How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Case studies and notes for airlines Helping travel companies generate quality leads online.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 2 Contents Introduction Launching New Routes and Services in a Competitive Marketplace... 3 Campaign Planning Reaching The Right Target Audience... 4 Your Email Design... 5 Your Email Content... 6 Effective Landing Pages... 7 Measuring Success... 8 Case Studies Sun Country Airlines... 9 SriLankan Airlines... 13 Next Steps Planning Your Own Campaign... 16 About Dot Tourism Dot Tourism Travel Marketing Experts... 17
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 3 Chapter 1 Introduction Launching New Routes and Services Airlines are launching new routes and services every week. In September 2013, 83 new routes were launched (data from 3rd September to 30th September inclusive). These include forays into new destinations from some of the industries biggest names. There is no doubt, it s a very competitive marketplace. Of course as these new routes are planned and launched the marketing dollars are hard at work to promote them, normally accompanied by a fanfare of PR. We can t help but resist comment on the great cakes we ve seen to celebrate some of these new routes! Any new flight launch needs a full marketing plan behind it to ensure it reaches the maximum number of people possible. This ebook offers an overview of how email marketing can be used to effectively reach a carefully targeted audience.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 4 Chapter 2 Campaign Planning Reaching the Right Target Audience If you are sending out an email to launch a new route or service it is essential that you are selective with your targeting. There are a number of factors that you can take into account. Here are a few that are worth bearing in mind. 1. Geographic location If you are launching a flight from a certain airport, you need to make sure that you segment your data to only include people who live within a reasonable travel distance of that location. Generally people will travel to the airport that is closest to them, but may consider travelling further for a better deal or to access a route not available elsewhere. As well as drive-time look at public transport links. If there is an easy, direct transport option people will use it. 2. Household income Depending on the service you are launching, you will want to segment your audience by their income. Expensive long haul routes or new business class services will be better received by higher earners. 3. Travel interest You may be able to further segment your email database by travel interest. For example new flight routes from the UK to popular US holiday destinations generally is well received by families. Routes to the Middle East are often popular with business travellers. While this is not an exact science it can offer an opportunity to tailor the email creative and offering in a way to appeal to your target audience, increasing response rates. You can either apply these demographic filters to your own email database (where you have collected the data) or use them to buy in targeted data. The latter comes with a real caveat of buyer beware. We don t condone buying in large quantities of data from unknown mailing houses as it simply doesn t get results. However, when working with select partners using squeaky clean ethics it can work.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 5 Chapter 2 Campaign Planning Your Email Design Getting the email design, content and any associated offer right is vital to make your audience pay attention and take action. There are numerous articles and guides to help you get these elements of your campaign right but here are a few tips to remember. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Keep your email design fairly simple. The more intricate the layout, the more likely it is to render badly in some email clients. Make sure your email is modern with good imagery and typography. It should reflect well on your brand. While to a certain extent email coding requires a more old fashioned approach the design should definitely be current and on trend. Ensure that any images you use are small in file-size and that your email is still readable with images disabled. Consider using responsive design so that your email renders well on mobiles. Ensure you have a clear call to action and don t distract users with too many options. Test, test and test again. You need to make sure your email looks professional.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 6 Chapter 2 Campaign Planning Your Email Content Your priority is to reach your audience, engage them to open your email with a compelling subject line and then get them to click on your call to action. To achieve this you will need some great content. 1 2 Make sure you have a strong offer. This could be a great ticket price or a competition. Make sure your email is useful and interesting. For example, if you are launching a new flight route to an unusual destination give people advice and tips on why they should travel there. Think about their purpose for visiting and address that in your content. If your email is targeting business travellers then have an information panel about business facilities at the two airports the flight route you are promoting connects. You need to ensure that your content is memorable and taps into what the user is looking for. It is worth getting content professionally written 3 4 Personalise your email where possible. Don t just use the recipients name but make use of any other data you have available, for example reference their local airport if you know their location. Keep it brief and don t waffle. You need to keep your content punchy and readable. Entice people to click and read more on your website or landing page rather than trying to present everything all at once to them.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 7 Chapter 2 Campaign Planning Creating Effective Landing Pages Making sure you have an effective landing page is often an overlooked component of planning an email campaign. We cover landing pages in detail in our free ebook The Complete Guide To Optimising Your Travel Landing Pages but here are a reminder of the basics. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Give the landing page a title, description, and layout that clearly and quickly explains the value of your offer; include a strong incentive for users to take an action to download or sign up for your offer. Remove any distracting clutter, even navigation links. You want visitors focused on one thing: filling out your form. Social sharing links, while technically a distraction, do serve your cause by allowing users to spread the word about your offer to their social network. Include social sharing links to maximize exposure for your offers. Strike a balance in the structure of the form. Keep it short and non-intrusive from a user s perspective, but capture enough information to make the lead useful to you for follow-up. Keep users engaged. After they ve completed the form, direct them to a thank-you page or send an auto-response that suggests other offers they might find interesting or next steps they can take. Track, measure, and analyse your conversion rates. Use what you learn to improve your landing pages and improve your conversion rates.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 8 Chapter 2 Campaign Planning Measuring Success It s important that you approach your email marketing with a purpose. Before you start your campaign you need to determine your goals and set in place the measurements you will use to determine whether it has been a success. A few useful goals that airlines launching a new flight route or service can aim for: 1. Database growth If you are entering a new territory or expanding services from a certain location then building up a database of potential customers that fulfil your target criteria (for example live within a 60 minute travel time of the airport) is an excellent goal. This sort of target can be achieved through email list rental (if you are very careful and selective about the source) or through using lead generation techniques to target people not already on your database. You can also encourage your current database to refer friends. Running a competition with additional entries for each friend you encourage to enter is a popular and successful tactic for achieving this. 2. Ticket sales If you have an engaged database then a creative campaign with a strong ticket offer can help you drive ticket sales. 3. Brand awareness Increasing brand awareness and promoting your services to previous and existing clients can help drive sales in the longer term. A creative campaign that encourages readers to click through and spend time on your website can help boost knowledge of what you offer and keep you in the forefront of their mind next time they need to make a booking. This type of objective can work well with increasing sign up to loyalty programmes.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 9 Chapter 3 Case Studies Sun Country Airlines We developed a complete email strategy to promote a new route being launched by Sun Country Airlines from Gatwick, UK to Minneapolis, USA. Finding the right audience With no existing database to use we sourced a targeted mailing list of UK consumer interested in travel to the USA living in South East England, using London Gatwick as their primary airport. Design and content With no previous knowledge of the brand it was important that the email was eye-catching with a strong, clear message. We designed a series of HTML emails counting down to the launch of the new service to generate excitement. We used split tested landing pages to maximise database conversion rates, inviting recipients to sign up for special fare alerts and deals. The campaign included: Three custom emails Split tested landing pages Email list procurement Database management Detailed reporting Primary objective: Promote a new route from the UK to USA, building a UK consumer database. Results at a glance: Open rates of 28% Click through rates of 17% Database conversion rate of 9% Results The campaign performed very well with above average open and click through rates. Even with no available offer as a call to action, by split testing landing pages we achieved a database conversion rate of 9%.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 10 This shows the first email that was broadcast for the Sun Country Airlines campaign. We used it as the opportunity to introduce the brand and to start generating some excitement with a count down to the inaugural flight on the new route.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 11 This shows the final email that was broadcast for the Sun Country Airlines campaign. We keep the strong call to action header encouraging people to sign up for special flight deals and add in more flight offers.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 12 This shows one of the many landing pages set up for the campaign. We used split testing to show different versions, allowing us to optimise and refine the content of the page in order to maximise conversions.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 13 Chapter 3 Case Studies SriLankan Airlines We developed a complete email strategy to promote SriLankan Airlines new direct flight services from the UK to Sri Lanka and the Maldives. Finding the right audience As SriLankan Airlines were looking to grow a new database we sourced a carefully selected mailing list to use. We targeted 400,000 UK consumer interested in long-haul travel, winter sun with an income of over 30,000 per annum. A competition to win a holiday provided an incentivised data collection call to action for these recipients. Design and content The email design was developed to be eye-catching with a strong call to action while following strict corporate identity guidelines. The emails were tested for compatibility in 29 different browser / email clients. We set up a landing page to provide Sri Lanka destination related content. The campaign included: Three custom emails Landing page Content creation Email list procurement Detailed reporting Primary objective: Raise awareness of Sri Lanka as a destination and build a UK mailing database Results at a glance: Open rates up to 46% Click through rates of up to 5% Landing conversion rate of 81% Results The campaign performed really well with open rates of up to 46% and click through rates of up to 5% with competition entries exceeding expectations.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 14 This shows one of the creatives used in our SriLankan Airlines email campaign. We kept copy very succinct and ensured that the call to action was prominent at the top of the email.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 15 This shows the landing page we created for SriLankan Airline. We used some evocative imagery alongside succinct copy about the highlights of Sri Lanka as a destination.
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 16 Chapter 4 Next Steps Planning Your Own Campaign We hope you have found this ebook useful and have been able to gather some inspiration for your next campaign. Just to recap, here are the next steps to take if you are planning to run one soon. 1. Determine your goals. Are you looking for database growth or trying to drive sales from your existing contacts? 2. Plan your offer. You need something appealing to make people act, from special flight deals to a competition to win a free trip. 3. Plan your strategy. Do you have an existing database to use? Are you looking to use a lead generation service? Think about how many emails you want to send and what you want them to say. 4. Design your email and write some great copy. Keep it catchy and succinct. 5. Get your email coded up and test, test and test again. It needs to look great and perform across all email browsers. You may want to use responsive design for optimal performance across all email clients. 6. Prepare your landing pages. You may wish to use split testing to optimise their conversion performance, 7. Determine what your measurables are so that you can track the success of your campaign. You are now ready to send out your campaign! Of course you may choose to outsource all the above to a team of dedicated experts... if that is that case don t forget to give us a call!
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 17 About Dot Tourism We help airlines reach travel consumers and have run a number of successful campaigns to help launch new routes and in-flight services. We can put together a digital campaign for you that includes: Targeted database sourcing Email design and broadcast Inspirational content creation Focused landing pages that convert Engaging, fan-gated social media content Lead generation Our exciting lead generation based campaigns offer a cost effective way to build a customer database when launching in new areas. We tap into email, banner advertising and lead generation websites to deliver qualified prospects on a cost per lead basis. This type of campaign has already proven effective for airlines such as KLM We would love to recreate this success for you. Get in touch for a free campaign strategy plan that will outline the options available to you. Get in touch Visit: http://content.dottourism.com/free-campaign-plan-for-airlines
How Airlines Can Use Email To Promote New Routes and Services Page 18 Thank You Thank you for reading this e-book. We hope you found it useful. We have plenty of other great resources and a growing library of e-books written especially for travel marketing professionals. Keep in touch Please connect with us on Social Media Download Resources Visit: http:///marketing-resources/ Read Our Blog Visit: http:///blog/ Next Steps: Request your free campaign plan Visit: http://content.dottourism.com/free-campaign-plan-for-airlines