It’s the long weekend in many countries. Canada, US, most of Asia-Pacific are on a holiday. Yet, it’s very nice to see that airlines are listening. Chris Brogan tweeted today that he’d pay JetBlue $7,200 for one year of unlimited flying “pass”. And @JetBlue immediately replied that they’re “listening”.     Somewhere else on Twitterland, Christi Day of Southwest Airlines was dealing with an outburst from @TheKevinSmith, on Valentine’s Day eve, which finally involved Southwest’s VP calling Smith personally. Though these may seem like normal twitter conversations, to me they reflect a paradigm shift in the way airlines have started to deal with their customers. It wasn’t too long ago, where I had to print out and post a letter to an airline for a missed-connection claim, because their email inbox was full! And the matter took over 5mths to get resolved (in the end, I didn’t get my $$). JetBlue and …

A special day in aviation
Two important events took place in aviation today – both of which conjored mixed feelings in me.
1. The British High Court declared illegal the potential X-mas strike by British Airways‘ Unite union. The good news is that this promises hassle-free travel for almost a million BA travelers over the holiday period. The downside is that the union is keen on re-grouping to go on strike early next year.

2. It was the last day at work for Paula Berg, the force behind the successful new media brand strategy of Southwest Airlines for the past decade. She’s leaving to move back with the true love of her life – the mountains. So again, a bitter-sweet news. (Watch Paula’s video interview on SWA’s media strategy here)
What’s the link between Southwest Airlines and British Airways?
“So, what’s the connection”, you may wonder?

Paula had emailed me about her move last week and in her note included 68 reasons why she loved working at Southwest over the last ten year. Can you imagine an employee putting in so much affection and effort while she’s leaving? This only …

When it comes to social media branding, Southwest Airlines has been the trendsetter for quite some time, and is looked upon by competition and even other industries. From their very successful blog, “Nuts about Southwest” to its over 700,000 followers on Twitter – they’ve got their act together. And behind these efforts is a very hardworking team led by Paula Berg. I had the pleasure of meeting Paula at the Inbound Marketing Summit in Boston, where she delivered a keynote on Southwest’s social media branding strategy and I led a session for airlines/airports in social media.
What makes Southwest Airlines so successful on social media?
In this interview by SimpliFlying.com, Paula, who’s the Manager of Emerging Media at Southwest Airlines, reveals what makes Southwest Airlines successful on social media. From her journey as a one-lady show, to the sizeable social media team she now manages, Paula shares how challenges were overcome, disasters averted and successes rewarded. It’s the Southwest culture in full show. She shares her thoughts on the importance of “white-knuckle moments” as well as how to overcome them.

Watch the interview with Paula (6:03 mins) to hear her explain:

Why social media is a perfect fit for …

This is a cross-over article from Rohit Bhargava’s Influential Marketing Blog. When I read it, I couldn’t help but request for it to be posted here. His views resonate completely with mine and this is a perfect example of how authenticity is key in branding. Especially so in airline branding – because it’s so easy for the customer to switch if the brand expectations are not met. And in this case, United seems to be getting it wrong.  I’ve also commented on these previously, in my article entitled “Airlines, stop putting lipstick on a pig!” Meanwhile, enjoy Rohit’s ideas.

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Over the course of two days, I saw two stark examples of what could easily be considered the best and worst of airline advertising messages encompassed in two ads done for domestic US-based airlines. Let’s start with the worst from United:

What makes this ad so ineffective? First of all, the call to action to experience their first and business class has almost nothing to do with …

I had a great laugh watching this latest advertisement by Southwest Airlines. It’s the baggage handlers who take a dig at other airlines (they’ve even censored a United Airlines tail) who charge bags and don’t take good care of them. It’s a refreshing perspective from the tarmac, and I’m sure you’d enjoy it too.

Airline branding at its best! And no, they don’t break guitars.

Three airlines, three rockstars
Heard of Morgan Johnston? On Google, “Morgan Johnston Jetblue” produces over 37,000 results, as compared to “Dave Barger jetblue”, which returns 26,800 results. Dave Barger is the CEO of the airline, and Morgan Johnston leads JetBlue’s social media branding strategy. Morgan was into video production, before he joined JetBlue’s Corporate Communications department in early 2007.

Heard of Christi Day? She was voted the Employee of the Quarter earlier this year at Southwest Airlines, because of her tremendous efforts in leading the airline’s brand on various social networks. It’s not very often that a personin the PR dept. of an airline gets such a prestigious award.

Heard of Elliott Pesut? He was featured as the Geek of the Week, in one of Seattle’s leading daily this summer. Why? Because he is the “Head Twit” for Alaska Airlines. Elliot is a trained pilot, who was earlier at Flight Operations in Alaska Airlines. He volunteered for this new role, when the opportunity arose.
Why should YOU lead social media branding for your airline?
See a common thread in the stories above? All these people have no background in IT or new web technologies, yet have created an …

At the Aviation Outlook Summit in Sydney early this month, where I delivered a keynote on airlines + social media branding, the first day was mostly doom and gloom whereas the second day was much more up-beat. Not surprisingly, executives from legacy carriers like Qantas, Air New Zealand and the European Commission spoke on the first day, and up-beat executives from rising stars like AirAsia X, Oman Air and Gold Coast Airport spoke on the second day. That got me thinking…are legacy airlines dead? I now believe they are. Here’s why.
1. Legacy airline brands come with legacy baggage
Unions, legacy systems, government bureaucracy, old planes, old workforce, high costs, bankruptcy… these are all words that can be easily associated with Air India, Alitalia, Japan Airlines, Air Canada and many more legacy airlines. And these are all aspects that do not allow these airlines to function efficiently in the current climate.

The airline industry has evolved drastically in the past decade. With each new shock (9/11, SARS, H1N1…) we see new stars emerging, which have streamlined costs, efficient operations and specifically targeted markets they go after. And they beat the hell out of monolithic airlines that legacy carriers have become. Just read …

Last week, I attended a very refreshing workshop on customer service in Singapore. Ron Kaufman, one of the best-known customer service coaches in the region, led it. I found his ideas on how front-line staff should deal with customers immediately applicable to the airline world.

Inspired from Ron’s workshop, I’ve taken three of the best lessons from him and suggested here how airlines can use these to drive brand loyalty.
Do something unbelievable
In Ron’s words, delivering unbelievable customer service comes above delivering an expected or desirable customer service. Seth Godin would call this the “Purple Cow Effect”. It’s about doing something that’s customers don’t expect, in turn getting them to talk about to with their friends.

A very good example of this is the now-famous rapping flight attendant from Southwest Airlines. He did something mundane – reading out pre-fight safety instructions – in an unbelievable way. And not only was this much appreciated by those on the flight, but the word spread and this rapping flight attendant was a huge hit on YouTube. He even made it to Oprah! That’s the power of unbelievable.
There is such a thing as karma – …

This is a guest post by Rob Mark from Jetwhine.com in Chicago. We’ve decided to begin a little cross-posting here at SimpliFlying and at Jetwhine.

A commercial pilot and journalist, Rob has been writing Jetwhine as the blog of “aviation buzz and bold opinion,” for two and a half years. His posts are never dull because you never need to try to figure out where he and his co-writer Scott Spangler stand on an issue. Enjoy.

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For as long as I can remember, Southwest Airlines, now the largest U.S. domestic airline, created in the 1970s by Herb Kelleher and Rollin King, has been the low-cost airline others most want to emulate. The need to copy isn’t just about money, although Southwest has a profit history better than any other airline in the world. Most Southwest look-a-likes have, in fact, been dismal failures.

Southwest has a record of solid labor relations – despite last week’s pilot contract rejection – and a culture of customer fun in an industry that most others have never been able to duplicate. Southwest simply delivers a solid, consistent service at a …

A couple of weeks ago, I asked had an interesting conversation with a senior airline executive in Asia. Here’s how it went:
SN: What’s the emotional motivation (not $) for your customers to fly your airline?
Airline exec: Erm…I’m not sure.
SN: Hmm…is there someone front-line I can speak with who’d know, like the check-in staff, or flight crew?
Airline exec: Actually, the airport crew is outsourced, so we have little inputs, and it’s logistically tough to reach out to the crew.
What fascinated me the most were two things. One – I was talking to a (very) senior executive who didn’t know what, beyond price, attracts his customers. And secondly, the fact that the airport crew is outsourced may be a short term gain ($$ savings) but a long term loss due to the lack of front line inputs.


Twitter to the rescue! Tweet. Tweet.
But market research need not be that difficult. Especially when tools like Twitter exist these days, which allow you to connect with anyone – inside or outside your company – to seek opinions, cheaply and in real-time. Twitter is the in-thing these days. An …