The Pros and Cons of Airline Marketing’s Selfie Fever — and Five Questions for Airline Marketers

A couple of weeks ago, we published a brief history of the airline selfie. It’s your quintessential guide to everything that you need to about the selfie and how it seems to have taken the world of aviation by storm. 

We were not wrong. In the short time that has elapsed between the publication of that article and this one, we’ve discovered two more airline marketing initiatives that have gleefully latched on to the selfie bandwagon. The first was an initiative (see below) by IndiGo, an Indian LCC that’s known to focus fiercely on its product and price, without worrying too much about the changing marketing landscape around it.

The second one is a slightly older initiative from April called #EtihadHunt by Etihad Airways, organised in collaboration with Manchester Airport. To be fair, the selfie is just a small part of the Hunt. But it must be said, it seemed to generate the most excitement in the people pictured in the video below.

The Good, the Flat, the Opportunists

While the initiatives were barebones and not very unique, the efforts stand out for one big reason. Neither Etihad nor IndiGo are particularly good exponents of social and digital marketing. Hence, when a marketing initiative from them includes an internet fad, it sends a positive signal that finally they’re awakening to the opportunities of the Connected Age.

But what about the signals from airline marketing initiatives in general? Does the eagerness to embrace selfies involve a deeper strategy or is it sheer opportunism?

1. The Early Movers — Turkish Airlines’ Kobe vs Messi selfie shootout was great because not only did the video have much-loved superstars, but they also caught on to the selfie trend the earliest.
2. The Innovators — KLM’s CitySelfie Contest is a unique spin on selfie marketing by smartly using selfies as a destination marketing component.
3. The Opportunists — I’d hate to steal IndiGo’s thunder especially when they’ve finally come up with something more than the usual Facebook offers, but their selfie initiative is both boring, overdone and ostensibly an attempt to keep up with the times.

Handle with Care

Here’s the truth airline marketers need to know: Selfies are quickly losing their sheen. From something that started as a cool internet fad, selfies are quickly becoming the subject of ridicule and disparaging internet memes. There’s only a limit to which people on the internet can stand even attractive faces showcased from various different angles.

Five Questions for Airline Marketers

But if you’re an airline marketer and still keen to incorporate selfies into your marketing initiative, here are five questions you might want to ask first:

1. Is this sufficiently different from what has this been done before?
2. Is the selfie adding something significant to my campaign and not just feeding some narcissistic desires of my audience?
3. Am I doing this because I want to show that my airline is with the times? If so, can I not find a more credible way of doing it?
4. Have I considered the possibility that given current sentiment the initiative might be ridiculed?
5. Can I find a niche for airline selfie marketing that hasn’t been explored before?

All fevers end. In the best interests of everyone, I expect this one to fade into the recesses of memory soon.