Ai Editorial: Delivering a seamless CX as partners - how SAS and Avis do it

 

First Published on 13th June, 2016

Ai’s Ritesh Gupta interacts with SAS’s Haroon Rana about optimizing the experience of travellers via diligent partnership marketing.  

 

Booking different components of a trip can be an exacting exercise. The value proposition that I come across, say on airline.com vs. OTA-owned platforms vs. Google vs. TripAdvisor etc., varies. All have a role to play in the booking funnel. But what this means is I do end up with multiple sessions across searching, cross-checking (for instance, for me a hotel review on OTA still falls short on the “collective trustworthiness” or sheer display on TripAdvisor), buying etc.

So seamless customer experience (CX) is fittingly a big area of focus. And partnership marketing featuring airlines and other travel suppliers is a luring way to fulfill it.

In fact, partnership marketing has proven to be a proficient way of meeting the needs of loyal travellers, stepping up the average order value, and most importantly, pleasing customers for what they want and the way they want.

The end result, as two successful partners SAS and Avis say, is “happy customers – happy revenue”. Happiness here implies satisfied stakeholders – loyal customers and better revenue generation for suppliers.

SAS’ Partnership Manager, Haroon Rana and Avis Budget Group’s Stig Williams, International Partnership Manager, who jointly presented during Ai’s recently conducted Ancillary Merchandising Conference in Barcelona, say it is definitely “Better together”.

Making it work

So what’s the most challenging aspect of managing airline partners relationships to ensure competitive commercial bilateral agreements?

According to Rana, who has been associated with SAS, Peugeot and Telenor, points out that the most overlooked part by airlines is providing customers with four aspects:

          Relevance - attractive service/ product (offers that are relevant to many, broad customer base from the start)

          Strong offer - a good deal (this is going to generate sales, key to attract members)

          Recognition – of the customer’s choice and their purchase, plus rewarding loyal customers

          Collaboration – to maximize loyalty, a win-win-win mindset   

“The important part for all four aspects is to give time - analyze customer needs and preferences (when, where and how do they need your service), analyze data thoroughly, make offers and marketing attractive, to make continuous adjustments and assess afterwards critically. Plus, from a bilateral point of view, it is also important to having a view of the cooperation being mutual important and beneficial,” said Rana.  

Here we look at areas that can be important for the collaboration:

-       Understanding the customer: Rana says the key is the customer – the individual customer or micro-segments of customers with same needs. “The customer should feel that the product is made for them,” he said. “Every contact with the customers has to be optimized to being customer-centric, empowering the employees to take action and decision, along with making strategies with market focus. This is also the way we work at SAS EuroBonus.” For instance, SAS is looking at aiding passengers during the course of their journey. Here in-flight attendant equipped with details on an iPad (blend of flight-related details as well as information about the passenger) can enhance the customer journey.

For their part, Avis Budget Group asserts that their service extends beyond the rental: 

a.     Post rental survey – provides Net Promoter Score tracking specific to SAS EuroBonus customers

b.     Experienced and engaged customer service team

c.     Reporting capabilities – tracking performance by channel to ensure focus on key revenue generating opportunities

-       Leveraging assets or joint promotions: SAS, which has over 4.3 million SAS EuroBonus members, and Avis work together right from the planning stage of a journey. They run joint marketing campaigns and also leverage each other’s assets (like SAS’ aircraft feature Avis video advert on all long-haul flights and are aired before take-off and before landing or Avis promoting SAS EuroBonus on its own platforms). So partners are working out relevant content/ offers as per the booking funnel.  

Also, airlines are getting smarter when it comes to the timing of ancillary offering; say whether to go for online booking path cross sell or to offer on the confirmation page of a transaction or pre-trip email etc.  They are closely working with partners. There is an opportunity for ancillary revenue generation at various cross-sell points, but the products and offerings need to be targeted and differentiated based on audience and context. Timing plays an important role. So, for example, if I am on airline.com and buying trip essentials, then the timing of car rental, room booking or ticket for an event would differ.

-       Integration/ sharing information: It is vital that exchange of information between partners is swift.  There is a need to avoid lengthy integration projects required to enable interactions, such as transaction processing. Also, there are interesting options such as new loyalty and rewards platforms, built with blockchain and smart contract technology. This technology has introduced interoperability to the currently fragmented industry, multi-branded coalitions, superior program liability management and dynamic issuance/ redemption options.

Scope for improvement  

Partnership marketing isn’t new but improving the conversion rate or the efficacy of loyalty programs is a work in progress.

Even from the CX perspective, there is a lot of scope for improvement. Airlines and other travel-related business aren’t data-omniscient – it’s not as if they have automatic access to all of a traveler’s digital preferences. So as airlines and other suppliers invest in digital marketing infrastructures and mark budget for customer acquisition, it is imperative they find ways to meet the travel shopping needs astutely. Rana agrees that customers are “often demanding a one-stop shopping place for their travel with relevant and strong offers”. “Companies aggregating service providers can be good for this as it is faster/ easier to implement, but I think in-depth collaboration with key partners within the travel sector is vital and has proven to be much more valuable for collaboration and monetary gains.” He also added that loyalty programs of suppliers can be an attractive proposition, as some benefits are given by the airline and some by the partner – the total travel experience should though be brought together for the consumer.

Hear from experts about loyalty and personalisation at the upcoming 3rd Mega Event Asia-Pacific, scheduled to take place in Kuala Lumpur (23-24 August, 2016)

Follow Ai on Twitter: @Ai_Connects_Us