“If it doesn’t scare you, it’s not worth doing.”
This is the personal mantra of Amanda Cromhout, the CEO and founder of Truth Loyalty. The boutique firm, based out of Cape Town, specialises in loyalty program design and strategy that helps brands drive the right loyalty programs for their esteemed customers. She has worked with some of the largest brand names like British Airways, Coca-Cola, Emirates, car manufacturing brands like VW, Audi, Jaguar, Land Rover, and petroleum firms like BP and Shell.
Amanda Cromhout | CEO and Founder | Truth Loyalty
She is also a world-renown keynote speaker and has delivered speeches voicing her years of expertise in front of audiences across the globe. At EliteX, we are proud to have Amanda Cromhout as part of the edition: Most Inspirational Speakers to follow, 2025.
A crafted career path; awards & accolades
She started working immediately after graduating from University. She first worked as Country Manager for Malawi, and within 3 years, she assumed the chair of the General Manager at British Airways’ Southern Africa chapter. David Noyes, a senior director at BA inspired her to take up the challenge of a difficult leadership role when she could have settled for less. It is from this exchange, Amanda lives by The mantra “if it doesn’t scare you, it’s not worth doing”. During her journey, she and her team were trained by Sky News to handle crisis management media and that involved a lot of speaking daily. Her confidence got a boost with a grilling mentorship here and prepared her as an internationally acclaimed keynote speaker with a gift of words. In the loyalty realm, she has won prestigious accolades like International Loyalty Personality of the Year 2023 and Best Loyalty Professional of the Year 2024.
Today, she is a loyalty consultant, a teacher in a training academy, and keynote speaker on stage, in front of thousands of people.
Turning adversity into opportunity
My connection with the Blind Loyalty Trust is personal. It’s very personal. And I speak from the heart. I’ve often had to fight back tears, because it’s personal.
The easiest path is to crumble in the wake of adversities, but rare are those who turn situations to their best advantage. The rarest of these are those who turn those difficult experiences into something large for society. Amanda surely comes in this rarest breed of philanthropists who used a personal experience to launch the Blind Loyalty Trust. The trust is committed to offering free life-changing treatment, such as complex surgeries to reverse blindness.
She narrates her own incident where she temporarily lost sight in her right eye, but thanks to timely medical aid and the necessary resources, she could get her eyesight restored. But not everybody in this world is privileged to do the same, though over 80% of blindness is reversible. The fact that 80% of blindness is not reversed due to a lack of funds inspired her to create funds for those who cannot afford the surgeries. This noble cause has helped many people look at the world again without crumbling to circumstances.
The founder of the Blind Loyalty Trust, combines her positioning in the global loyalty industry, so every loyalty organisation achieves their corporate social responsibility seamlessly. This mission is extremely close to her heart and a key topic in some of her keynote speeches.
A deep dive into her speaking career
Amanda is a passionate keynote speaker, all set to bring positive changes in this world while helping businesses drive successful customer loyalty programs to offer exceptional customer delight to their clients.
The prep
Before every keynote speech on loyalty programs, Amanda and her team brainstorm ideas, choose words, content flow and create impactful slides to touch the core of the audience. She rightfully states that it is always about the minimum words on the slide that create the maximum impact. She constantly thinks about her opening and closing lines. There is no room for average. Every word needs to make a difference to the vast sea of listeners.
It’s an honour to be on stage in front of thousands or hundreds of people. And therefore, with that honour comes great responsibility.
The authenticity
For example, I might talk about my own passion for preferring to drink Diet Coke over coffee and how a great loyalty program picks that up in the data in a hotel and delivers Diet Coke to my mini bar fridge, or to the room rather than everything else stocked in there.
For example, I might talk about my own passion for preferring to drink Diet Coke over coffee and how a great loyalty program picks that up in the data in a hotel and delivers Diet Coke to the mini bar fridge, or to the room rather than everything else in there.
It all boils down to establishing an authentic personal connection.
Fears, doubts, relevance, etc.
Amanda believes in delving deep into the topics of research and not leaving any stone unturned to explain anything to the audience. When asked about self-doubt or stage fright, more often than not, now, she has none but this comes from decades of experience. The key lies in deep research, commitment and preparation as part of her homework before stepping on the stage.
Once in the arena, it’s all about performing for the audience with a heap of humility, confidence, authenticity, and personality. Then it is no longer a business-to-business equation; it is more of a human connection. Across niches like loyalty psychology, B2B loyalty, KPIs of measuring loyalty or loyalty strategy and data, she believes that:
The message must be meaningful. We can’t just reproduce what we’ve done before.
It is impactful storytelling that makes the audience think deeper and creates an unmatched experience that inspires them to take action.
Important tips for speakers
Paraphrasing a question sent by the audience helps the speaker earn some time before answering a difficult question. At the same time, it is absolutely important to be honest and vulnerable and accept that one doesn’t always have an answer.
If I don’t know the answer to a question, I will say so.
We might not have all the answers, but we should always put in the effort to learn and get qualified to answer at a later stage.
Have the courage and have humility.
Keynoting is a very nerve-wrecking job for many, but humility, empathy, and preparation help ease the process. By preparation, you must also be absolutely abreast of the type of outfit, hairstyle and accessories that you will don to create the right impact on the audience. Amanda takes care to ensure that she doesn’t wear noisy shoes on the stage or distracting jewellery on her hands, so she looks professional.
There have been many instances where Amanda has received standing ovations from the audience at the end of her keynote. It is heartwarming to know that her speech has touched the core of individuals.
What is in store in 2026 and beyond…
Amanda dreams of continuing the journey of combining her loyalty profession with The Blind Loyalty Trust. This movement is changing the lives of underprivileged patients globally. Her team are making a real impact in business and in helping others.
Make sure you’ve got a story and make sure you’ve got a point of differentiation.