Virgin America’s online community – bull’s eye, or a flop?

Virgin America is the latest airline to foray into Web 2.0. It follows hot on the heels of similar initiatives by AirFrance-KLM, Lufthansa and sister-airline Virgin Atlantic. The big question is whether the effort is worth it, or is it yet another futile attempt? Will it help the brand? What else can be done to improve the website’s effectiveness?

What’s good about the “community” website?

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Well… firstly, I think it’s a move in the right direction, and Virgin America has got a number of things right in their online community. Let me quickly review what’s good about the site, which will help the brand:

Reviews and stories: Site visitors are able to submit their stories of flying with Virgin America. There is also a section called “The Scoop”, which not only displays these stories, but also offers integration with leading online tools like Facebook and  Twitter. This is certainly good to get the customer warmed up to the Virgin America brand.

Engaging: The site has interactive features like the “toy box” where they can play games like “Voyage Simulator”. There is also a contest they can take part in, to be the “President of the Community”. These and other features are good for engaging the customers with the brand.

Tickets everywhere: The website has a panel on the left of the screen, which is essentially a flight booking form. Moreover, special offers sprout all over the website. This is a good strategy of inducing sales from visitors who have already “bit the bait”.

Now that Virgin America has already done a neat job with the website, how about some interesting ideas about increasing site adoption?

How abut engaging the passenger, in-flight?

Now that Virgin America has wi-fi on-board its planes, the airline should capitalize on this capability to engage the customer in-flight too. What better way to do this than by setting the community website as the homepage on the in-flight entertainment (IFE) system?

Those accessing the site from on-board the plane can have their personal details automatically added from the booking they would have made earlier (this can then be used to provide a custom homepage too!). They should be able to create an account online, and automatically be prompted to write a review for the flight they are on. After all, stories are best shared when fresh! Passengers should be able to store contact details of people they meet on-board while “chatting” through the plane’s entertainment system.  This would offer complete integration with their offline and online experience.

What do you think about these ideas? Do you think Virgin America has hit jackpot or is this another dud? What are some risks pursuing such an active online strategy? Let’s hear it in the comments section.

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