UNITED AIRLINES HIRES A NEW CTO

In early 2023, United Airlines hired a new CTO. His name is Oscar. You may be familiar with Oscar if you’ve watched Sesame Street growing up. Yes, it’s that much-loved character who loves trash. CTO here stands for Chief Trash Officer.

United Airlines is leveraging Oscar to publicise how the airline turns regular trash into sustainable aviation fuel. While it is a complex process in partnership with Fulcrum Energy, what stands out is the airline’s effort to focus on simple storytelling to get its message across to a wide audience.

Sustainable travel initiatives and technologies are inherently interesting. But they are too complex to weave stories around. Few airlines do a good job communicating sustainability initiatives that resonate with multiple stakeholders without attracting backlash from climate activists and authorities. United Airlines’ focus on storytelling shows us a way forward.

United is investing heavily in a future where planes can be fueled by sustainable aviation fuel. The airline has launched a commendable marketing effort to educate the public, media and other stakeholders in the simplest way possible. The airline has released multiple videos explaining its approach towards a more sustainable future in simple terms. The videos say nothing about carbon-neutral flying. Instead, they talk about turning trash into sustainable aviation fuel, which is a fact, not a claim. The videos go on to say the airline is “investing more in sustainable aviation fuel production than any other airline in the world.” These are all indisputable facts.

There is also a dedicated landing page explaining the multiple initiatives while introducing the mascot, Oscar. While in the past we have seen airlines use a mascot as a brand ambassador, like Rico at Air New Zealand, no other airline has engaged this method to promote sustainability like United Airlines.

Keeping The Word

Achieved by aligning all product, service, and corporate operations to deliver the promises made while setting brand expectations, eXperience is probably the most important aspect of an airline’s brand. The aim of providing a superlative brand experience should be to build customer loyalty. What can the airline do to make sure that customers fly with them again?

Brand eXperience is fostered across multiple touchpoints, from the booking hotline and website, to the check-in row and onboard the plane. This also provides multiple opportunities to emphasise the brand personality of the airline.

Something unique to airlines is the length of the customers’ experience with the brand. For the duration of the flight, as well as before and after, airlines owe it to themselves to leave an indelible impression on the customer that keeps them coming back for more.

Often, airlines spend a lot of attention on frequent fliers, but almost none on a majority of the other customers. Though loyal customers need to be rewarded, the rest should not be ignored. It is the firsttime fliers who need to be cultivated to become die-hard fans.

So how can airlines make every customer feel that he or she is the centre of their universe?

Many make the mistake of assuming that delivering such an experience would require excessive expenditure. In reality, consistency across multiple touchpoints is the key to winning a customer’s heart. Indigo in India has a sets a simple brand eXpectation of getting the passengers to a destination on-time. While it may seem trivial to most, this used to be a big deal in India. When it comes to brand eXperience, Indigo delivers simple service that almost always exceeds expectations by flying on time and then delivering a professional yet fun service.