If you’re racking up miles and rewards points like nobody’s business, then you should probably find out what your Traxo Travel Score is.

Traxo Travel Score

Dallas-based Traxo has come up with a patent-pending algorithm that chews up data from all the traveling you do and spits out a number that quantifies your status as an expert traveler, with attendant perks and prestige.

Factors taken into account include the number of unique states and countries visited, total miles and days traveled, and the total status achieved across all the various travel loyalty and mileage programs. Recent trips are given more weight.

Since the company gets all your trip data directly from various travel sites, you don’t really have to do anything or go out of your way to improve your Traxo Travel Score, apart from maintaining your regular travel schedule.

“With the Traxo Travel Score, we help you display and unlock the benefits of your travel experiences beyond what you might get from individual loyalty programs,” says Andres Fabris, CEO of Traxo. “A high Traxo Travel Score rewards travelers with both bragging rights and tangible travel perks, while identifying the most valuable consumers for our corporate travel partners.”

The perks for those with a high score include travel insurance from World Nomads, an Avis or Budget car rental voucher and a one-year subscription to Conde Nast Traveler magazine, among other things. Scores are tiered, from 0-10, 10-20, up to 90-100. (According to Fabris, tier brackets start at the factor of 10 number and extend to just under the next tier level, e.g., 0-9.9, 10-19.9, 20-29.9, and so on.)

Elite scorers will have a chance to select from an even more exclusive list of perks, such as a round-trip ticket on South African Airways. But it’s not easy takings, since the perks are available only to those with scores of 80 or above. For example, an average Conquistador traveler (90-100) has been to 13 countries and 12 states, belongs to seven travel accounts, has flown 130,000 miles and spent 150 days on the road last year.

If you travel this much, then you certainly deserve a few more perks. But the beauty of it is that you get the extra perks via Traxo without having to buy any more travel services than you already do—assuming you’re already a Conquistador or a Jetsetter (80-89.9).

Like all of Traxo’s travel tools, the score has a prominent social aspect to it. For starters, the tool factors in your social and local check-ins, based on information obtained directly from sites like Gowalla.

So, basically, it gives you bragging rights, and you can log in to your Traxo account and use the sharing option to blast your Traxo Travel Score to all your friends and followers on the social networks.

More details: Traxo Travel Score

Photo – Traxo

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(The post was updated to reflect a clarification on the tiered scores.)

According to the 2011 Colloquy Loyalty Census, American businesses issue roughly $48 billion worth of perceived value in reward points and miles annually to 2.1 billion members.

Colloquy U.S. loyalty membership study

The study from Swift Exchange and Colloquy included consumer-oriented reward programs from a host of merchants in travel and hospitality, retail and financial services.

In terms of rewards, the travel and hospitality sector is the second largest industry and hands out $17 billion worth of rewards points and miles every year. The financial sector is even bigger at $18 billion, and the retail industry makes up the top three with $12 billion a year.

Highlights from the report:

- The number of loyalty memberships climbed 16.3 percent from 1.796 billion in 2008 to 2.089 billion in 2010. The report says that the recession may actually have helped fuel the growth as companies used loyalty as a way to be competitive.

But the growth rate for this period is still significantly slower than the 37.3 percent increase from 2000 to 2006 and the 34.5 percent increase from 2006 to 2008.

- The average U.S. household has signed up for 18.4 programs but actively participates in only 8.4 programs.

- A full one-third, or $16 billion worth of rewards points and miles, goes unredeemed by consumers. This means that on average, each of those “active” households, which gets $622 in rewards, is leaving $205 on the table.

- A sector-wise membership breakup shows that travel and hospitality takes 32 percent of the total, with the airline industry hogging 324.9 million members, followed by the hotel industry with 176.8 million; car rental and cruise industry with 17.8 million; and restaurants with 9.7 million.

Chart Image – Colloquy

2011 Colloquy Loyalty Census – Download full report (registration required)

Correction: An earlier version stated that on average, 2.1 billion active households left $205 on the table. The report merely says that the total number of loyalty memberships is 2.1 billion, not the number of active households.

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Haiti Aid Effort & The Dollar Value of Your Loyalty Points

In this month alone, at least four states – Florida, Hawaii, Michigan and Pennsylvania – have made fresh overtures towards the casino sector for allowing entry or expansion. With tourism numbers down and the economy still sluggish, no doubt there will soon be more states lining up to roll the dice.

For destinations looking to gamble all your chips and sell your soul to a casino mogul, there’s a few things you should know first – about how Sin City has refined casino marketing into a fine art. Here’s a few examples:-

Encore Carpet

Sleep Deprivation:- What’s Sin City’s secret sauce that stops bleary eyed gamblers from calling it a night?

From the flashing neon outside and the garish lighting inside to the free flow of alcohol and the magic carpets, everything is meant to be a wake-up call for a gambler about to quit.

These magic carpets don’t fly, but the extravagant color patterns and designs assault the senses and keep casino customers wide awake all night long.

No exit

No Exit:- Once you’re inside, they want you to forget the world outside. So there’s no windows or clocks to remind you of the time of day (or night).

CityCenter’s ARIA casino is an exception, designed to utilize natural light to reduce energy consumption.

They make it easy for you to enter, but not so easy to exit. Casinos in Vegas have many entrances and escalators leading in from all sides, but only a select few leading out.

Airport slot machines

In-flight Entertainment:- If you’re in Vegas or on your way, you can run from the slots, but you can’t hide. McCarran Airport has over 1, 234 slot machines all over the terminals.

Las Vegas Sands Corp. even bought two L-1011 planes which it intends to modify and outfit with baccarat tables, to be used by gamblers being ferried by Sands from Asia to its Las Vegas casinos.

Not to be left behind, even the waters in Las Vegas aren’t immune. The Hard Rock Resort’s swimming pool offers a floating craps table.

Comp City

Comp Clubs:- To reel in a big whale, casinos will offer the world in comps, from free group transport (see above) to hotel suites with butler service, shopping trips, exclusive event tickets and club access, and even loss rebates – where the casino gives you back a percentage of your loss. 

Comp Clubs are a more down-to-earth rewards program which reward casino play for regulars – Sin City’s version of loyalty club memberships. Basically everything else you can get for free, provided you spend enough on casino play.

There’s Harrah’s Total Rewards, MGM Mirage has the Players Club, etc. The Las Vegas Advisor rewards book is a good place to find out what’s on offer.

Everything you see in Vegas – from the monumental exteriors to the fantasy worlds inside, from cheap hotel rooms to comps, all of it is focused on maximizing opportunities for gambling, ensuring that visitors stay and play longer, and keep coming back for more.

Photo credits:- No exit – intergalactic hussy; Encore carpet – David G. Schwartz; Airport slots – Jérôme; Comp City – Max Rubin