Universal Reward Protocol (URP) To Customize Shopper Engagement With Their New Blockchain-Based Platform

By Kapil Gauhar

Universal Reward Protocol (URP) is a unique ecosystem that incentivizes shoppers for their shopping behaviour, online and offline, by letting them earn rewards in the form of tokens.
The ICO is currently in private sale.

Retail tech is a sector that can be majorly disrupted by blockchain technology. Many prominent international retailers are riding the blockchain wave and working on exciting developments in this sector. Universal Reward Protocol (URP) and its founders are the newest firm to experiment with blockchain in retail tech. They are developing a blockchain-based protocol that bridges the gap between shoppers, retailers and brands by streamlining their interactions. They have announced an Initial Coin Offering to finance this project. Considering the increasing popularity of this company in the crypto space, they are confident in their ability to conduct a successful token sale.

CEO and Co-founder Yves Benchimol is enthusiastic about this revolutionary technology’s contribution to the retail space. He said, “We have created URP to disrupt the shopper experience and redefine the relationship between shoppers and retailers.” He further added, “URP is a new way for retailers and brands to interact directly and transparently with their shoppers, and automatically reward their behavior and data sharing in a tailored, streamlined way.”

URP’s novel creation, which took the team almost three years to develop, offers retailers exclusive and previously inaccessible information by collating indoor geolocation, AI technology and data fusion. This product has been tested extensively, including by collecting data on a sample of around 350K shoppers. A total of 10M  store visits were recorded and 40K customized offers were sent, which gave the developers an in-depth understanding of the pain points experienced by retailers in the personalization of interactions with their shoppers. The solution is being used in France by renowned companies like Auchan (2nd largest grocery retailer in France and China), Carrefour (biggest French grocery retailer, 9th worldwide) and Nestlé (biggest food company in the world). Its ability to audit in-store shopper behaviour is an asset that most retail chains would like to make use of, and will allow URP to reward shoppers for entering a store.

Any shopping behaviour that customers display, such as store visits, browsing, purchases etc. can earn them rewards. With the consent of the customer, this blockchain platform will collect their shopping behaviour data and share it with the retailer. This way, customers have full control over their data and they can control the level of personalization and privacy in their relationship with each brand.

The URP tokens that a shopper has earned can be spent through a redemption offer personalized based on the data collected about the shopper.

The URP team has an impressive set of names that they can boast about. In March, Thomas Wolf, former CEO of France and Regional Director Europe of Catalina Marketing and world leader in digital couponing, joined the URP team as Chief Operating Officer. His extensive experience in the retail industry makes him the best candidate to oversee the deployment of this protocol, worldwide.

They are also backed by an impressive board of advisors, including :

• Francois Poupard, former Head of Innovation at Auchan Retail and member of the Auchan founding family, who serves as an advisor.
• Samuel Baroukh, head of e-business at Nestlé France;
• Jeremy Bokobza, lead blockchain developer at Stratis;
• Eddy Travia, pioneer investor in blockchain technology startups and the CEO of Coinsilium, a London-based blockchain venture builder

URP’s ICO is currently ongoing (private sale). The company is offering 240 million URP for purchase at a price of €0.10. Participants can purchase the coin with ETH or Fiat.