increasingly ask about loyalty not as a marketing add-on, but as an operational necessity, especially in F&B and retail.

Customers expect:

• Familiar payment methods
• Seamless checkout
• Clear incentives to return

Loyalty programs thrive where customers transact frequently.

And frequent transactions are enabled by frictionless payments.

This is where brands start connecting payment behaviour with membership, rewards, and CRM journeys.