American Express Creates New Unit to Provide Consulting and Business Development Services

American Express Business Insights Goes Beyond Traditional Market Research to Help Companies Reach Customers and Build Their Business

NEW YORK,- American Express today announced the launch of American Express Business Insights, a new analytics and consulting organization that draws on the power and reach of the Company’s global network to help business customers develop better-informed strategies to grow their business.

Unlike conventional research that relies on static, self-reported information or surveys, Business Insights combines fresh, real world aggregate trend analysis to provide unique business planning and marketing expertise. Business Insights will identify strategic opportunities drawn from the aggregate spending patterns on approximately 90 million cards in force across 127 markets. It will work with business clients to provide data-driven insights focused on specific customer segments that will help them to develop customized marketing and growth strategies.

Business Insights will be housed within the American Express Global Merchant Services unit. In keeping with American Express’ privacy principles, all data analysis is done only on an aggregate level and does not disclose any personally identifiable information to merchants or partners for marketing purposes. At American Express, aggregate data involves pooling transactional data to create customer segments such as “ultra-affluent” or “large corporate” to better evaluate the purchasing patterns within a business.

“Our ability to interpret trend patterns across the American Express global network represents an unprecedented reserve of competitive insights for businesses that are fighting hard every day to improve their offerings and reach their customers more effectively,” said Bill Glenn, president, Global Merchant Services, American Express. “Using the power of the American Express network, we can help companies make smarter, more rigorous, and more customer-focused decisions – delivering a real competitive advantage in a continually challenging market environment.”

Business Insights will deliver a range of potential consulting applications that includes:

* Identifying consumer spending trends
* New product innovation
* Geographic expansion
* Customer acquisition and retention
* Improved marketing and advertising strategies
* Customer relationship management
* Improved procurement processes

“We are most excited about being able to provide our over 450 hotels with customized reports that contain invaluable insight into their customers’ purchasing behavior. The reports provided by American Express Business Insights afford our colleagues the ability to strategically and effectively manage the allocation of their resources,” said Claudia Kozma Kaplan, SVP, Marketing and Communications, The Leading Hotels of the World. “In a global marketplace where precise communications are increasingly important, this type of information is essential.”

The approximately 90 million cards in force and more than four billion transactions that take place each year at American Express serve as the foundation for analyzing consumer, small business and corporate spending patterns. Business Insights will customize its analyses and also draw on publicly available market data to provide valuable advice that businesses can act on.

“Businesses constantly wrestle with thorny questions like which markets to enter or expand, where to open new stores and how to define their ideal customer by seeking answers from research that is usually an arm’s length removed from real world behavior,” Mr. Glenn added. “Business Insights brings an entirely fresh perspective to solving these age-old questions.”

Business Insights provides a tiered offering to customers with products and services that match the needs of any sized company. In addition to large-scale, global consulting projects, Business Insights also offers a suite of quarterly benchmarking reports that provide spending trend analysis among various customer segments, vertical industry trends, and specific merchants’ market share and customer mix.

Business Insights services are available immediately to companies around the world. A current selection of products for U.S. businesses is available online at: www.americanexpress.com/businessinsights.