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Research Survey: Airline Social Media Outlook 2013-2014 Survey

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airline social media survey 2014

How Airlines Dedicate Resources to Social Media

How do airlines manage their budget for social media?

How much manpower do they allocate for social media?

How do airlines make sense of social media and map it back to their business goals?

These are just a few of the questions that we seek to find answers to. Committed to providing greater insights into airline social media marketing, SimpliFlying conducts an in-depth survey annually with airline executives around the world to find out how airline business goals are being driven on social media, the commitment of resources to manning social media efforts, and the evolving role social media is expected to play for airlines over the next year. Here is an example of the resultant report and infographic, as well as videographic, from last year.

Join our survey for Airline Social Media Outlook 2013-2014!

This month, we are once again embarking on our annual research initiative and would like to invite airline executives to participate in this survey. In return, survey participants will receive a complimentary copy of the premium report before it becomes publicly available. The Airline Social Media Outlook 2013- 2014 Report will feature in-depth analysis of exclusive insights from the survey. In addition, our subject-matter experts provide recommendations, based on latest trends around the key aspects of resource allocation, on how airlines on social media can take their game to the next level.

If you are a Manager or Head of Marketing, Corporate Communications, or Social Media at an Airline, do join us in this survey!

join now

 

Videographic: Airline Social Media Outlook 2012-2013

In the mean time, here’s a recap of last year’s valuable findings in our videographic from last year’s Airline Social Media Outlook. Enjoy!

Click here to view the embedded video.

 

The post Research Survey: Airline Social Media Outlook 2013-2014 Survey appeared first on Simpliflying and was written by SimpliFlying.

Author information

SimpliFlying
SimpliFlying
At SimpliFlying, in everything we do, we believe in thinking differently about aviation marketing. Having worked with over 30 airlines and airports across 5 continents, we understand the intersection of aviation and marketing better than anyone else. We have the most experience. The most clients. The most success.

SimpliFlying.com is one of the Top 2 blogs on aviation, and the Twitter handle (@simpliflying) is one of the Top 5 most influential on airlines, with over 12,000 followers. If you're keen to tap our expertise, email us at helpmesoar@simpliflying.com

“So what exactly do you do again?” Marco Serusi looks back at 2 years with SimpliFlying

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- Hi, I’m Marco Serusi, how are you?

-I’m good, nice to meet you

- [...]

- So you’re Italian but do you work here?

- Well, that’s a hard question, I live in Valencia, I work for a company based in Singapore and I spend my time either travelling the world speaking at conferences and giving MasterClasses or sitting at home and working from my computer with colleagues and clients based in different countries.

Prolonged blank stare follows.

Blank stares

At SimpliFlying we are all quite used to it, but it’s still an awkward situation. We work for an amazing company with clients like Facebook, Google, London Heathrow and LAN airlines but whenever we try to explain what we do to people outside this industry we just get blank stares of disbelief.

It’s understandable. After all, we are industry leaders in aviation marketing and very well-known inside the travel industry. But when we tell people that we can live wherever we want, we work from home and travel all over the world they usually get quite confused — and a bit jealous.

marco-serusi-simpliflying

If I then add that I found my job on Twitter, I get even more stares usually followed by a: “so, what exactly do you do again?”

So far what I wrote last year still holds true “[...] people’s understanding of my mysterious job  ranges from my lovely grandmother’s belief that I work “for the internet” to some close friends who understand that I work for some sort of consulting company that has (somehow) something to do with marketing and planes, and I work from home…or wherever I like.”

Behind the scenes

Following SimpliFlying’s tradition I am writing this article on my 2nd SimpliBirthday, or in other words on the 2nd anniversary of joining the company.  During these two years a lot has happened and I gradually went from helping out with some research work to becoming one of the main consultants in the company and speaking regularly at conferences.

However, despite my relative “seniority”  in the company I sometimes still  struggle to get to grips with just how cool our company culture can be.  When someone new joins the team I usually send them this:

2

It’s a company where meetings take place on Skype; Whatsapp is the main communication highway; and most of the work is sent via e-mail or Dropbox. Please don’t get me wrong — it’s actually hard work, but Skype also doubles as our “virtual water-cooler” and sending  memes to each other is actually considered normal.

Once a year we meet in a randomly selected place in a randomly selected country and we spend some time together in something we call the “SimpliRetreat“. We all live in different countries and this is usually a time of both really intense work but also a very happy and unusual moment when we are finally all in the same place.

The Team

simpliflying-team

The more I look at our team the harder it is for me to believe that such an amazing group of people could somehow end up working with the same company. I think most if not all the credit has to go to our CEO Shashank who not only founded the company but also created a great brand and culture that made it possible for this team to come together and be the way it is.

During the early days of the company he worked alone on this project and was later joined by Shubhodeep who’s currently our VP or Products and Operations — the person who helped me the most during the transition from my former “traditional” job to this “unusual” one.

Our head of PR Li-Guen (or “crazy Guen” as I like to call her) is by far the best colleague I have ever worked with. She’s a PR wizard and talented consultant who has also become a friend that helps me keep hold of my mental health during some of our craziest work periods.

I’ve also learned a lot from a relatively new addition to the team, David — our VP Airports — who has (perhaps unknowingly) taught me a lot about leadership and sales.

The newest addition to the team is Ravi — I’m yet to meet him in person but he seems to be extremely driven and hard working. Yet another perfect fit for the team!

 How I got here

marco-serusi-simpliflying

A lot of people ask me how I got here and I sometimes I just tell them I’ve been lucky, but that’s probably not entirely true. I’m here because I worked hard and made the most of it thanks to some great people I met along the way.

I’m thankful to all of them but especially to my first marketing teacher, Justin who made me discover marketing at a time where the only thing on my mind was becoming a pilot. And to my MBA marketing teacher Emilio who helped me understand there was a lot more to marketing than I had thought.

When I think that this job found me on Twitter I also owe a big thank you to Leandro, a friend from my MBA days who first taught me how to Tweet. Also to Javier, the then CEO of a small Spanish charter airline who became my first mentor when he hired me as an intern — he later gave me the opportunity to become Marketing Director of the company when I was just 23 years old.

If it had not been for all these people I would not be here, and if it had not been for my team-mates I would have probably accepted one of the job offers that I regularly receive.

Thanks guys.

P.S. So what is it that you do again?

I think the most understood answer to this never-ending question goes something like this: I am an aviation marketing consultant. I spend half my time researching latest innovations in airline marketing and the other half either travelling to speak at conferences and meet customers or on Skype helping airlines and airports think differently about aviation marketing and stay ahead of competition.

Hope that helps!

The post “So what exactly do you do again?” Marco Serusi looks back at 2 years with SimpliFlying appeared first on Simpliflying and was written by Marco Serusi.

Author information

Marco Serusi
Marco Serusi
Marketing Consultant at SimpliFlying
Marco is a Marketing Consultant at SimpliFlying and is based in Valencia, Spain. He is a subject matter expert and consultant on social media practice in aviation. He has contributed extensively to thought-leadership in this space as well as held training workshops for senior aviation executives on behalf of SimpliFlying. He advises clients globally on aviation marketing strategy. He’s Italian, but has lived in several countries since he was 18, earning an Air Transport degree in the UK, a pilot license in Florida and an MBA in Spain. He now lives in Valencia, Spain where he previously worked as a Marketing Director.

You can talk to him in Italian, English or Spanish. You can also tweet him at @simplimarco, e-mail him at marco@simpliflying.com.

Three Years With SimpliFlying: Constant Newness, The Joy of Unpredictability & The Happiness of Growing

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On the cold, fog-infested night of December 6, 2010, I took my first international flight (from India) to a destination other than Singapore. I was travelling to a “mystery” event — an event so shrouded in mystery that everyone on aviation forums knew what it entailed —  organised by Cathay Pacific in Hong Kong.

 

The Beginning

It was my first assignment for a fledgling company that had not yet confirmed its decision to hire me; yet, astonishingly, there I was, travelling to a new country, flying Business Class for the first time (my first brush with an airline lounge as well), put up at a plush hotel, and treated to a royal spread over the course of a spectacular event. My reports from the event, written while combating a cold-induced fever, would turn out to be the first of many articles on SimpliFlying (133 at last count). I was officially hired soon after, and Dec 1, 2010 was retroactively assigned as my joining date.

 

Back to the Future

About two weeks ago, at the cusp of December, I found myself back in Hong Kong. Almost exactly three years later, I was back to the place where I can claim, with some justification, I found my footing for the first time in my adult life. However, much had changed in these three years.

From a small company that had worked with fewer than 10 clients, SimpliFlying today boasts a client roster of over 40 well-known names in aviation. When I was in Hong Kong last, a number of people had heard of us as the new kids on the block, while some had difficulty placing the company. This time, I noted with some pride that the company was known to everyone I met as the biggest name in aviation marketing. Even hotel marketers had heard of us! Moreover, in 2010, I represented SimpliFlying as a Marketing Associate; this December I went as the Vice President, Products and Operations. And I went not to report on an event but to deliver a keynote at a well-known conference, where I also held two MasterClasses for senior travel marketing executives.

That’s not all. By the time the year comes to a close, I will have visited 15 countries across Asia, Europe and the Middle East, most of them for work. In 2010, Hong Kong was the 3rd country I had ever visited. Today, the number of air miles lined up for me over just the next few weeks would have caused my 2010-eyes to glaze over in disbelief.

 

Growing Up

When I wrote a piece on completing one year at SimpliFlying, I reflected on the fact that many people did not know what I really did, nor did they quite understand what SimpliFlying did. I tried explaining it then, but I have a much better answer today. An answer that our entire team — tripled in size since I joined it — subscribes to, and would unanimously tell anyone who asks.

SimpliFlying today is the leading aviation marketing consultancy in the world. We believe in thinking differently about aviation marketing; we understand the intersection of marketing and aviation better than anyone else. Clinching proof of this lies in the fact that we have the largest client roster, the most success, and hence the most experience in the niche that we work in — to help airlines and airports understand how today’s Connected Traveller behaves differently, and how they can tap into the “digisocial” revolution to recalibrate their marketing strategies, with an eye on this new landscape. We deliver consulting, training and speaking services globally.

 

Bragging Rights

Today we work with some of the biggest names in aviation including Airbus, Boeing, Turkish Airlines, LAN Airlines etc. It makes me proud to have been a constant part of the company’s dual quest for success and excellence in these three years.

It will be apt here to reflect on a few personal successes as well. Working here has been unique in how the company has allowed me access to greater responsibility at every step of the journey, and reposed faith in my abilities, enabling me to gain precious experience that I could scarcely have gained elsewhere. Here’s a quick Top 7 list of the “big” things I’ve been majorly involved with in the last couple of years:

  • The website, on which you’re reading this article, was majorly revamped last year. I led the project on my own and delivered it within time, in about 5 weeks.

  • We launched two major State of the Industry Reports in 2013 — one each for airlines and airports. I wrote major portions of them, apart from helping with their delivery, design and marketing.

  • We partnered with Facebook to produce a whitepaper on loyalty for airlines. We also have an ongoing partnership with social media benchmarking company Unmetric, under which we publish regular analyses, which I manage.

  • The recently launched Airport Marketing Benchmark Report owes quite a bit of its provenance to my efforts.

  • I delivered keynotes at a number of conferences in 2013 on behalf of SimpliFlying. In preparation, I took a short course in public speaking at the Dale Carnegie Institute.

  • I also began delivering training workshops — or, as well call them, MasterClasses — for senior aviation executives.

  • I finally contributed directly to sales and learnt the art of closing deals!

 

 

Nothing has changed since I first started working at SimpliFlying — my work constantly excites and nourishes me still; I’m involved in creative decisions at the company; I get along even better with my boss now; and I still wouldn’t give up the joy of having flexible work hours, and the choice of working from anywhere in the world. But when I look back at these three years I also find myself inhabiting a strange new land — wonderful and filled with exciting unknowns. I am in a position of much greater responsibility, and feel compelled much more to ensure the success of the company; I am often the official face of the company; I work with a much larger team (more on the team below) and have people report to me; I am expected to help bring in revenues; most importantly, the products we will be building over the next year will have a much larger impact on the company and its fortunes than I could have once imagined.

 

The Greatest Team Ever

Thrilling as my job might sound, none of this could hardly have come to fruition without my having the most talented and exciting people as team-mates. In Shashank, our CEO, I have found not just an enthusiastic guide and an inspirational speaker/storyteller, but also a person I can confide in; in Marco, who completed 2 years in the company recently, I’ve found geekiness (in the best way possible), a smart sense of humour and an exceedingly keen mind when it comes to everything social media; Guen, who is about to complete 2 years soon, was one of the first full-time interns for the company and is its PR ninja — exceptionally hardworking and ever reliable; David, who joined the company this year has brought tremendous energy to the team along with a go-getter attitude that each of us aspires to; Ravi, our latest hire, has been my best friend for over a decade, is one of the most enterprising people I know and is working on an exciting project that will be revealed later in 2014.

In my one-year anniversary piece, I ended with these lines: “Life is bliss! Quite obviously, I’m not looking for a job!”. This is true today as well — I’d look mighty silly searching for a job when I find myself doing new things almost every day at SimpliFlying. Let me leave you with a photograph that might evoke just a faint bit of jealously — here’s where I stayed last month when I was invited to speak at a private Airbus event in Sri Lanka:

shubhodeep pal simpliflying sri lanka

 

Something tells me you might fancy applying for a job here.

 

 

The post Three Years With SimpliFlying: Constant Newness, The Joy of Unpredictability & The Happiness of Growing appeared first on Simpliflying and was written by Shubhodeep Pal.

Author information

Shubhodeep Pal
Shubhodeep Pal
Vice President, Products & Operations at SimpliFlying
Shubhodeep Pal is the Vice President, Products and Operations at SimpliFlying. He has been leading Research, Product Development, Marketing and Business Development since December 2010 from the headquarters in Singapore. He has spoken at airline conferences and delivered training workshops for senior aviation executives. He has also appeared on television interviews and been quoted in publications such as the Wall Street Journal. His writings have appeared extensively on SimpliFlying and respected industry outlets such as Airlinetrends, Tnooz, Airport World, Low Cost and Regional Airline Business Magazine and Loyalty360. In a previous role, he also conducted a workshop on social media at the Ministry of Home Affairs, Singapore. He speaks three languages fluently, and is also a published poet and amateur film critic. He can be reached at shubhodeep@simpliflying.com.

“How Social Changed My World in 2013″: David McMullen on completing a year with SimpliFlying

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One of the traditions at SimpliFlying is to celebrate the anniversary of joining the business with a personal account of the journey. So following my one year milestone, here are a few words about me, my colleagues and why I do what I do.

You’ve probably heard us talking a lot about how we think social is changing the world of aviation marketing. Well, my world changed completely in 2013.

For those of you who know me, it will be no surprise to hear that I fell in love with my career many years ago when I moved into the aviation marketing realm. Working at the heart of the world route development community allowed me to build friendships and working relationships with the most talented airline & airport professionals, whilst being surrounded by gifted colleagues who supported my enthusiasm — while I absorbed their knowledge and passion.

In December 2012, I even surprised myself when I resigned from my role in route development, to join SimpliFlying and follow my passion into the world of airport customer engagement and social media marketing.

Why I do what I do

I share the same beliefs as my colleagues. We care deeply about aviation marketing.  Some airports tend to know what works and what doesn’t. They have the budget, resources and brand name behind them and are at the forefront of aviation social media strategy — we work with many of these organisations.

But many airports find social media overwhelming and confusing. They dabble half-heartedly in it and thus find it ineffective. Explaining the fundamental social media principles effective brands are successfully using and modelling and adapting them for new airport clients is the reason I get out of bed each day. This is what gives me and my colleagues tremendous satisfaction. Breaking down the principles that are already working so well and simply and easily applying them to other airports, which have little to no budget, makes me feel like we’re making a real difference.

A SimpliAmazing business

If you’re a regular visitor, I don’t need to tell you how great this business is, or even how recognised the word ‘SimpliFlying’ is within the industry.  It is a company built from the ground up by a team incredibly committed to this space.

From observing the launch of SimpliFlying back in 2008, to introducing its CEO and founder, Shashank Nigam to the global route development community in 2010, I was a regular champion of this remarkable team that was quite literally changing the very nature of aviation marketing and ‘thinking differently’ about how airlines and airports communicate with customers.

So why did I leave a role that I loved so much?

It’s simple. I had the chance to join SimpliFlying.

Think of it this way. Imagine being part of a team that is setting the new standards within the industry — a team that has already devised award winning strategies for many of its over 40 airline & airport clients. Imagine taking a key role in a business that is globally recognised as the industry leader by both IATA & ACI.  If you’re a football fan like I am, it’s like being asked to play for Real Madrid or Barcelona (or Liverpool)! Who could refuse?

I’ve already mentioned the word ‘team’, but it’s far greater than that. I work amongst a group of talented and hardworking individuals who every day strive to raise the bar in aviation marketing. The team are fully aligned in their beliefs about aviation, marketing and much more. They continue to break down the barriers to innovation. It’s the type of person that works for SimpliFlying that makes the work so special. The work of SimpliFlying is warmly and immediately human. It deals with human needs, wants, dreams and hopes. Its ‘product’ cannot be turned out on an assembly line.  It’s a group of people who everyday say ‘hey, look there’s the moon up there; let’s take a walk on it’.

Stronger in the face of adversity

In July 2013, after just 5 months in the role and after several months training for my first triathlon, I was involved in a terrible accident and spent many weeks in hospital recovering from surgery after a fall that I might not have survived.  During the immediate days in hospital and the following weeks and months of extensive treatment and physiotherapy, my colleagues – Shashank, Shubhodeep, Guen, Marco & Ravi – were ‘virtually’ by my side to support me, every single day.  I was part of something far greater than a team. I am extremely proud to be a member of the SimpliFlying family!

So here I am one year on, leading the SimpliFlying Airport business. Driving new airport consultancy and training partnerships whilst travelling the globe one flight at a time to speak at the biggest and best aviation conferences in the world.  Could life get any better?

Well, it did. On the 31st December 2013, my year ended in a SimpliPerfect way.

david-mcmullen-wedding

 

The post “How Social Changed My World in 2013″: David McMullen on completing a year with SimpliFlying appeared first on Simpliflying and was written by David McMullen.

Author information

David McMullen
David McMullen
VP, Airports at SimpliFlying
David McMullen leads global airport engagement projects for SimpliFlying as VP, Airports. Following 5 successful years leading the award winning Routesonline platform, working with airports of all sizes in route development strategy and marketing communications, he joined SimpliFlying at the beginning of 2013. Assisting hundreds of airports to develop their online presence, David's career has taken him all over the world and he has been lucky enough to meet some of the most amazing people and work in some of the most inspiring places. He has a real enthusiasm for social networking/social media, plus all things digital. His passion for sport, travel and learning about new cultures has enabled him to practice snowboarding throughout Europe and qualify as an advanced scuba diver on the Great Barrier Reef. You can connect with David on Twitter, @SimpliMcMullen, or on LinkedIn.

[Event] Leading Travel Brands Discuss Social Strategy in New York. Have you booked your place? #SimpliSkift

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Social Media Best Practices From Travel’s Most Socially Effective Brands

New York City | March 25, 2014

115 West 30th Street, #1213, New York NY 11109

simpliflying skift masterclass

 

 

Early Bird Price | Expired

Regular Price | USD 495 per person

purchase button simpliflying skift masterclass

Major travel brands are already registered

simpliflying-skift-masterclass-nyc-attendees

Leading the travel industry into a new era of customer engagement

The new realities of social media mean that it is no longer enough to just have a large number of fans or followers, or just keep running contests. The ability to drive specific business goals, and measure the results when using social media for a travel brand is invaluable. In this MasterClass, you will learn from over 30 case studies from airlines, airports and other travel brands around the world driving revenues from social media.

Over 1000 travel industry executives have attended the Simpliflying MasterClass till date. It will be possibly the best investment of three hours you’d make all year. So, what are you waiting for? Register your interest or watch the MasterClass in action and hear what past attendees are saying about it!

 Key Features of the MasterClass

The MasterClass uniquely merges theory with practice. The curriculum comprises over 30 real-world case-studies. They will force participants to think on their feet, and derive solutions to real-world challenges encountered with today’s Connected Travellers.

Learn how to use SkiftIQ, the competitive intelligence service, which covers the social media activity of over two thousand airlines, airports and travel brands, by the types of interactions they have with users and the conversations in which they participate.

Not only does the MasterClass cover all grounds through interactive group exercises and simulations, you can choose to get expert advice on developing your ancillary revenue strategy as well as get a social media assessment.

To learn more, click below or email david@simpliflying.com.

sign me up button

 

The post [Event] Leading Travel Brands Discuss Social Strategy in New York. Have you booked your place? #SimpliSkift appeared first on Simpliflying and was written by SimpliFlying.

Author information

SimpliFlying
SimpliFlying
At SimpliFlying, in everything we do, we believe in thinking differently about aviation marketing. Having worked with over 30 airlines and airports across 5 continents, we understand the intersection of aviation and marketing better than anyone else. We have the most experience. The most clients. The most success.

SimpliFlying.com is one of the Top 2 blogs on aviation, and the Twitter handle (@simpliflying) is one of the Top 5 most influential on airlines, with over 12,000 followers. If you're keen to tap our expertise, email us at helpmesoar@simpliflying.com

5th Annual SimpliFlying Awards 2014 for Excellence in Social Media

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5th Annual SimpliFlying Awards

SimpliFlying researches over 600 airlines and airports every 60 days; and the transformation that airline marketing has undergone in recent years is amazing.

The SimpliFlying Awards for Excellence in Social Media honour airlines and airports that push the frontier of innovative marketing in this age of connected traveller.

Now in its fifth year, SimpliFlying Awards 2014 includes 6 categories that will judged on two levels: public voting (30% of total score) and a cross-section of established aviation and travel experts (70% of total score).

Key Dates

  • Shortlisted nominees will be announced on June 15, 2014.
  • Shortlisted entries will be put up for public viewing and voting on July 18, 2014.
  • Top 3 per category will be announced in mid August. The awards will be given out on at a ceremony on September 12, 2014 in New York City.

Last year’s winners include KLM, Amsterdam Schiphol Airport and Qatar Airways. A complete list of 2013’s finalists can be seen here and the winners listed here.

 

Hosted by:

 

 

 

 

 

 


Special Category

Most Creative Campaign by Airline

We invite you the public to nominate the most memorable and innovative campaign that you have seen from an airline since 2013. The shortlisted airlines will be invited to submit a brief entry about their campaign, that will be judged on:

1) Novelty Factor 2) Online engagement results 3) Any other additional results or metrics the airlines wish to highlight

*Note: Nominations has closed.

nominate button


2014 Award Categories

(The shortlisted finalists and their presentation pitches submitted for the respective categories will be announced shortly.)

 

Best Airline on Social Media

Need to demonstrate that how social media and other digital technologies are consistently integrated into overall marketing and business strategy for the airline, especially in the past two years.

Shortlisted Finalists are: Southwest Airlines, Turkish Airlines, Azul Brazilian Airlines, KLM, Lufthansa

Best airline finalists sfawards14

 

Best Emerging Airline on Social Media

Applies to airlines that just joined social media in the past two years or have showed dramatic increase in social media activity in the past two years. Need to demonstrate how social media and/ or other digital technologies are used to drive marketing goals for the airline.

Shortlisted Finalists are: IndiGo, Emirates, flynas, Etihad Airways

 

Best Customer Service using Social Media

Need to demonstrate the ability to respond to and engage with customers on social media to create value and meaning relationships with them

Shortlisted Finalists are: AirAsia, Virgin America, Southwest Airlines, KLM

 

Best in Driving Revenue using Social Media

Need to demonstrate the  ability to drive sales through innovative and targeted campaigns on social media

Shortlisted Finalists are: WestJet, KLM, Volaris, AirAsia, flynas

 

Best Use of Emerging Platform by Airline

Need to demonstrate how a particular platform (any platform excluding Facebook, Twitter and YouTube) is used to drive marketing goals for the airline

Shortlisted Finalists are: Air New Zealand, Turkish Airlines, Aer Lingus, Qatar Airways


2014 Judges

Henry HarteveldtHenry Harteveldt, Atmosphere Research Group

Henry has been a travel industry analyst for more than 14 years, focusing extensively on the airline, lodging/hospitality and cruise sectors. He has published more than 125 reports on a variety of topics, including traveler behavior, loyalty marketing, eCommerce, mobile, product merchandising/ retailing, and distribution. Prior to starting Atmosphere Research, Henry spent nearly 12 years leading the global travel industry research and consulting practice at Forrester Research, Inc.  

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Mary Kirby, Runway Girl Network

Mary Kirby has covered the aviation industry for 16 years. She joined Flightglobal in 1999, and by 2007 was senior editor at its weekly title, Flight International, where she was also proprietor of the highly regarded Runway Girl blog. In 2011, Mary was appointed editor-in-chief of the Airline Passenger Experience Association’s magazine, where she brought prominence to its media, and successfully grew its reach. In 2013, she launched Runway Girl Network, which covers the airline passenger experience, and highlights the accomplishments of women in aviation.

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David Mogensen, YouTube, Google

David brings 13 years of marketing experience to Google, where he leads a team focused on modern brand building.  In this role, he is responsible for defining how Google and YouTube are positioned to Fortune 500 brands as well as Google’s brand thought leadership efforts and partnership with TED on its Ads Worth Spreading initiative.  

Christian Kamhaug

Christian Kamhaug, Hill+Knowlton Strategies

Christian spent 13 years in the airline business before leaving his “first love” and moving to the PR-industry. He now heads the Travel & Turism Practise at Norway’s largest PR-firm Gambit Hill+Knowlton Strategies. His last position in the airline-business was Head of Social Media at Scandinavian Airlines (SAS), where he was instrumental in bringing SAS into the social scene. In 2010 he accepted the Simpliflying Social Media Awards for best use of social media in a crisis, for the ground-breaking way social media was used during the “ashcloud” crisis of April 2010.  

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Hillary Gurber, Google

Hillary Gurber is a passionate sales executive with over ten years of experience in digital advertising.  In Google’s Travel Vertical, Hillary partners with leading airline and hotel customers to deliver best-in-class solutions across display, mobile, video and social platforms.  Prior to joining Google, Hillary held sales roles at Demand Media and Yahoo!; at both companies she was recognized with noteworthy awards for revenue growth and sales leadership.

Brian Carr

Brian Carr, Twitter

Brian works on the travel/tourism vertical at Twitter’s headquarters in San Francisco, CA. Over the past few years, Brian has helped evangelize the Twitter platform and drive marketing solutions to a wide breadth of marketers throughout the US and abroad.  This includes strategy and product adoption from an organic and paid basis.  His work includes partnerships with major airlines, hotel chains, online travel agents, cruise, rental car agencies and domestic and international visitor bureaus/destination marketing organizations.  

 

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About SimpliFlying Awards for Excellence in Social Media

The SimpliFlying Awards for Excellence in Social Media, established in 2010, are the only annual awards dedicated to recognising the best social media campaigns and practices in the aviation industry. Committed to raising the standard of airlines and airports on social media, the SimpliFlying Awards promote the exchange of knowledge in the sphere of social media by recognising the best airlines, airports and travel providers on social media and inviting award winners to present and share their successes with the rest of the world. Each year, SimpliFlying Awards picks the best through a rigorous process of public voting and expert evaluation by a distinguished panel. Past award winners include KLM, Lufthansa, Malaysia Airlines and Helsinki Airport.

 

The post 5th Annual SimpliFlying Awards 2014 for Excellence in Social Media appeared first on Simpliflying and was written by SimpliFlying.

Author information

SimpliFlying
SimpliFlying
At SimpliFlying, in everything we do, we believe in thinking differently about aviation marketing. Having worked with over 30 airlines and airports across 5 continents, we understand the intersection of aviation and marketing better than anyone else. We have the most experience. The most clients. The most success.

SimpliFlying.com is one of the Top 2 blogs on aviation, and the Twitter handle (@simpliflying) is one of the Top 5 most influential on airlines, with over 12,000 followers. If you're keen to tap our expertise, email us at helpmesoar@simpliflying.com

View and Vote Now For Your Best Airline in SimpliFlying Awards 2014! #SFAwards14

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simpliflying awards 2014 airlines

**Please note that the voting polls have closed. Click here for the final results.

Back for the 5th time, SimpliFlying Awards are bigger and better than ever. And this time in New York, Sep 12!

For SimpliFlying Awards 2014, not only has the awards categories been revamped with 6 categories dedicated to airlines, we also saw entries from more airlines around the world as compared in past years – from United States, Europe, Asia, Middle East and Australasia. (Note: SimpliFlying Awards for airports is coming up separately later this year. Details to follow soon.)

The airline finalists for SimpliFlying Awards 2014 have submitted their presentation pitches for their respective categories to be scored by our esteemed judges. At the same time, they have also put together 2 slides to quickly demonstrate to the public they think they should win.

And the race begins NOW til Aug, 8!

Our airline finalists across six categories have put together two slides each to demonstrate quickly why they deserve your vote.

Public votes accounts for 30% of the total scores for each participating airline, so do vote wisely after you have looked at their submissions! Voting closes Aug 8, 2014 at 2359 (Eastern Standard Time).

 



Best Airline on Social Media



 

Best Emerging Airline on Social Media

 

 



Best in Customer Service using Social Media

 



 

Best in Driving Revenue using Social Media

 



 

Best Use of Emerging Platform by Airline

 



Most Creative Campaign by Airline

 

Hosted by:

The post View and Vote Now For Your Best Airline in SimpliFlying Awards 2014! #SFAwards14 appeared first on Simpliflying and was written by SimpliFlying.

Author information

SimpliFlying
SimpliFlying
At SimpliFlying, in everything we do, we believe in thinking differently about aviation marketing. Having worked with over 30 airlines and airports across 5 continents, we understand the intersection of aviation and marketing better than anyone else. We have the most experience. The most clients. The most success.

SimpliFlying.com is one of the Top 2 blogs on aviation, and the Twitter handle (@simpliflying) is one of the Top 5 most influential on airlines, with over 12,000 followers. If you're keen to tap our expertise, email us at helpmesoar@simpliflying.com

Announcing the Best Airlines in Social Media at SimpliFlying Awards 2014 – Top 3 Finalists

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awards-trophies

Thank you for supporting the SimpliFlying Awards 2014 with all your votes! After receiving almost 40,000 votes from the public (making up 30% of total score) and judging by our highly-esteemed jury (making up 70% of total score), we are pleased to announce the Top 3 Finalists for our airline categories in this year’s SimpliFlying Awards 2014.

 

First up for the special category of ‘Most Creative Campaign by Airline’, where we are announcing the overall Winner. Congratulations to Turkish Airlines for a phenomenal job they have done with their Kobe vs Messi selfie-shootout campaign! Cebu Pacific from the Philippines (for their monsoon rain-activated ads) and Cathay Pacific Airways from Hong Kong have emerged as Highly Commended airlines for this category.

Special Category

Most Creative Campaign by Airline

Winner: Turkish Airlines

Highly Commended: Cebu Pacific

Highly Commended:  Cathay Pacific

most creative sfawards14


 

For the main awards categories, the Top 3 airlines from each category will be invited to present on Sep 12, 2014 at the 16th Annual TDS North America Summit in New York where the SimpliFlying Awards 2014 are being hosted. The overall winner for the respective categories will be announced at the official awards ceremony in the evening.

 

Top 3 Finalists in Main Awards Categories

(*in no particular order)


Best Airline on Social Media

Lufthansa, Turkish Airlines, KLM

top 3 best airline sfawards14


Best Emerging Airline on Social Media

Etihad Airways, flynas, Emirates

top 3 best emerging airline sfawards14


Best in Customer Service using Social Media

Virgin America, Southwest, KLM


Best in Driving Revenue using Social Media

KLM, WestJet, Volaris


Best Use of Emerging Platform by Airline

Turkish Airlines, Qatar Airways, Aer Lingus


Congratulations to all those who secured a position in the Top 3 and a huge round of applause to all the airlines that participated so enthusiastically in this year’s awards! The overall winner for each of the main categories of SimpliFlying Awards 2014 will be revealed on Sep 12, at the awards function. We look forward to seeing you then.

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About SimpliFlying Awards for Excellence in Social Media

The SimpliFlying Awards for Excellence in Social Media, established in 2010, are the only annual awards dedicated to recognising the best social media campaigns and practices in the aviation industry. Committed to raising the standard of airlines and airports on social media, the SimpliFlying Awards promote the exchange of knowledge in the sphere of social media by recognising the best airlines, airports and travel providers on social media and inviting award winners to present and share their successes with the rest of the world. Each year, SimpliFlying Awards picks the best through a rigorous process of public voting and expert evaluation by a distinguished panel. Past award winners include KLM, Lufthansa, Malaysia Airlines and Helsinki Airport. More about SimpliFlying Awards 2014 here

The post Announcing the Best Airlines in Social Media at SimpliFlying Awards 2014 – Top 3 Finalists appeared first on Simpliflying and was written by SimpliFlying.

Author information

SimpliFlying
SimpliFlying
At SimpliFlying, in everything we do, we believe in thinking differently about aviation marketing. Having worked with over 30 airlines and airports across 5 continents, we understand the intersection of aviation and marketing better than anyone else. We have the most experience. The most clients. The most success.

SimpliFlying.com is one of the Top 2 blogs on aviation, and the Twitter handle (@simpliflying) is one of the Top 5 most influential on airlines, with over 12,000 followers. If you're keen to tap our expertise, email us at helpmesoar@simpliflying.com

Airline Winners at 5th Annual SimpliFlying Awards 2014 #SFAwards14

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sfawards14 results cover

SimpliFlying Awards: The Authoritative Showcase of Best Social Media Practices of Leading Airlines on Social Media

This evening, the top finalists of 5th Annual SimpliFlying Awards shared the best of their social media milestones at the Travel Distribution Summit hosted by EyeforTravel in New York City. These winners and highly commended finalists had been shortlisted from each category, a culmination of:

Six stellar judges, renowned aviation, travel and digital marketing experts who assessed the awards entries

Over 39,830 public votes received in 3 weeks

Views and participation from over 170 cities around the world

Amidst the fanfare on Twitter, sterling presentations at the awards and a glittering awards ceremony, five deserving winners walked away with trophies that marked their triumph in their respective categories.

sfawards14 trophies 1

Photo credit: (c) Artstudio.com

 

Without further ado, here are the winners:

Best Airline on Social Media

  • Winner: KLM Royal Dutch Airlines
  • Highly Commended: Lufthansa, Turkish Airlines

View the finalist public presentations here

Best Emerging Airline on Social Media

  • Winner: Etihad Airways
  • Highly Commended: Emirates, flynas

View the finalist public presentations here

Best in Customer Service using Social Media

  • Winner: KLM Royal Dutch Airlines
  • Highly Commended: Southwest Airlines, Virgin America

View the finalist public presentations here

Best in Driving Revenue using Social Media

  • Winner: KLM Royal Dutch Airlines
  • Highly Commended: Volaris, WestJet

View the finalist public presentations here

Best Use of Emerging Platform by Airline

  • Winner: Qatar Airways
  • Highly Commended: Aer Lingus, Turkish Airlines

View the finalist public presentations here

Special Category: Most Creative Campaign by Airline

  • Winner: Turkish Airlines
  • Highly Commended: Cebu Pacific, Cathay Pacific

View the finalist public presentations here

 

Once again, a huge round of applause to the winners of 5th Annual SimpliFlying Awards for Excellence in Social Media.

“Airlines are pushing the boundaries of innovation with social media today. Travellers are evolving and it is encouraging to see airlines thinking differently about aviation marketing.”

– Shashank Nigam, CEO of SimpliFlying

We would like to thank and congratulate all the winners and finalists in this awards, especially those who had graced the awards event in New York City today to present and share their successes with the rest of the world.

They are highly commended for their excellent work on social media and aviation marketing and are all heroes in their own right. Just look at the amount of buzz and interaction on Twitter feed for the awards #SFAwards14 and conference #tdsusa!

Special thanks to our distinguished judges

“There was lingering doubt about whether social media strategies can deliver ROI and myriad other benefits to airlines and passengers, but they have been put to rest by this year’s outstanding submissions.”

- Mary Kirby, founder of Runway Girl Network, one of the judges for the awards.

Six thought leaders in the travel and marketing space have played a paramount role in our 5th Annual SimpliFlying Awards. We would like to extend our gratitude to our distinguished judges, namely Henry Harteveldt from Atmosphere Research Group; David Mogenson from Google, YouTube; Hillary Gurber from Google, Mary Kirby from Runway Girl Network, Christian Kamhaug from  Gambit Hill + Knowlton Strategiesl and Brian Carr from Twitter.

sfawards14 judges

 

Last but not least, thank you EyeforTravel

Special thanks go out to EyeforTravel, especially Gina Baille and Emily Assender, who has been so wonderful in coordinating the planning and logistics to help make this a successful awards yet again!

The journey for SimpliFlying Awards 2014 has been truly memorable for us all. We look forward to coming back with a bigger and grander event next year at the 6th Annual SimpliFlying Awards for Excellence in Social Media 2015. Stay tuned!

Photo credit: (c) Artstudio.com

The post Airline Winners at 5th Annual SimpliFlying Awards 2014 #SFAwards14 appeared first on Simpliflying and was written by SimpliFlying.

Author information

SimpliFlying
SimpliFlying
At SimpliFlying, in everything we do, we believe in thinking differently about aviation marketing. Having worked with over 30 airlines and airports across 5 continents, we understand the intersection of aviation and marketing better than anyone else. We have the most experience. The most clients. The most success.

SimpliFlying.com is one of the Top 2 blogs on aviation, and the Twitter handle (@simpliflying) is one of the Top 5 most influential on airlines, with over 12,000 followers. If you're keen to tap our expertise, email us at helpmesoar@simpliflying.com

What goes on behind the scenes of SimpliFlying Awards?

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sfawards selfie 3

Back when we launched the SimpliFlying Awards in 2010, they were the first and only awards dedicated to recognising the best social media practices in the airline industry. Committed to raising the standard of airlines on social media, SimpliFlying Awards promote the exchange of knowledge by honouring the best airlines on social media and inviting them to share their successes with the rest of the world.

It has been five years and we are extremely thankful for the love and support from our readers and airline friends. As the awards get bigger every year, we see growing interest and more questions such as:

“How can my airline join and what is required?”

“How do you judge the entries?”

“Is there any fee for joining the awards?”

To fulfill the curiosities of the many, here is a zoom-in on what goes on behind SimpliFlying Awards, including the processes involved.

Finalists Selection

finalists sfawards14

Every 60 days, we research over 600 airline and airport pages from around the world. Over the last two years, we have analysed over 400 campaigns. It is based on these research that we shortlisted the best five to eight airlines for each SimpliFlying Awards category. A lot of these campaigns get featured in our monthly airline marketing benchmark reports as well, which anyone can subscribe too.

These airlines are then invited to submit a presentation pitch for the awards. In case one of them can’t join due to certain timelines or constrains, we have backups for each airline too.

Scoring and Judges

How was the judging panel formed?

The best awards in the world feature the best judges, and we go the distance in putting together a stellar panel each year. This year, we felt our judging panel was one of the best till date. We invited successful veterans well-respected in the travel and aviation industry, and who are familiar with airline marketing and social media happenings around the world. These include Mary Kirby, Henry Harteveldt and Christian Kamhaug who all have at least 13 years of experience in the travel and airline industry.

At the same time, we also had our event partner EyeForTravel put forth recommendations from among their top speakers list. Thanks for them, we had David Mogensen from Google/YouTube, Hillary Gurber from Google and Brian Carr from Twitter join our judging panel.

sfawards14 judges

And the scoring system?

We make it a point to improve our awards processes and judging criteria every year based on feedback from our awards participants.

This year, we reduced the weightage of public voting from 50% to 30% to negate the bias that bigger airlines have bigger reach and staff base to vote for them. We also ensured that we disabled multiple votes from the same IP address to prevent fraud.

sfawards14 scoring

We increased the weightage of the judges’ scores from 50% to 70%, and made sure we had a wider representation on the judging panel, with industry veterans across different disciplines including travel, aviation and technology.

The Day of SimpliFlying Awards Itself

bts sfawards 1

Top secret in the boxes – 15 jade crystal plaques for our winning finalists. The SimpliFlying team was not spared of hard manual labour work. From left: Shashank Nigam, Marco Serusi and Li Guen (Sep 12, NYC).

luncheon awards

Bonding over luncheon at the #tdsusa event were our awards finalists and presentors including from Etihad Airways, Lufthansa, Malaysia Airlines, Southwest, KLM, flynas.

Even before their presentations, the awards finalists continued to share with one another about their industry experiences.

No one seemed too tense before their presentation as they continue to share with one another about their industry experiences.

KLM's presentation invited many eager questions from the audience.  Left: Shashank Nigam as he faciliated the Q&A session. Right: Karlijn Vogel, KLM Social Media Manager.

KLM’s presentation invited many eager questions from the audience. Left: Shashank Nigam as he faciliated the Q&A session. Right: Karlijn Vogel, KLM Social Media Manager.

sfawards collage ceremony

Star-studded awards ceremony with our esteemed judges. Second from top row onwards: Southwest, Turkish Airlines, KLM, Aer Lingus, flynas, Etihad Airways, Qatar Airways, Group picture.

A selfie attempt to squeeze 15 people into one screen

Last but not least, a selfie attempt to squeeze 15 people into one screen

Post- SimpliFlying Awards

Sharing the scores and comments from our judges

While we might have wrapped up SimpliFlying Awards 2014, the journey to social media excellence continues.

We are thankful for the effort that the airline participants have put in for SimpliFlying Awards, and we wanted each of them to take away more from this awards than anything else.

So we collated the judges scores and feedback  to share with all the airlines who submitted for the awards because we believe the journey to social media excellence is an ongoing collaborative process.

The results from the public votes are no secret (original post here).

sfawards share feedback

SimpliFlying Awards 2014 have been a wonderful journey for us and we couldn’t be happier to witness the exchange of knowledge and insights among the different airlines from around the world.

We look forward to coming back with a bigger and grander event next year at the 6th Annual SimpliFlying Awards for Excellence in Social Media 2015! In the mean time, all the best wishes to our airline friends. Keep soaring!

sfawards selfie 2

The post What goes on behind the scenes of SimpliFlying Awards? appeared first on Simpliflying and was written by SimpliFlying.

Author information

SimpliFlying
SimpliFlying
At SimpliFlying, in everything we do, we believe in thinking differently about aviation marketing. Having worked with over 30 airlines and airports across 5 continents, we understand the intersection of aviation and marketing better than anyone else. We have the most experience. The most clients. The most success.

SimpliFlying.com is one of the Top 2 blogs on aviation, and the Twitter handle (@simpliflying) is one of the Top 5 most influential on airlines, with over 12,000 followers. If you're keen to tap our expertise, email us at helpmesoar@simpliflying.com

SimpliFlying completes five years — how fantasy took flight

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simpliflying 5 years

On June 12, 2014, as I entered the Emirates Lounge at New York’s JFK Terminal 4, I saw a familiar scene — the lounge decked up in a conference setting, canapés being served to guests, who were mostly senior aviation and financial journalists. The destination on my boarding pass read, “Headquarters”. That’s because everyone was to go on a ride on the Emirates A380, to experience its comforts, after a slew of presentations by senior Airbus executives. I had been invited as a guest speaker by Airbus, to share my thoughts on the importance of passenger experience in the age of the connected traveller. It was an uncanny feeling.

Life comes full circle

Almost exactly six years earlier, on August 1, 2008, I was in the same lounge, witnessing Emirates’ first A380 flight. At that time, I was still working full-time in Boston at Endeca. SimpliFlying.com was a fledgling blog, and I had somehow managed to get a pass to the press event by Emirates. I had taken a Boltbus down from Boston just that morning, had a gyro for lunch at Penn Station, and taken the Metro to JFK. Once in the Emirates lounge, I was like a kid in a toy store — bedazzled by the sights and sounds of aviation. It was the first time ever that I was at an industry event.

During the press conference, I was the first one to ask a question of Tim Clark, the CEO of Emirates, after he finished his address. When I mentioned I’m with SimpliFlying, I received strange looks from most of the people in the lounge, as few had heard of the website. It was ironic that six years on, I was at the same location, with the same people. And this time, I was the one speaking from the stage. Life had come full circle.

Becoming an aviation entrepreneur

It wasn’t easy. To leave a stable job in Boston. To jump ship at the peak of a recession. To leave the US and head back to Singapore. To move back in with my parents to save on rent. To become an entrepreneur. And that too in aviation. But it’s been a tremendous journey, and it’s been totally worth it. From my first conference in Abu Dhabi in March 2009, till the latest one I spoke at, the IATA Commercial Strategy in San Diego last year. From our first client, Winair, to some of our long running supporters, like LATAM Airlines and Boeing. From starting out with myself and an intern, to a full-time team spread around the world.

Speaking at the Trinity Forum

Speaking at the Trinity Forum

SimpliFlying started its journey in early 2009 by re-imagining the way airline branding worked, when we introduced the 6X airline branding model. We focused on digital marketing and gradually the blog became one of the most respected resources for cutting-edge airline marketing strategies. SimpliFlying was #2 in the FlightGlobal Webbies in 2009 and I won the Global Brand Leadership Award that year as well.

Then came the tougher part — how to turn this into a business? There were multiple ways we could have gone — it wasn’t uncommon for blogs in 2008 to be selling t-shirts and stickers to make money. I also enjoyed writing, and at one point seriously considered becoming a professional aviation journalist — at the time inspired by Mary Kirby (who was with FlightGlobal), Jon Ostrower (the original FlightBlogger) and Brett Snyder (of the CrankyFlyer fame). Though, I really wanted to get my hands dirty, and work with real airlines, rather than just talk about them. And that’s what pushed me towards setting up a consulting practice.

The start was not easy — building credibility in an industry I had no background in, required a lot of effort, a bit of luck and a large number of well wishers. I started attending aviation conferences to be a sponge and to learn from those in the industry. Soon, I was invited to moderate panels as an industry observer, and within months, I had delivered my first presentation at a conference in Abu Dhabi, had appeared on CNBC and quoted in the press.

I kept doing more conferences, and it wasn’t long before SimpliFlying bagged its first consulting client — which was St. Maarten’s Winair. Their CEO, Edwin Hodge, was impressed by my presentation at a conference in Miami and invited me to set up Winair’s social media strategy back in July 2009. Being a total aviation geek, I was just delighted to be going to St. Maarten. It was to be the first of many trips. We did good work, and Intercontinental Hotels Group became our second client. It’s the only hotel chain we’ve worked with, and the work with them in 2010 gave us the impetus to set up a proper consulting arm.

The twists and turns

If you compare airline marketing and communications back in 2009 and now, there has been a drastic transformation. Back when we started crafting a marketing vision for airlines, powered by social media and digital avenues, there were only a handful airlines like Southwest, jetBlue and Alaska engaging with customers online. Today, there are over 250 airlines on social media, making the industry one of the most active on the channel.

The team at work

The team at work

Pushing for a highly conservative industry to embrace change has been no walk in the park. There were several pivotal moves made through the course of our business, risks we had to take to effect change in the industry.

We were advised not to start a training practice, as those who received training would never come back for consulting. Interestingly, some of our largest clients like LATAM Airlines started by attending our MasterClass. We were told to be cautious of smaller airlines, because they may not pay. Yes, we had to pursue some of them, but some of our most innovative work has been with smaller airlines like Estonian Air and airBaltic. We were told never to charge for speaking at conferences, but now, we are frequently sought around the world to share our insights at the most prestigious aviation events.

Today, we have worked with over 50 airlines and airports, spoken at over 60 events, developed models that continue to push the airline marketing frontier and regularly produce reports aimed at helping airlines understand and embrace the connected traveller.

It wouldn’t have been possible without the people…

We were fortunate to have been mentored from day one, by the likes of Donald Schenk, Patrick Murphy, Robin Speculand and many more. Beth Mastre taught me the basics of sales. Chris Brogan gave a vision of how social media could transform airlines. Industry leaders like Azran Osman-Rani, the former CEO of AirAsiaX, Mike Tod of Air New Zealand, Abdulrahman Al-Fahd of Saudia, Jeff Cacy and his team at Boeing continue to be an inspiration till date. Our clients and well-wishers have believed in us, and backed us for a long long time. Since the beginning, Nicola Lange of Lufthansa and Tero Taskila, the former CEO of Estonian Air have been great motivators too.

We have been blessed with awesome partners too. We have now published over 500 airline marketing case studies in our monthly benchmarking reports, in partnership with Raymond Kollau of Airlinetrends.com  Over at IATA, Marc Heinicke and Hicham Seifiddine have been great supporters. Max Kingsley-Jones and the team at FlightGlobal have welcomed our opinion pieces with open arms. Finally, Gina Baillie, Emily Assender and the team at Eyefortravel have been wholeheartedly supporting our Awards for four continuous years now!

Since 2009, we have fostered a lot of friendships in the industry, across the world, who have been great supporters. From David Parker Brown of AirlineReporter in Seattle, to Devesh Agarwal in Bangalore and Grant McHerron in Melbourne. Pawan Borle from flyDubai and Sumit Roy have been ardent supporters of the blog and the business. The industry folks have been welcoming of new ideas, and at the same time encouraged us to continue to push the boundaries.

#SimpliRetreat

#SimpliRetreat

Last but not least, a heartfelt thank you to my wonderful colleagues at SimpliFlying, past and present. We wouldn’t have been half of what we are today without the super talented, hardworking and dedicated team we have had at SimpliFlying. We have created our own unique culture, meeting a few times a year during our SimpliRetreats and during client projects. We have our own SimpliWaterCooler — which is Skype and Whatsapp, and other traditions like #SimpliSurprises.

Planning the next five!

Planning the next five!

To celebrate SimpliFlying going strong at six, below is a video looking back on our journey. Also, do leave us a birthday message on our ’5th anniversary’ dedicated microsite here: bit.ly/simplifive

We are excited about continuing to think differently about airline marketing, for the next five years and beyond!

The post SimpliFlying completes five years — how fantasy took flight appeared first on SimpliFlying - The Leading Airline Marketing Consultancy.

Author information

Shashank Nigam
Shashank Nigam
Shashank Nigam is the CEO of SimpliFlying and a globally sought-after consultant, speaker and thought-leader on airline branding and customer engagement strategy. He is also the youngest winner of the Global Brand Leadership Award and has addressed senior aviation executives globally, from Chile to Canada and from Sydney to San Francisco. Shashank's perspectives have found their way into major media outlets, including CNN Travel, CNBC, MSNBC, Bloomberg UTV, Mashable and in leading publications like Airline Business, ATW, Aviation Week, and others. Shashank studied Information Systems Management and Business Management at Singapore Management University and Carnegie Mellon University. Hailing from India, he splits his time between Singapore and Vancouver, among other cities.

The Future of the Connected Passenger Experience — Highlights from #AIX2015, Hamburg

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Hamburg Messe Entrance

Aircraft Interiors Expo (or AIX as it is popularly known) is one of the world’s biggest exhibitions on aircraft interiors, held at Hamburg Messe, Germany. This year’s event was held for three days between the 14 and 16 of April, featuring industry innovations for cabin interior design, seating, in-flight entertainment products, connectivity systems, galley equipment and lighting among other things.

Given our focus on engaging and marketing to the Connected Traveller, here’s a roundup of the best Connected Passenger Experience innovations to look out for.

 

In-Flight Entertainment (IFE)

Given that passengers today are always connected on the go and carrying multiple devices (view presentation), there are major implications on the IFE industry. Hence, the IFE segment by its own carries a lot of expectations of significant improvements, almost equaling home theatre effects in some cases. The key advancements for us included a streaming IFE system making its debut and a low-cost IFE system which has made many LCCs & Hybrids take notice.

1)   IntelliCabin IFE – BAE Systems’ wireless IFE solution will make its debut on the Indian full service carrier, Vistara (we were one of the first to reveal Vistara’s IFE plans), on its A320 fleet. Although the system supports live TV & In-flight Wi-Fi, the initial rollout will only have wireless streaming of content on passengers PEDs in economy and Samsung tablets handed out to Business class passengers. The IFE system is one among the suite of IntelliCabin products, through which BAE Systems aims to provide cabin management through in-seat power, LED lighting & crew interface. This is the ideal companion for the connected traveller of the future.

Click here to view the embedded video.

 

2)   Lumexis iPAX – Embedded IFE and ultra-low-cost (ULCC) are words that seldom go together. But when you enable the system for sale of food, duty-free items, premium entertainment and even in-seat power on board, ULCCs take notice. Combine that with paid advertising and a credit card reader, and Lumexis hopes this lightweight, easy-to-install package will make ultra low cost airlines salivate. The fact that 45% of single-aisle aircraft get off production lines without an IFE option, and that the iPAX starts at $1495(+) per seat, we may see a lot of these 6-inch plastic OLED screens soon.

Click here to view the embedded video.

SimpliFlying Take: In a landscape where passengers are addicted to their smart devices for constant information and entertainment, airlines are running out of reasons to not provide IFE in innovative ways, such as through streaming in-flight entertainment systems. New technologies will press airlines — even LCCs — to seriously consider that not having an on-board entertainment system is not an option. It’s their best chance of staying connected with their passengers throughout the journey.

Connectivity and Passenger Systems

Another segment which saw much activity at AIX 2015. Big names like Honeywell, Inmarsat and GEE unveiled their KU band antennas, but what caught our attention were a payment and an advanced aircraft tracking technology.

1)   Contactless Retail Systems and NFC – IFPL’s system has an e-ink screen for their payment portal, which makes the proposition especially appealing for airlines without IFE or connectivity. Products can be viewed and entered into the device, followed by payment through NFC. Considering the arrival of “Transaction liability shift” in US from October, this can be a worthy low-cost solution for airlines.

Click here to view the embedded video.

 

2)   SITA OnAir AIRCOM Flight Tracker – This is an aircraft tracking solution leveraging three systems already on the aircraft: a) ACARS, b) ADS-B and c) ATC data.

The system only warrants a software upgrade to an airline server, and does not involve any hardware upgrades to the aircraft, making it an economical service, which can be adopted within a short period. Malaysia Airlines will be the first to implement global flight tracking, with the service beginning on its entire fleet this summer.

SITA OnAir Flight Tracking

SITA OnAir Flight Tracking

 

SimpliFlying Take: Innovative payment systems will be key in the years to come — especially with the launch of Apple Pay and Apple Watch — if airlines wish to continue reaping dividends from the sale of ancillaries. For the Connected Passenger, convenience is key.

Moreover, flight-tracking systems will be crucial at three fronts — first, for airlines who wish to manage their operations better and handle crises; for passengers too, the addition of such technology will be a welcome addition as a “soft” security measure after the year gone past; finally, for handling crises on social media, real-time data will be crucial to project accurate information speedily, subduing unnecessary rumours and mis-information.

 

Special Mention: Although Boeing’s Space Bins took most of the limelight, we were fascinated by an aircraft interior concept mock-up featuring digital walls with branding and imagery. The possibilities with a project like this are endless, for airlines, brands and passenger experiences.

Boeing's Future Flight Vision

Boeing’s Future Flight Vision

The post The Future of the Connected Passenger Experience — Highlights from #AIX2015, Hamburg appeared first on SimpliFlying - The Leading Airline Marketing Consultancy.

Author information

Vishal Mehra
Vishal Mehra
Senior Digital Strategist at SimpliFlying
Vishal Mehra is leading Social and Digital marketing efforts at SimpliFlying. A self-confessed commercial aviation geek, Vishal has led digital marketing campaigns at leading global agencies for 9 years, before finding his dream job at the intersection of aviation and digital marketing. His interests include Travelling, Technology, Podcasts (long before Serial arrived) and Beer.

A Different Life at Work: Ravi Chauhan looks back at his first year at SimpliFlying

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“So what do you do?”, she asked. We were sitting in the common room of a hostel in Zagreb, Croatia towards the end of a month long trip across Europe.

“Well I work at an aviation marketing consultancy called SimpliFlying.”

“Oh cool, so you are on a vacation right now?”

“Well we can choose to work from wherever we like, so we are working and traveling across Europe. For a month! In fact we we are headed to Budapest for our company retreat.” I said with an evil grin across my face.

“Man, that is my new dream job” she and her friend said in unison.

I thought as much.

Just over a year ago, I joined SimpliFlying to develop new products that define the future of the industry. A year later we believe that we have made good progress down that road. Yet, before joining SimpliFlying, I had my own fears. I had never worked in a company before, having started a business of my own right out of college. So I expected formality, pre-defined hierarchy and maybe even a bit of slowness. Boy, was I in for a surprise!

I entered a world of virtual water coolers, lively and frank discussions followed by quick, almost instant implementation.  And then it struck me: this was no ordinary workplace.

The workplace: A place in heaven

Yes, we are all based in separate countries and yes we have a virtual water-cooler up in the cloud (Skype and WhatsApp). It wasn’t easy at first to get accustomed to this ‘international-work-from-home’ office, but as soon as you settle into this, you realise what an education it is.

It never ceases to  amaze me how international — much in the spirit of the industry we work in — the company is! Each team member is based in a different country  and is entitled to all the public holidays in his or her own country (in addition to an unlimited vacations policy!). Even during the discussions, it is wonderful how the different cultures blend  together to create a mix of innovative yet culturally sensitive thinking. Great workplaces are characterised by their capability to generate a vast gene pool of diverse ideas. Ours certainly is one which does this exceedingly well.

The Work: A model way of life

Building products is hard; building products for an industry as complicated and as continuously-evolving as aviation is even harder.

When I set out to create new  products for aviation at SimpliFlying, I had no idea about the sheer complexity of the industry. I learnt it the hard way. We started off with a product that we believed would change the face of airports and how they raise capital for investment. We put months of hard work and thought behind it. When we thought it was ready, we reached out to the industry for feedback: and are we glad we did that. It was painfully clear that the industry wasn’t prepared for it. Having worked at it for 4 hard months we had to shelve it for a day the industry would be more ready for it.

Failure at the first attempt was hard. However, it was again the wonderful team at SimpliFlying that helped me regain focus and to work on a whole new product with even more enthusiasm.

Together we identified that most our clients face huge challenges in linking their social media performance to their organisational objectives. This not only severely limits the extent to which social media can help to organisations but also hugely frustrates marketing managers since they can’t quantify their contribution to the company!  We aimed to build a product to overcome this challenge.

Six months later we had an exciting new product with us. Yet even after the product was ‘built’ there was an additional step required: airline feedback.

Over the past 6 months we have taken feedback from numerous airlines, understanding their organisations and their needs whilst continuously improving the product. After numerous working weekends, 8 hour long calls, webinars at 12 midnight, or crunching over 600 routes and 600 social pages data, we have successfully built the world’s first model to quantitatively link airline social media performance directly to their routes performance and organisational objectives — and we are ready to ship this June!

However, the most unexpected thing that happened to me in the past year had nothing to do with the product I help build.  It was during these calls with the passionate  people working in airlines, that I fell in love with this industry and the people that make it. It made a romantic out of me, despite my best efforts I  must admit.

Friends, Romans, Company-Men

If there is a place where the most driven, iconoclastic and amicable people find their calling, then that place  is SimpliFlying. The credit most certainly goes to Shashank, our CEO and storyteller in chief, for creating an environment and individual space where we can be different in our own ways and still work towards on single goal.

Keeping the ship steady even in stormy seas is Shubhodeep (A.K.A Shubhodaddy) who leads operations and firefighting. He is the go to man for all our troubles — personal or professional — and makes sure that despite our remote work stations we achieve our goals for the company.

Marco is the voice of reason and brings together the best of two worlds, aviation and marketing. His structured thinking and the depth of his knowledge about aviation marketing adds the all important qualitative aspect to the quantitative models I build. And of course it doesn’t hurt that he has a great sense of humour.

Guen is one of the most wonderful people I’ve ever worked with. The PR whiz from Singapore is perhaps the most dedicated team member, someone whom we would all trust our lives with. Her constant questioning of existing norms and methods has influenced and improved the way we work and think.

The most recent addition to the team is Vishal, a firebrand social media expert who is creating his own niche in the company. His work and its impact on the team is pretty obvious and I look forward to working more with him.

Crucially, despite the fact that SimpliFlying comprises such remarkable individuals, it is greater than the sum of all. I believe that is because we genuinely like each other and the work we do. We truly believe that we, at SimpliFlying, help airlines become remarkable and it is that unshakeable belief that brings us together.

 

The post A Different Life at Work: Ravi Chauhan looks back at his first year at SimpliFlying appeared first on SimpliFlying - The Leading Airline Marketing Consultancy.

Author information

Ravi Chauhan
Ravi Chauhan
Ravi Chauhan is a Project Associate at SimpliFlying. Based out of Delhi, India, Ravi works on developing Special Projects that can potentially provide new business avenues for SimpliFlying. Developing businesses is Ravi’s passion and numbers are his love. As a student he was deeply involved in quizzing and marketing competitions. He won almost every marketing and quizzing competition that his college had. He saved up the winnings (about $2000, a huge amount by Indian standards), and left to travel India. After clocking over 8000 kms, mostly on buses, he encountered a business opportunity in the interiors of Kashmir, India in the food business, and dedicated the next 3 years to developing it. By 2010, he had developed it into a $100,000 annual turnover business. But with the collapse of the international markets, and monopolistic practices of the larger players, he had to shut it down. He brings with him invaluable experience in starting, marketing and running a business.

Turkish Airlines launches Istanbul to San Francisco route with creative marketing

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When Turkish Airlines decided to launch Istanbul to San Francisco flights, its seventh destination in the United States, marketing the route effectively and driving awareness were key goals. Especially since SFO is one of the most competitive long-haul markets in the world.

Thanks to the growth in the city of San Francisco, and Silicon Valley, the passenger traffic and the number of airlines San Francisco International Airport serves has risen rapidly. In the recent years, the likes of Emirates, Etihad and Air New Zealand have launched new flights to the city. Though the Turkish Airlines hub at Istanbul is technically in Europe, it is close to the Gulf hubs of the Middle East. Hence, the competition for passengers is intense.

For launching the Turkish Airlines Istanbul San Francisco route, the airline had a couple of options: Stick to the usual, or do something different. In our opinion, it chose the third option, going with “holistic”. Their efforts were driven by three key initiatives.

Launch Istanbul to San Francisco with a special livery

Turkish Airlines commissioned a Boeing 777-300 to sport an exclusive livery signifying the link between Istanbul and San Francisco, with a beautiful artistic design, showcasing Istanbul on one side, and San Francisco icons on the other. This helped generate interest in the close-knit and vocal community of Aviation Geeks and Plane Spotters about the route, which in turn was amplified on social media. Turkish Airlines’ official presence on social channels helped to drive the reach even further.

Importantly, anyone who sees this aircraft at any airport around the world will be able to draw the link between Istanbul and San Francisco. That in itself drives awareness of the route.

Turkish Airlines Boeing 777-300 at San Francisco International Airport. Credit: Vitaliy Lobanov, Airplane Pictures

Turkish Airlines Boeing 777 at San Francisco International Airport. Credit: Vitaliy Lobanov, Airplane Pictures

Creative content marketing

Turkish Airlines also had to position Istanbul as a great destination for traffic out of San Francisco. Although Turkish Airlines carries a lot of connecting traffic, it also has the great advantage of having a distinguished cultural capital like Istanbul as their hub. Hence, O&D (Origin & Destination) traffic is of great significance too.

To promote Istanbul, Turkish Airlines smartly partnered with BuzzFeed to co-create listicles, highlighting the city, and the connections with San Francsico. For example the post, “How San Francisco and Istanbul are Long-Lost Sister Cities“, was visual and received a lot of traffic from both the cities.

Given BuzzFeed’s tremendous reach and popularity, especially in the US, this helped in driving awareness, which would not have come from typical advertising.

As an extension of this initiative, Turkish Airlines also created a funny video, highlighting one of their initiatives called “Startup Class”, and relating it to start up companies in Silicon Valley and San Francisco. Though the service is not yet available on flights to San Francisco, the video imagined a funny and engaging situation, involving a whole host of imaginary yet relatable characters. As of the writing of this article, the video had surpassed 1.6 million views in less than a month.

Click here to view the embedded video.

 

Experiential Marketing

The third piece of the strategy involved encouraging locals and tourists in San Francisco to experience their favourite destinations around the world in engrossing 360-degree video and photo formats. A beautiful city binocular was custom made in aircraft aluminium. The wide-angle views were in perfect sync with Turkish Airlines slogan of “Widen Your World”. As a testament to its success, more than 6000 people experienced it in just 4 days.

Click here to view the embedded video.

 

(Note: Efabrika, an Istanbul-based creative agency, designed and produced the Widen Your World Binocular experience and  produced the Startup Class video for Turkish Airlines.)

The expansion of Turkish Airlines in the past few years has been remarkable. They serve more destinations in the world than any other airline. The marketing department has done an apt job of complementing the airline’s tremendous growth. Adding San Francisco to their global network has been a case study on doing route launch marketing right.

Full Disclosure: While Turkish Airlines is a current SimpliFlying client, our team did not specifically work on this launch.

The post Turkish Airlines launches Istanbul to San Francisco route with creative marketing appeared first on SimpliFlying - The Leading Airline Marketing Consultancy.

Author information

Vishal Mehra
Vishal Mehra
Senior Digital Strategist at SimpliFlying
Vishal Mehra is leading Social and Digital marketing efforts at SimpliFlying. A self-confessed commercial aviation geek, Vishal has led digital marketing campaigns at leading global agencies for 9 years, before finding his dream job at the intersection of aviation and digital marketing. His interests include Travelling, Technology, Podcasts (long before Serial arrived) and Beer.

Airline Finalists of 2015 SimpliFlying Awards

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Based on public nominations and SimpliFlying Honeycomb analysis, we are proud to announce the airline finalists of 2015 SimpliFlying Awards for each award category below.

These airline finalists will be submitting a presentation deck to be scored by the awards jury. Each judge will be looking at how the airlines demonstrate innovativeness, engagement and business impact.

Come September 29, the top from each award category will be invited to Las Vegas on October 20, 2015 to attend the SimpliFlying Awards ceremony and exclusive Airline Marketing Innovation Lab held at Eyefortravel TDS North America. Until then, stay tuned!

What is SimpliFlying Awards?

Now in its sixth annual edition, the 2015 SimpliFlying Awards honour airlines that push the frontier of innovative marketing. This year has seen not only 7 additional award categories but also an Academy awards-style jury comprising stalwarts and veterans of airline and travel marketing. For FAQs and more information, please click here.


 

#SFAWARDS15 AIRLINE FINALISTS

BRANDING:
Air New Zealand, Lufthansa, Turkish Airlines, Icelandair, TAM Airlines

CUSTOMER SERVICE:
American Airlines, Southwest Airlines, Lufthansa, Virgin America, Etihad Airways

DRIVING REVENUE:
Volaris, Etihad Airways, WestJet

LAUNCHES:
Virgin Atlantic, Aer Lingus, Singapore Airlines, Turkish Airlines, Qatar Airways, AirAsia

MOBILE:
Lufthansa, Air New Zealand, easyJet

OVERALL IN NORTH AMERICA:
American Airlines, Westjet, Southwest Airlines, Virgin America

OVERALL IN CENTRAL & SOUTH AMERICA:
Avianca, TAM Airlines, Azul

OVERALL IN EUROPE:
Turkish Airlines, Iberia, Lufthansa

OVERALL IN MIDDLE EAST:
Etihad Airways, Qatar Airways, Air Arabia, Saudia

OVERALL IN ASIA PACIFIC:
Singapore Airlines, Cathay Pacific, Air New Zealand, AirAsia, Jet Airways


SimpliFlying Awards FAQs

Why is there no voting this year?
Public voting has been removed to level the playing field between large airlines and small.

Can an airline be nominated for more than one category?
Yes, an airline can be nominated for more than one category.

Is there a fee to participate?
No, there is no fee to participating in SimpliFlying Awards 2015.

Which airlines can apply for the SimpliFlying Awards? Is preference given to SimpliFlying clients?
Any airline can submit a nomination for the SimpliFlying awards, through public nomination. No preference is given to whether an airline is a SimpliFlying client or not. It all depends on the merit of the nomination and results achieved through social media efforts. The nominations are supplemented by some of the top-ranked airlines according to the SimpliFlying Honeycomb, just to ensure every deserving airline is considered for the awards.

What are the awards processes like? 
To be in the running for this awards, your airline first needs to be nominated. Anyone can submit a nomination, including airline staff. For each award category, five airlines will be shortlisted and invited to submit a detailed deck to the jury. Based on the collective scores of the jury, the top 3 for each category will be announced and invited to the awards ceremony and exclusive Airline Marketing Innovation Lab happening in Las Vegas on October 20, 2015.

How will the jury be scoring the entries?
Each judge will be looking at how the airlines demonstrate innovativeness, engagement and business impact of social media.

What is the time commitment for this awards?

There are a few important deadlines to take note of. Please go to the awards page here and scroll to the section “IMPORTANT DATES”.

Do I need to be present in Vegas to join in this awards?
If your airline emerges as one of the Top 3 for a category, we strongly recommend that you send a representative to collect the plaque at the awards ceremony in Las Vegas on October 20, 2015. The Airline Marketing Innovation Lab will also be happening on the same day in Las Vegas and the fee will be waived for award finalists.

For more information about 2015 SimpliFlying Awards:  http://simpliflying.com/2015-simpliflying-awards/

The post Airline Finalists of 2015 SimpliFlying Awards appeared first on SimpliFlying - The Leading Airline Marketing Consultancy.

Author information

Li Guen
Li Guen
Head of Communications and Marketing at SimpliFlying
Li Guen heads the communications and marketing functions at SimpliFlying where she drives corporate branding efforts and industry research initiatives. Prior to this, Li Guen was at Weber Shandwick working with clients including Rolls-Royce, Changi Airport Group and P&G. In her free time, Li Guen likes trekking mountains in Asia. You can tweet her at @SimpliGuen or email her at guen@simpliflying.com.

Announcing Top 3 Airlines of SimpliFlying Awards 2015

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After rigorous evaluation by our highly esteemed jury, we are pleased to announce the Top 3 airlines for the award categories in SimpliFlying Awards 2015.

All the finalists this year are invited to the awards ceremony in Las Vegas co-hosted by EyeforTravel at theTDS North America 2015 conference on Oct 20, 2015.

Accompanying the awards this year is the world’s first Airline Marketing Innovation Lab that brings together some of the best airline marketers in specialised roundtables to discuss the vision of airline marketing in 2020. In addition, there will be a panel discussion where the SimpliFlying Awards winners will share some of their best practices, followed by a Q&A. The overall winner for each category will be announced at the official awards ceremony closer to the evening.

Top 3 Airlines in Each Category

(*in no particular order)


BRANDING

Lufthansa, Turkish Airlines, Icelandair

1


CUSTOMER SERVICE

Southwest, Virgin America, Etihad Airways

2


DRIVING REVENUE

Volaris, Etihad Airways, WestJet

3


LAUNCHES

Virgin Atlantic, Singapore Airlines, Aer Lingus

4


MOBILE

Air New Zealand, easyJet, Lufthansa


OVERALL IN NORTH AMERICA

WestJet, American Airlines, Virgin America

6


OVERALL IN CENTRAL & SOUTH AMERICA

TAM Airlines, Avianca, GOL

7


OVERALL IN EUROPE

Iberia, Lufthansa, Turkish Airlines

8


OVERALL IN MIDDLE EAST

Qatar Airways, Etihad Airways, Air Arabia, Saudia


OVERALL IN ASIA PACIFIC

Cathay Pacific, AirAsia, Air New Zealand

10


In addition to the above categories, SimpliFlying will be honoring airlines for the following special categories:

  1. Most improved airline in social media
  2. Best handling of a crisis situation
  3. Leadership in social media (Individual)
  4. Hall of Fame

Congratulations to all those who secured a position in the Top 3 and a huge round of applause to all the airlines that participated so enthusiastically in this year’s awards! The overall winner for each of the main categories of SimpliFlying Awards 2015 will be revealed on Oct 20, 2015 at the awards ceremony in Las Vegas.

###

About SimpliFlying Awards for Excellence in Social Media

The SimpliFlying Awards for Excellence in Social Media, established in 2010, are the longest running awards dedicated to recognising the best social media campaigns and practices in the aviation industry. Committed to raising the standard of airlines and airports on social media, the SimpliFlying Awards promote the exchange of knowledge in the sphere of social media by recognising the best airlines, airports and travel providers on social media and inviting award winners to present and share their successes with the rest of the world. Each year, SimpliFlying Awards picks the best through a rigorous process of  expert evaluation by a distinguished panel. Past award winners include KLM, Southwest, Lufthansa, Emirates and more. More about SimpliFlying Awards 2015 here

The post Announcing Top 3 Airlines of SimpliFlying Awards 2015 appeared first on SimpliFlying - The Leading Airline Marketing Consultancy.

Author information

SimpliFlying
SimpliFlying
At SimpliFlying, in everything we do, we believe in thinking differently about aviation marketing. Having worked with over 30 airlines and airports across 5 continents, we understand the intersection of aviation and marketing better than anyone else. We have the most experience. The most clients. The most success. SimpliFlying.com is one of the Top 2 blogs on aviation, and the Twitter handle (@simpliflying) is one of the Top 5 most influential on airlines, with over 12,000 followers. If you're keen to tap our expertise, email us at helpmesoar@simpliflying.com

Airline Winners at SimpliFlying Awards 2015 for Excellence in Social Media

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The Authoritative Meeting of The Best Airlines in Social Media

Last evening, top airlines gathered at the SimpliFlying Awards 2015 for Excellence in Social Media held at The Bellagio, Las Vegas to celebrate one another’s achievements. The SimpliFlying Awards, established since 2010, are the longest-running awards dedicated to airlines on social media.

This year, there are 11 awards categories in total – five that represent aspects of the airline business where social media drives significant value in, as well as six categories by region. The judging panel, comprising stalwarts of airline and travel marketing, assessed each airline by their innovativeness, engagement and business impact.

Without further ado, here are the winners. Photos from the awards ceremony have been uploaded in this Facebook album.

Results of SimpliFlying Awards 2015 For Excellence in Social Media

Best Airline in Branding

Winner: Turkish Airlines

Highly Commended: Lufthansa, Icelandair

Best Airline in Customer Service

Winner: Virgin America

Highly Commended: Southwest Airlines, Etihad Airways

Best Airline in Driving Revenues

Winner: WestJet

Highly Commended: Volaris, Etihad Airways

Best Airline in Launches

Winner:Aer Lingus

Highly Commended: Virgin Atlantic, Singapore Airlines

Best Airline in Mobile

Winner: easyJet

Highly Commended: Lufthansa, Air New Zealand

Best Overall Airline in North America

Winner: American Airlines

Highly Commended: Virgin America, WestJet

Best Overall Airline in Central & South America

Winner: TAM Airlines

Highly Commended: Avianca, GOL

Best Overall Airline in Europe

Winner: Turkish Airlines

Highly Commended: Iberia, Lufthansa

Best Overall Airline in Middle East

Winner: Etihad Airways

Highly Commended: Qatar Airways, Saudia, AirArabia

Best Overall Airline in Asia Pacific

Winner: Air New Zealand

Highly Commended: Cathay Pacific, AirAsia

Best Overall Airline (Global)

Winner: American Airlines

 

Special Category Awards

Most Improved Airline in Social Media: Saudia

Best Handling of A Crisis Situation: AirAsia

Leadership in Social Media (Individual): Tony Fernandes, AirAsia

Hall of Fame: KLM Royal Dutch Airways

 

Special thanks to our distinguished judges

Screen Shot 2015-10-21 at 11.50.24 am Screen Shot 2015-10-21 at 11.50.32 am

Last but not least, thank you EyeforTravel

Special thanks go out to EyeforTravel, especially Gina Baille, Jenna Gottscho, Chloe Leighton, Julia Heighton and the whole E4T team to help make this a successful awards yet again!

The post Airline Winners at SimpliFlying Awards 2015 for Excellence in Social Media appeared first on SimpliFlying - The Leading Airline Marketing Consultancy.

Author information

Li Guen
Li Guen
Head of Communications and Marketing at SimpliFlying
Li Guen heads the communications and marketing functions at SimpliFlying where she drives corporate branding efforts and industry research initiatives. Prior to this, Li Guen was at Weber Shandwick working with clients including Rolls-Royce, Changi Airport Group and P&G. In her free time, Li Guen likes trekking mountains in Asia. You can tweet her at @SimpliGuen or email her at guen@simpliflying.com.

Airline Marketing Manifesto 2020 Developed at the World’s First Airline Marketing Innovation Lab

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SimpliFlying organised the world’s first airline marketing innovation lab attended by 50 of the most innovative airlines, including Singapore Airlines, Cathay Pacific, American Airlines, Turkish Airlines, and LATAM Airlines, as well as B2B brands such as Airbus, the Engine Alliance and Amedeo.

It comprised roundtables led by independent industry experts on four key focus areas: social customer service, branding, performance analytics and touchpoint innovation. The objective of the innovation lab was to address existing issues and develop a roadmap for future airline marketing innovations.

“We managed to get some of the best airlines in the world in a room for a day of intense peer- to-peer learning focused on marketing. This has never been done before in the aviation industry and we’re proud of what we have achieved.”

— Shashank Nigam, CEO, SimpliFlying

SimpliFlying’s latest Airline Social Media Outlook research conducted with 166 executives from 78 airlines helped shape the discussions, especially around social customer service which is currently a top priority for 89% of executives.

The airlines together agreed that social media and digital are becoming core differentiators in the business − a point emphasized in the keynote presentation by Devin Liddell from design agency Teague and Rohit Bhargava of Influential Marketing Group.

“I greatly enjoyed the peer-to-peer interactions, meeting so many people from the industry and gaining such valuable insights.”

— Daniel Abt, Lufthansa

Here’s a recap of the key moments from the lab, followed by some photographs of the watershed event.

See you next year!

Fifty of the best airline marketers in the world came together for a day of intense peer-to-peer discussions on the future of airline marketing in a forum put together by SimpliFlying

Posted by SimpliFlying on Wednesday, October 21, 2015

The post Airline Marketing Manifesto 2020 Developed at the World’s First Airline Marketing Innovation Lab appeared first on SimpliFlying - The Leading Airline Marketing Consultancy.

Author information

Shubhodeep Pal
Shubhodeep Pal
Vice President, Products and Operations at SimpliFlying
Shubhodeep Pal is the Vice President, Products and Operations at SimpliFlying. He has been leading Research, Product Development, Marketing and Business Development since December 2010 from the headquarters in Singapore. He has spoken at airline conferences and delivered training workshops for senior aviation executives. He has also appeared on television interviews and been quoted in publications such as the Wall Street Journal. His writings have appeared extensively on SimpliFlying and respected industry outlets such as Airlinetrends, Tnooz, Airport World, Low Cost and Regional Airline Business Magazine and Loyalty360. In a previous role, he also conducted a workshop on social media at the Ministry of Home Affairs, Singapore. He speaks three languages fluently, and is also a published poet and amateur film critic. He can be reached at shubhodeep@simpliflying.com.

SimpliFlying Awards 2016 #SFAwards16: Honouring airlines that push the frontier of innovative marketing

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SimpliFlying Awards 2016 for Excellence in Social Media is back after a hugely successful instalment last year October — held together with the world’s first Airline Marketing Innovation Lab in Las Vegas.

This year, SimpliFlying Awards 2016 will be held in Bangkok, Thailand on September 1, 2016.

The longest-running awards dedicated to airlines on social media has announced ten categories and important dates to note.

For more details and FAQs about SimpliFlying Awards 2016, please refer to the awards information page here: http://www.simpliflying.com/simpliflying-awards-2016-bkk/

For further enquiries, please contact Guen at guen@simpliflying.com.

The post SimpliFlying Awards 2016 #SFAwards16: Honouring airlines that push the frontier of innovative marketing appeared first on SimpliFlying - The Leading Airline Marketing Consultancy.

Author information

Li Guen
Li Guen
Head of Communications and Marketing at SimpliFlying
Li Guen heads the communications and marketing functions at SimpliFlying where she drives corporate branding efforts and industry research initiatives. Prior to this, Li Guen was at Weber Shandwick working with clients including Rolls-Royce, Changi Airport Group and P&G. In her free time, Li Guen likes trekking mountains in Asia. You can tweet her at @SimpliGuen or email her at guen@simpliflying.com.

Upcoming: SimpliFlying Lab and Awards Ceremony 2016

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The best insights and inspirations occur when experiences and ideas are exchanged under three conditions:

Respect. Open mind. No Ego.

SimpliFlying Lab and Awards. London. Sep 7, 2016.

This year, SimpliFlying Airline Marketing Innovation Lab and Awards, or SimpliFlying Lab and Awards for short, will be happening in London on September 7, 2016 and promises to be a transformative experience.

Intimate exchange of experiences and ideas: The morning session will be an exclusive gathering of 30 marketers from top airlines around the world. Four roundtable discussions will be happening concurrently, each focused on a different topic. Expect free-wheeling exchanges about the biggest challenges and successes faced and debates on the future of airline marketing. Participants include SimpliFlying Awards finalists such as Air New Zealand, Southwest, Finnair and more. This is an exclusive and intimate gathering where everyone, a well-respected counterpart of one another, comes with an open mind.

Thought-provoking case studies, presentations and panels: In the afternoon, the SimpliFlying Lab opens up to a joint session with Terrapinn’s Aviation Marketing track focused on latest trends. For example,

  • What Tinder, Snapchat mean for airlines and how they can used to improve brands, by Engilbert Hafsteinsson, VP Sales & Marketing, WOW air
  • What makes airline brands SOAR (plus real-world examples), by Shashank Nigam, CEO, SimpliFlying
  • China Case Study: The challenges of using digital and social marketing in the Chinese market, by Jonathan Hutt, Social Marketing Director, Spring Airlines
  • Using social to be transformative and drive value across your brand, by Paul Buckley, Social Media Head, Aer Lingus
  • Panel discussion among SimpliFlying Awards finalists on best practices when pursuing new trends and technologies in marketing

Celebrating the best in airline marketing: Towards the evening, the event closes with the SimpliFlying Awards 2016 ceremony where airlines are honoured each year for pushing the frontier of innovative marketing. This is also the world’s longest-running awards dedicated to airlines on social media. Click here to see the top three airlines for each category.

Throwback to the first SimpliFlying Lab & Awards in 2015

When we first started SimpliFlying Lab in Las Vegas last year, we put our best to work. The biggest reward gained was the tremendously positive feedback we had received at the end. Below is a video playback of the glorious moments from SimpliFlying Lab and Awards 2015.

If you plan to join us this year in London, below are a couple of tips and feedback from airline participants last year.

“Bring your questions, bring your learnings and just bring an open mind. What we got out of today was something I wished we could make last for five days.” – Cassie Roma, Air New Zealand

“It’s very interesting that all the airlines participate in sharing. And it’s not just the management team but also those who oversee and implement.” — Yong Swee Ping, AirAsia

“This is a great opportunity to collaborate with other airlines. It’s very rare that I’m at a conference with so many different airlines where we can talk about what we are doing at our own organisation.” – Rob Hahn, Southwest Airlines

To join or learn more about SimpliFlying Lab & Awards 2016, click here.

 

The post Upcoming: SimpliFlying Lab and Awards Ceremony 2016 appeared first on SimpliFlying - The Leading Airline Marketing Consultancy.

Author information

SimpliFlying
SimpliFlying
At SimpliFlying, in everything we do, we believe in thinking differently about aviation marketing. Having worked with over 30 airlines and airports across 5 continents, we understand the intersection of aviation and marketing better than anyone else. We have the most experience. The most clients. The most success. SimpliFlying.com is one of the Top 2 blogs on aviation, and the Twitter handle (@simpliflying) is one of the Top 5 most influential on airlines, with over 12,000 followers. If you're keen to tap our expertise, email us at helpmesoar@simpliflying.com
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