Answer:

As a Business Analyst 2 at American Express, my approach to understanding the root cause of the declining usage of the rewards program would involve the following steps:

1. Collecting Data:
   In order to understand the reasons behind the declining usage of the rewards program, I would gather data from the following sources:
• Internal Data:
  This would include transactional data from the rewards program, customer behavior data, and customer feedback data.
• External Data:
  This would include competitor analysis data, market trend data, and industry reports.
2. By analyzing this data, I would aim to identify patterns and trends that might help me determine the root cause of the declining usage of the rewards program.
3. Analyzing Data:
   Once I have collected all the relevant data, I would use various analytical techniques to analyze the data and derive meaningful insights. Some of the techniques that I would use include:
• Data Mining:
  Using this technique, I can analyze large data sets to identify patterns, relationships, and trends which may help to determine the root cause of the declining usage of the rewards program.
• Cohort Analysis:
  I would utilize cohort analysis to segment the customers based on their behavior and usage of the rewards program. This would help me to determine whether the decline is confined to specific segments or whether it is universal.
• Sentiment Analysis:
  This technique involves analyzing the customer feedback data to determine the customer's sentiments regarding the rewards program. This would help me to understand the reasons behind the customer dissatisfaction and hence improve the rewards program based on the feedback.
4. Deriving Insights:
   Finally, I would use the insights from the data analysis to identify the root cause of the declining usage of the rewards program. Based on the insights, I would recommend the following measures:
• Enhance rewards program offerings based on the customer needs and preferences, which can be gathered from the customer feedback and market analysis data.
• Improve communication and awareness about the rewards program to encourage the usage of the rewards program, which can be done via personalized outreach and promotional campaigns.
• Re-evaluate the rewards program eligibility criteria, redemption policies, and ease of redemption to make the rewards program more attractive to the customers.
5. Implementing these measures would help to address the root cause and improve the customer engagement and usage of the rewards program at American Express.
6. Overall, my approach to understanding the root cause of declining usage of the rewards program would involve collecting relevant data, using analytical techniques to analyze the data, and deriving insights from the analyzed data to recommend measures that can improve the rewards program.
7. References:
8. 
   
• Data Mining
• Cohort Analysis
• Sentiment Analysis