First impressions matter

When I first saw this advertisement, these questions would come to the travelers’ minds:

1. Why is Oneworld the “most important” alliance in the world?
2. And whose claim is that? The alliance itself? Or an independent third party?
3. Who is Mexicana? A new airline from Mexico? Or an old one?
4. Are they any good?
5. Do they fly anywhere other than Mexico?
6. Oh..and which of those logos is Mexicana? The first or the last… they both look similar!

None of those questions were answered. And from a marketing standpoint, what’s the “call to action”? Being the curious type, I clicked on the advertisement anyway, and I came to a “Promotions” landing page, which didn’t quite make sense.

Repetition doesn’t work anymore

The page I was led to repeated the same message, THREE more times! I was getting impatient at this time, so I click on the advertisement on the right bar, hoping to find out more. Where does that lead me? The SAME page. Yes, I’m not joking. The same page re-loads and I’m back to square one. In about 10 mins, I’ve still not found out any of the answers to my above questions! And that’s being about 20 times more patient than the average web user.

Enlightenment at last… or is it?

As I dug around, I finally found another graphic, which seemed to go just a little more into the details of Mexicana joining OneWorld. And I thought now my curiosity would be doused. The details certainly shed more light onto what the new alliance meant, but I still failed to understand why OneWorld is the most important alliance in the world, and what’s the significance of Mexicana joining them. Most importantly, I’m still clueless how it would benefit me if I fly to Mexico once in a couple of years, and only to Cancun!

How could this have been done?

Instead of just proclaiming that Mexicana has joined the “world’s most important alliance” and leaving me to figure out what that might mean for me, the airline and the alliance could have tried one of more of these things:

1. Get Mexicans who fly Mexicana to upload videos on YouTube on why this alliance will benefit them
2. Get Mexicans who don’t fly Mexicana to upload videos on YouTube on why this alliance will benefit them
3. Get Frequent Flier members who fly Mexicana to share their side of the story
4. Get a family to share their story, and get a few businessmen too
5. Have employees share publicly how this would change their work, and may be even improve it

Then compile all these videos and stories on a landing page on the website, or a blog, where the clicks from the ads would come. In fact, the ads themselves should just feature a person and a story. Why? Because it makes the story authentic.

Authenticity matters

Through these suggested efforts, even if at the end of the day I don’t understand why Oneworld is the “most important” alliance in the world, I might find someone I can relate to – the businessman, or the Mexican – and connect with the story to see how the alliance benefits me. Listening to other people tell their story moves more people to action, than blatantly claiming something in an advertisement.

So if you’re working with Mexicana, may I recommend you stop spending $50,000 (or more!) in getting me to watch the same advertisement four times in a day. Instead, spend $10,000 to hire a social media agency to put together the campaign suggested above. If nothing else, you’ll save $40,000. Oh, and if you need a reference, just go over to Volaris – which already does a fantastic job with authentic branding. What do you think?

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Among its members are some of the world’s largest and most admired airlines, including Singapore, ANA, Lufthansa, and Thai. But of late, a number of airlines with varying (and questionable) reputations have joined the alliance, including Air India, Egyptair and a couple of Chinese carriers. In the future, Star Alliance looks to get more member airlines from Latin America and Africa – further widening the quality spectrum among its carriers. And this may be detrimental for not just the Star Alliance as a whole, but for individual carriers’ reputation as well.

Bigger isn’t always better

The bigger it becomes, the more diluted the brand becomes. Gone will be the days when to fly from Sydney to Stuttgart, you could fly the pampering Singapore Airlines to Frankfurt, and connect to a super-efficient Lufthansa for the last leg of the flight. Just imagine the disparity in the quality of your experience if you have to fly Singapore Airlines for one leg and connect to Air-India for the other leg of your journey. It’ll almost feel like a downgrade from Business Class to Economy, even if you’re flying the same class throughout.

Though a larger number of carriers will increase Star Alliance’s reach, it will be an uphill battle trying to manage expectations and ensuring a satisfactory experience. It is one thing to achieve operational efficiency – which tends to be the mantra for airline alliances – and totally a different ball-game to maintain service and quality standards across carriers.

What about the tightly-knit OneWorld?

As Star Alliance expands its wings, Oneworld seems to have a differing vision for the future. It is aiming to provide a seamless experience to its customers, not only in terms of operations. With British Airways and American Airlines trying to form a close alliance, and British Airways trying to acquire Iberia and merge with Qantas, a very-very tightly knit alliance is getting even closer.

Hence, even though Star Alliance may offer more destinations, Oneworld will be able to offer a more cohesive and coherent experience to its customers – something thhat might just be a game changer. Moreover, as you can see from the figure below, Oneworld is close on the heels of Star Alliance in terms of capacity in most areas, if not ahead. Hence, a seamless brand experience might turn out to be a true differentiator in the future.

Focus on one thing, and do it well

So now that I’ve pointed out some of the branding challenges Star Alliance might face with its upcoming expansion, what are some of the ways to overcome them? Here are a couple of ideas.

1. All airline alliances have a pre-joining period for airlines where all systems are brought to the alliance’s standards. To ensure brand consistency, Star Alliance should introduce not just operational pre-requisites but also minimum quality and brand standards to be met for new members.

Yes, the above measure would help bring some measure of coherence, but it’s difficult to imagine a consistent brand experience across 50 airlines! I can’t forsee a day when Air-India can match Lufthansa in efficiency or having service in Spanair matching Singapore Airlines’ standards. So what else can be done?

2. Be honest. Since Star Alliance is aiming for the biggest network, then they should just brand themselves as being the largest. They shouldn’t emphasize quality. Instead, just focus on quantity. That’s the safest bet. When people are promised less, they expect less too. When expectations are exceeded, that’s only upside.

What do you think? Will size be a problem for Star Alliance? Will it affect the individual airlines negatively? What would Oneworld and SkyTeam do? Let’s hear your thoughts in the comments. section.

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There’s been ton of chatter that Qantas is looking for a bedmate even since the new CEO Alan Joyce took over. Finally, British Airways CEO announced that the airline is in talks with Qantas regarding a potential merger. On the surface, it may look like a good deal, since there are so many synergies to tap on the famed Kangaroo route. But dig a little deeper and you will realize that Qantas may just become a concubine for BA, rather than a trusted mate, and it might just make sense to keep the options open towards airlines like Cathay Pacific.

But before I get into that, let me share my thoughts on why a Qantas and British Airways is still good for both the airlines.

Why QF and BA make a good couple

The goal of mergers is to generally extract value by streamlining operations. But Qantas and British Airways (BA) can probably hope for much more than that, if the merger goes ahead. Both airlines are not only part of the OneWorld Alliance, but also already operate like a single airline on the Kangaroo route between London and Sydney. Their frequent flier programs are in sync and both have similar corporate structures.

The marriage may work with the blessings of the Australian government, which currently has a cap on foreign ownership of Qantas. Importantly for BA, it can tap on Qantas’ low-cost carrier, JetStar, to expand its reach in Asia Pacific as well as leisure destinations in Australia.

There are a number of downsides for this tie-up too, but they have been discussed elsewhere. So, I shall focus on other alternatives Qantas should explore, specifically, Cathay Pacific.

Cathay Pacific may make a better bed mate for Qantas

Reason 1: Complementary routes in growing markets. Just like BA, Cathay Pacific is also an integral part of the OneWorld alliance. But unlike BA, Cathay Pacific has  much better presence in China, one of the world’s fastest growing aviation markets. Also, tying up with Cathay Pacific will give Qantas a much better access to lucrative Asia Pacific – US routes as well – again a growing market. This, as opposed to British Airways’ better access to Africa and Europe, which are mature markets, but the growth rate is much lower than Asia. Also, Qantas’ interest in Africa is bound to be much lower than in China.

Simply put, a merger with Cathay Pacific will allow them to rule Asia-Pacific together. Just look at their existing route maps and you’ll understand what I mean.

Qantas Route map

Cathay Pacific Route map

Reason 2: More focused attention, resulting greater chances of success. BA is already trying to tie up with Iberia and American Airlines. Moreover, there will always be tough competition with AirFrance-KLM and Lufthansa (+Swiss, BMI, Austrian…) to keep BA’s hands full. Hence, Qantas may just become a concubine, rather than a bed-mate.

In Cathay Pacific’s case, it only has the subsidiary DragonAir, just like Qantas’ JetStar. Hence, there are much lesser distractions, which will allow both the airlines to focus on leveraging their merger. This focus may very well result in a successful, long-lasting marriage.

I hope Singapore Airlines and Emirates are watching these developments closely and coming up with their own strategies!

What do you think? Is BA good for Qantas or Cathay Pacific? Or someone else like AirFrance-KLM or even LAN Airlines? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments.

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Shocking prices!

Here’s an shocking discovery I made while searching for fares on Vayama.com. The fare for a JFK-Singapore flight is $800.20 (on Cathay Pacific), and from Boston – JFK – Singapore is $807.20 (on AA + Cathay Pacific). That means the flight from Boston to JFK is merely $7! That is less than the price for a person to get from Manhattan to JFK by subway! Even a regular bus ticket from Boston to New York City is $15. See the screenshots below for yourself.

How is this possible?

Even though both American Airlines and Cathay Pacific are part of the OneWorld alliance, and cooperate on this flight and have revenue share agreements, how is it possible for the fare to be so low? Is American Airlines really charging only $7 for this ticket? Or is Cathay Pacific or Vayama footing the difference between the regular Boston – JFK fare? If not, then such fares are totally unsustainable and probably the cause of many airlines’ downfall. It is here that the belt needs to be tightened, not by charging $2 for a cup of water!

I personally don’t have an explanation for such fares, but if you do, please share your thoughts in the comments section. I (and my readers) would love to be enlightened.

P.S: I generally don’t digress from writing about branding for airlines, but just couldn’t help deviate here towards the pricing side after my discovery online.

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