Airline Marketing Benchmark Report October 2014

benchmark report

airline marketing

OCTOBER 2014 ISSUE

A monthly selection of the most innovative marketing campaigns launched by airlines around the world SimpliFlying | airlinetrends.com October 2OI4

Issue 26

benchmark report

airline marketing

welcome.

Published by market research agency airlinetrends.com and aviation marketing strategy consulting firm SimpliFlying, the Airline Marketing Benchmark Repor t contains a wide range of airline marketing case studies each month, providing you with the latest and most innovative social, digital, experiential and traditional airline marketing campaigns recently launched by airlines around the world.

Whether you’re looking for inspiration or are eager to help your airline move into the nex t stage of engagement, while also understanding how your airline marketing initiatives compare to campaigns from competitors in general, these repor ts are indispensable for airline professionals working in the f ield of marketing and corporate communications. The monthly repor ts also help agencies that work with airlines stay on top of the latest innovative airline marketing initiatives.

OCTOBER 2014 ISSUE

experiential

For any questions about the repor t, please contact Shubhodeep Pal at shubhodeep@simplif lying.com.

As innovative campaigns come in all shapes and sizes, the Airline Marketing Benchmark Repor t is categorized into the following four themes:

Faced with ever more experienced consumers, who routinely ignore the commercials and ads thrown at them, airline brands are finding new ways to break through the adver tising clutter to connect with consumers.

digital

With the huge popularity of smar tphones and tablets, airlines are tapping into these digital platforms to engage consumers, as well as releasing videos online which they hope will go viral.

social

Besides engaging their online audience via Facebook and Twitter-based campaigns, the airline industry is also busy experimenting with new social media platforms.

tv, print, ooh

Despite the current focus on social, digital and experiential campaigns, airlines continue to serve up creative, traditional media-based, initiatives in order to reach a mass audience.

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experiential

cross-media

#flightdecks

the game plane ALLEGIANT

Airlines have hosted everything from fashion shows and comedy performances to music concerts on their airplanes. The latest onboard micro event is a television game show set and shot onboard flights operated by Las Vegas-based low-cost carrier Allegiant Air, using passengers as contestants competing for prizes from cash to luxury vacations at resorts in Las Vegas and Orlando.

Called The Game Plane – and described as part quiz show, part game of chance – the show is filmed entirely in-flight with real passengers competing to win prizes on the spot. The first season of The Game Plane includes 40 episodes and premiered September 20 in over 75 percent of U.S. television markets.

Filming was done on regularly scheduled flights, with potential contestants alerted, pre-interviewed and prepped in the gate

OCTOBER 2014 ISSUE

VIRGIN ATLANTIC

areas before boarding. Passengers who didn’t want to participate, or chance being caught on camera, could request to be seated in sections of the plane away from the action.

The game is mostly trivia, but also includes a variety of active challenges, such as in-flight putting contests. One of the games played during the show is called “How Smart is Your Co-Pilot,” and sends one half of a couple to an isolation booth — in this case the airplane lavatory — while the other half answers relationship trivia questions the partner emerging from the lavatory must try to match.

“We like doing things differently and the majority of our passengers are going on vacation,” so letting a film crew shoot an inflight game show seemed like a great match, said Brian Davis, Allegiant’s VP of Business Development.

On October 23rd, Virgin Atlantic will operate the inaugural flight of its first B787 Dreamliner from London Heathrow to Atlanta. To mark the occasion, UK electronic music acts Rudimental and Gorgon City will play a so-called back-to-back set, in a DJ collaboration taking place 30,000 feet in the air – in the first ever inflight performance to be live broadcasted via Wi-Fi from a plane flying over the Atlantic.

Besides being able to listen to the live performances, listeners on the ground will also be able to get interactive with the flight members and catch all the updates as they happen.

win a seat on the flight. Winners will receive two return tickets for the 787 inaugural flight and once in Atlanta will stay at the InterContinental hotel.

According to Virgin Atlantic, the idea behind the inflight event is to highlight the carrier’s history of innovation, saying that “#FlightDecks allows us to show off the new technological capabilities of the 787 and also to provide our passengers with world class entertainment ... both in the air, and from the comfort of their own homes.” A video of the announcement of the #FlightDecks event is available here .

Dubbed #FlightDecks , the two acts will take to the skies for an exclusive audience of over 250 invited guests and Virgin Atlantic has called fans of both bands to register at the #FlightDecks microsite for a chance to

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stopover stories

food truck

ICELANDAIR

Icelandair has launched its ‘Stopover Stories’ campaign, which is designed to draw attention to Icelandair’s Stopover deal, which gives people travelling on transatlantic f lights between the 25 cities in Europe and 14 cities in the USA that Icelandair operates to, the chance to stopover in Iceland (for up to seven days) without the expense of additional airfares.

The centerpiece of the new campaign is a two-minute video of a passenger – named Kat, who is a photographer from Seattle who is traveling to London – who is treated to a surprise, 48-hour stopover in Iceland.

The video shows her arriving at Kef lavik Airpor t for what she thinks is a shor t connection on the way to her f inal destination. Instead she was greeted by a par ty of friendly Icelanders, who whisked

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KOREAN AIR

her away on a two-day tour of Iceland— tailor-made specif ically to her suit her own interests and passions.

The surprise stopover video generated nearly 1.5 million views in the f irst 10 days after it was posted on YouTube and is the star t of the initiative: Through the end of the year, the airline will be giving people the chance to nominate an unsuspecting friend for a Surprise Icelandair Stopover when they pass through Iceland. Those who nominated the lucky winners will be invited by Icelandair as well.

Food trucks are a hot phenomenon these days, evolving from chip stands into quality gourmet food on the go. As experiencing the products and services offered onboard has become an effective marketing tool for airlines to engage savvy consumers, a handful of airlines – Air France, Austrian, Delta, United – and one airpor t (Stockholm Arlanda) – have already capitalized on the food truck trend for marketing purposes.

The latest airline to join the food truck bandwagon is Korean Air, which is offering Houstonians a taste of its inf light meals in order to promote its non-stop f lights between Houston and Seoul which it star ted this May. Aimed at prospective business travellers, the truck – fully wrapped with the Korean Air colors and images – serves 250 meals on weekdays during lunch hours at the so-

called ‘energy corridor’ of the city near the headquar ters of General Electric Oil and Gas and Chevron. On weekends it sets itself up at local events in the Houston area.

Two f light crews from Korean Air, along with a catering chef who will prepare the sample meals, are running the food truck. Foods that are available for sampling include bibimbap – a dish of rice, vegetables, meat and hot pepper paste – galbijjim – baised beef shor t ribs – and Bulgogi deopbab, a bowl of rice topped with bulgogi or grilled marinated beef.

The meal service kicked off on September 29th and runs through Oct. 26, and Korean Air plans to serve 100 bibimbap, 100 servings of bulgogi deopbab and 50 plates of galbijjim per day.

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live high fives

digital

teleporters

KLM

MARRIOTT

As the travel industry is always among the first to trial new technologies, British tour operator Thomas Cook recently let visistors of its new concept store try on Oculus Rift headsets to immerse themselves in a ‘virtual reality holiday’ .

On a similar note, Marriott Hotels has jumped onto the virtual reality bandwagon as part of its ‘Travel Brilliantly’ campaign in an effort to connect with next-gen travelers. The hospitality chain is taking to major cities a display in which consumers, wearing an Oculus Rift headset, can step into a phone booth-like “Teleporter” and be whisked to Black Sand Beach in Hawaii and the top of Tower 42 in London. Video of the 3D experience here and here .

The Teleporter made its public debut September 18 at the Marriott in New York,

OCTOBER 2014 ISSUE

and has now embarked on an eight-city tour (Boston, Washington, D.C., Atlanta,Dallas, San Diego, San Jose, and San Francisco) that runs through mid-November.

Marriott hopes users of the Teleporter will be inspired to actually go and take a trip somewhere. “Most people go to a hotel’s website and see beautiful but very static images,” said Michael Dail, VP of Marriott Hotels Brand Marketing, adding that the experience around the hotel is key for travellers.

The social aspect of the experiment is important from a marketing perspective.

Users are encouraged to share their opinions, pictures and personal experiences with the hashtag #GetTeleported, in an effort for Marriott to attract younger travelers who may not be as familiar with the global chain’s brand.

To promote its yearly post-summer World Deal Weeks – during which KLM offers attractive discount fares to more than 100 destinations – KLM enabled hundreds of Amsterdammers and New Yorkers to exchange high-fives via a live video link on August 28. The high-five is the symbolic campaign gesture of the KLM World Deal Weeks.

Throughout the day, the interactive installations offered a window to the other side of the ocean. People on the streets on either side of the Atlantic were spontaneously brought together by two interactive installations. Those who managed to complete a perfect ’Live HighFive’ on screen were eligible to win KLM tickets to Amsterdam or New York.

A video clip of the best high-fives was uploaded by KLM to YouTube and has generated more than 430,000 views so far.

On a related note, French train operator SCNF last year set up a door in various public places in Paris and passers-by curious enough to open the door were greeted to a live, full-size, video conference with mime ar tists, street dancers, bike riders and caricature ar tists based in cities such as Geneva, Milan, Barcelona, Stuttgar t and Brussels.

The ‘Next Door’ experience, enabled by live satellite links and a custom-made digital screen that perfectly fit the door frame, let par ticipants pick where their cycling tour guides would take them, or take on their street dance team with a dance-off.

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social

sherlock

#icanflysas

KLM

One of the most asked questions that KLM receives via social media is about getting lost items back. This inspired KLM to set up a dedicated ‘Lost & Found’ team at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport which aims to reunite lost items - from a teddy bear found by the cabin crew to a laptop left in the lounge – as soon as possible with their legitimate owner.

The team uses all available information like seat number, phone numbers and public social media details to reunite passengers with their belongings and often is able to surprise passengers by returning their personal belongings before they have even missed them. First results show that over 80 percent of the found items can now be reunited with their owners.

To promote the new lost & found service and to show how far the team goes, KLM

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SAS

has created a ‘tongue in cheek’ video that features a beagle dog – appropriately named Sherlock – which runs through Schiphol Airport in order to return lost items to passengers right away.

The video was shot in such a realistic way that several media – including CNN – initially thought Sherlock was an actual member of the Lost & Found Team.

The video generated more than 10 million views in its first 10 days online and as it became clear that the ‘beagle service’ featured video was a spoof, KLM had to release a statement saying that “The dog is purely used to symbolize the active way in which the team will search for owners and unite them with their lost possessions.”

People want to consume information as quickly as possible, and formats such as video and image posts do the job so much quicker than their written counterpar ts.

In fact, some of the fastest growing social networks today are based primarily on images: think Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat, while both Facebook and Twitter now feature images prominently.

The latest example of an airline that has tapped into this Visual Culture trend is Scandinavian Airlines, which has par tnered with the Tourist Boards of Denmark, Sweden and Norway to invite the public to share what #icanf lysas means to them, asking people to enter by tweeting or posting on Instagram or Facebook their most creative image of them or their family members that expressed the emotion, excitement or

experience of f lying in any shape or form, along with the hashtag #icanf lysas.

The competition ran from June 16 to September 15 and had the purpose to promote Scandinavia as a destination for people living in Western Europe. Each week the best entries were showcased in a winners’ gallery on facebook.com/ SAS and spot prizes including limitededition SAS retro f light bags and travel vouchers were awarded to ingenious entries each week.

The grand prize included four f lights in the SAS Plus class, city cards for sightseeing, and hotel accommodation in each city, before f lying on to the nex t Scandinavian capitals

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igital

hyperlapse

all-in escape

MULTIPLE AIRLINES

In a development that sees the ‘time compression’ trend meet visual culture, time-lapse photography and video has exploded in popularity over the past few years.

Launched at the end of August, Instagram’s new Hyperlapse app brings video stabilization and time lapse features to video shooting with mobile devices. Users have the option to speed up their videos by up to 12 times.

The Hyperlapse video app has enjoyed runaway success, with more than 40,000 Instagrams bearing the #hyperlapse hashtag in just the f irst 24 hours and has been received very well with reviewers calling the app well-designed, easy to use, easy to sync with social media, and inspirational in nature.

Technically the f irst airline to experiment with Hyperlapse has been Qantas, as it ‘re-grammed’ a Hyperlapse from one of

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SILKAIR

their travellers, who captured Qantas airplane movements from a lounge at Sydney International Airpor t before his own f light.

The f irst airline though to create their own Hyperlapse video using the new app has been JetBlue, which has consistently been an early adopter of social media technology. The f irst off icial airline Hyperlapse sees JetBlue show off a depar ture of one of its Airbus A320s from Orlando Airpor t.

Other social media-prolif ic airlines like KLM and Air New Zealand have yet to experiment with Hyperlapse-ing, but (unveiling of new livery), Southwest Emirates (inaugural A380 f light to Frankfur t) and Qatar Airways (arrival of f irst A380) are among the carriers to have featured Hyperlapses on Twitter and Facebook.

Last year, Singapore Airlines announced it was accelerating the expansion of its regional carrier SilkAir, ex tending SilkAir’s reach into the massive markets of China and India after decades of focusing grow th in Southeast Asia.

However, SilkAir has often been confused with being a regional budget airline. Says SilkAir CEO Leslie Thng “Consumers still perceive SilkAir as a low-cost carrier, to a cer tain ex tent, par tly because we do operate the narrowbody aircraft. There is a perception that narrowbody aircraft equates to low-cost carriers.”

To promote and explain SilkAir’s full-service proposition, the airline has launched a marketing campaign, called A Joy to Fly .

Par t of this campaign is a new web-based game called All-in Escape , where par ticipants can win daily prizes based on

their knowledge of SilkAir’s services.

In the game, players must match icons that depict SilkAir products and services with clues. Par ticipants have to enter a unique combination of 3 icons, of which the f irst 2 will be prompted by clues. Once they get the f irst 2 icons correct, they are entered in a grand lucky draw where they can win a pair of return Business Class tickets to new Silkair destination Kalibo (on the island of Boracay in the Philippines) or Hangzhou.

Par ticipants have to use their Facebook account to log in to play and are entitled to 3 tries per day at unlocking the unique combination. To win one of the 40 prizes given out daily, ranging from return trip tickets, airfare discounts, complimentary lounge access, complimentary seat upgrade, and additional baggage allowance.

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we go the extra smile

tv, print, ooh

southwest heart SOUTHWEST

With the merger of Southwest and AirTran well underway, Southwest was going to have to repaint all the existing Boeing 737s from AirTran with their livery anyway, so decided to refresh the brand all together.

“We don’t call it a rebranding,” Southwest CCO Bob Jordan said. “We call it a bold new look. It is the natural time to evolve our brand to present a bold and modern look that will reinforce us in the minds of our current customers and draw new people to fly us. They want to see a more modern, bold visual interpretation of Southwest— keeping our unique color palate that breaks up the airline industry’s ‘white’ sea of sameness.”

The new brand is called Heart and is based on its employees (who according to Southwest “are serving from the hear t”).

OCTOBER 2014 ISSUE

BRUSSELS AIRLINES

Southwest’s new branding includes a complete overhaul of its livery. Nicknamed ‘Heart One’ , the old “canyon blue” on the livery has been retired for a darker shade, the stripes on the tail have been modified, the fonts brought into the 21st century, and -- most significantly – a yellow, red and blue heart added to the plane’s belly.

The hear t logo also appears by the main entry door .

Southwest also launched a new commercial which loses a bit of the human touch by focusing heavily an airplane. But the sentiment behind it is beautifully expressed: “Without a hear t, it’s just a machine.”

On September 1st, Brussels Airlines introduced four branded fares on its European flights, saying customers should be able to determine themselves how they want to travel, based on their travel needs and budget. The carrier’s new branded fares range from a basic LCC offering (called ‘check&go’) to a full-service business offering (dubbed ‘biz&class’).

To market the new travel products, Brussels Airlines commissioned marketing agency TBWA to work out a fresh new style based on four key words: fresh, simple, Belgian and human.

With the four new products Brussels Airlines aims to position itself as a hybrid airline that offers a value-for-money solution for all market segments and budgets, without having to compromise.

The campaign focuses on the things passengers can do indeed (the “do’s”) - such as “do wiggle your legs on board” (plenty of leg space for that), “do sit together,” “do start your holiday on board.” – as there are already too many “don’ts “ passengers have to take into account when travelling by air.

The new positioning is accompanied by a print media and out-of-home ad campaign that revolves around the baseline “We go the extra smile,” meaning Brussels Airlines is an airline that goes the extra mile in everything it does to please its guests. According to the airline, “We go the extra smile” is also an important internal company philosophy for all Brussels Airlines employees.

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business sense

luminotherapie

EASYJET

EasyJet has launched a new TV advertising campaign which for the first time targets business travellers. More than 12 million of EasyJet’s passengers are flying on business, accounting for a fifth of traffic.

The campaign, dubbed ‘Business Sense’ , comes at a cost of GBP8.5m and features the voice of ‘House’ star Hugh Laurie. It first aired on U.K. television in mid-September and is complemented with a print, outdoor and digital campaign. The campaign is extended into European markets throughout October.

The TV spot focuses on the airline’s strong record for punctuality and points out that last year the airline was more punctual across Europe than BA. The ad opens in a busy airport where business men and women are rushing to catch their

OCTOBER 2014 ISSUE

VUELING

flights. Focus then shifts to a calm individual who is reading his newspaper, accompanied by the song “I’m late” from Disney’s ’Alice in Wonderland’. Suddenly, two large white ears pop from behind the newspaper and it turns out it is actually the white rabbit from the Disney classic, known for always worrying about being late. In the ad, however, he is calm because he knows his plane will be on time.

“This is the first time we are advertising to business travellers on TV and it is indicative of the importance we place on this key and growing market for us,” easyJet’s Commercial Director Peter Duffy, commented. “The campaign should help us to reach business travellers who may not have considered easyJet to date. We aim to communicate that easyJet isn’t just a more cost-effective option, it’s actually a smarter choice for business travellers all-round.”

Spanish low-cost carrier Vueling has taken a creative approach in using busstop abris to promote its flights between Paris and sunny destinations in Spain.

In May of this year, before the start of the summer holiday season, Vueling and outdoor advertiser JCDecaux Innovate promoted Vueling’s destinations by decorating five bus shelters around Paris in such a way they gave commuters a visual ilusion of being on a sandy beach in Spain.

The second part of the campaign was rolled out this September. To help bus passengers face the gloom of the upcoming fall and winter season, Vueling again decorated five bus shelters in the colors of a beach in Malaga (Andalusia) and also installed light therapy lamps, in an effort to inspire people to plan for a getaway weekend to the sun (images

here

and here )

On a similar note, another major European LCC – Norwegian – over the past years launched several creative out-of-home initiatives to persuade Scandinavians to book a flight to a southern, more sunny, destination in Europe. Examples include installing a rain gauge on bus shelters that recorded how much rain fell in the city (video here ).

In another campaign, the airline asked commuters at Oslo’s central train station to have their picture taken and get their skin tone saturation measured digitally.

Images people’s skin tones then were directly uploaded onto a giant screen, where the audience could follow who was the palest person in the league and deserved a free flight to the sun.

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arab idol EMIRATES

Always keem to associate itself with large media and entertainment franchises, Emirates has become one of the main sponsors of Arab Idol – Season 3 , the regional edition of the globally known reality show contest for aspiring singers.

Commercial Operations, said: “This is the first time the airline has been involved with a reality show sponsorship on this scale in this region.

Arab Idol is hugely popular, inspirational and thoroughly entertaining. It connects us to the very heart of people’s musical passions.

Emirates hosted the final 26 contestants of Arab Idol on a VIP trip to Dubai, flying them to Dubai from their hometowns which are spread all over the Middle East and North Africa.

At its core, Arab Idol is about providing talented people with the opportunity to discover new horizons, and this is very much in line with Emirates’ Hello Tomorrow brand proposition.

The 5-day trip included a visit to the Emirates Experience to fly the A380 simulator and a dhow cruise along Dubai creek. The contestants then had to make their way back to Beirut, host city of the Arab Idol show for the start of the live programme segments.

Arab Idol season 2 was won by 23-year old Palestinian Mohammed Assaf in a finale watched by a television audience of over 100 million.

Explaining why Emirates is entering the reality show arena, Majid Al Mualla, Emirates SVP

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about us.

Pricing SimpliFlying is a global consultancy that believes in thinking differently about aviation marketing. Having worked with over 50 airlines and airports around the world, it has presences in Singapore, UK, Spain, Canada and India.

Today, SimpliFlying advises airlines and airports on customer engagement strategy, achieving aviation business goals by harnessing the latest innovations in the social media space.

The firm also conducts MasterClasses to train and develop airline and airport teams to become self-sufficient in executing measurable and rewarding social campaigns.

OCTOBER 2014 ISSUE

SimpliFlying’s growing list of clients includes Lufthansa, Emirates, Toronto Pearson Airpor t, Halifax International, KLIA, Jet Airways, LAN Airlines, airBaltic, Airbus and Bombardier.

Get in touch at engage@simpliflying. com or visit www.simpliflying.com.

Airlinetrends.com is an independent industry and consumer trends research agency that monitors the global aviation industry for commercial innovations in response to changing consumer behavior.

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