Social media – Airport Benchmarking

Frankfurt Airport introduces Facebook bot and Twitter tool for real time updates

Karima Kouidri — Mon, 06 Feb 2017 17:04:03 +0000

Frankfurt Airport has introduced two new social media Tools:

a Facebook chatbot and a real-time flight information service on Twitter.

The Facebook bot, known as FRAnky, can communicate with passengers in German and English. Powered by artificial intelligence, it can provide answers to passengers’ questions, provide flight updates and offer information on airport restaurants, shops, services and facilities.

If the bot can’t provide an answer to a question it will direct the user to the contact information page or the Fraport Communication Centre.

Frankfurt Airport has also launched a Twitter-based flight information service. Using the handle @FRA_Flightinfo, users can request real time updates for specific flights.

Frankfurt Airport follows in the footsteps of the likes of Lufthansa, Austrian Airlines, British Airways, Icelandair and Thomson, who have also launched chatbots as complementary communication channels…

source : https://tinyurl.com/zyjlwfd

Sydney Airport launches real time flight information service for passengers

Karima Kouidri — Wed, 25 Jan 2017 09:57:51 +0000

New BizTweet service will make travelling easier and more efficient for passengers at Sydney Airport
Flight, gate and departure/arrival time information delivered direct to passengers’ devices
Sydney Airport is committed to enhancing the airport experience through technology

Sydney Airport has launched an innovative new service offering tailored, real time flight information to passengers via social media to further enhance the customer experience.

The airport has partnered with software provider TIC, whose BizTweet platform connects passengers with airports through social media.

Passengers flying to or from Sydney Airport can keep up to date with the latest flight information by tweeting their flight number to @flySYD or visiting the flight information page at www.sydneyairport.com.au.

Sydney Airport Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer Kerrie Mather said the service would improve the passenger experience, helping travellers plan their trip before they arrive at the airport.

“We want to make the airport experience as simple and stress free as possible for the 42 million passengers who fly in and out of Sydney Airport on more than 300,000 flights every year,” Ms Mather said.

“We’re proud to engage with our passengers through this information service, which provides access to the latest details on international and domestic flights, departure gates and boarding times at the touch of a button.

“Importantly, passengers will be able to access personalised flight information in their native language, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, so they’ll receive timely and relevant information, when and where they need it.”

The new service is also expected to enhance efficiency by improving passenger flow throughout Sydney Airport’s terminals.

Founder and CEO of TIC Paul Brugger said the company was pleased to partner with Sydney Airport.

“Sydney Airport is one of the most well-known airports in the whole world and we are now able to offer our tailored solution to more people than ever before, further enhancing the airport’s service to its passengers,” Mr Brugger said.

“It’s great to see Sydney making their service as relevant as possible to the passenger by using our multi-lingual functionality to communicate in up to 41 different languages instantly.”

The introduction of this new service builds on Sydney Airport’s technology strategy, which is delivering new and more customised ways for visitors and passengers to access the information they need when planning their trip to the airport.

Sydney Airport has implemented a suite of state-of-the-art technology, including free Wi-Fi and airport apps, self-service check-in, automated bag drops, SmartGates, dynamic wayfinding e-directories and beacon technology.

New multilingual Flight Information Displays (FIDS) are also available in 13 languages at the T1 International terminal. The new look FIDS feature bolder colours, larger font and a more intuitive display to enhance readability and wayfinding for passengers.

The airport is Australia’s leading airport for social media followers, with around 160,000 followers across Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn and offers the BizTweet service in 41 languages, from Arabic through to Vietnamese.

Contact:

Joeley Pettit

Sydney Airport Media

0437 033 479

ABOUT SYDNEY AIRPORT

Sydney Airport is Australia’s gateway airport, serving 42 million passengers a year and connecting Sydney to a network of around 100 international, domestic and regional destinations.

Located just eight kilometres from the city centre, Sydney Airport contributes $30.8 billion in economic activity a year, equivalent to 6.4 per cent of the NSW economy. Sydney Airport is a major employer in NSW, generating more than 306,700 direct and indirect jobs, equivalent to 8.9 per cent of NSW employment. Some 29,000 of these jobs are at the airport itself.

ABOUT TIC AND BIZTWEET

TIC is an innovative technology company based in Cork, Ireland. Serving customers across four continents, it designs bespoke and user friendly software solutions that businesses can use and adapt to communicate more efficiently with their customers.

BizTweet is TIC’s flagship product and has won numerous business awards since its inception in 2011. The innovative software provides corporations with the ability to segment their customer base depending on their customer’s data and send pre-configured Tweets in real-time. Helping businesses to overcome the problems of impersonalised or time-sensitive social media replies and responses, BizTweet helps businesses to stand out from their competitors, easily and effectively.

To find out more about TIC and BizTweet visit www.tic.ie.

Alaska Airlines offers free in-flight messaging

Karima Kouidri — Wed, 11 Jan 2017 16:49:52 +0000

Alaska Airlines offers free in-flight messaging via iMessage, WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger

Travellers flying with Alaska Airlines can now send messages using iMessage, WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger for free on the carrier’s Gogo-equipped aircraft.

The service, called Free Chat, has launched in beta, with full functionality deploying on 24 January. To use it, passengers will simply need to sign in to their Gogo Wi-Fi accounts.

Andrew Harrison, Alaska Airlines’ Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer, said: “We’re celebrating the new year – and our new, bigger airline – with the rollout of new customer-friendly enhancements on Alaska-branded flights, starting with Free Chat.

“We know that staying in touch while on the go is essential to our guests, many of whom don’t need full Internet access. Free Chat is a great way to keep that connection alive without breaking the bank. And yes, it’s fully emoji-compatible.”

In addition to the launch of Free Chat, Alaska Airlines is offering passengers free, unlimited access to its entire catalogue of in-flight entertainment content until the end of March. Later this month, passengers will also begin to see the upgraded food and beverage options onboard, while the the Premium Class will debut this month.

source :http://tinyurl.com/jp6b3u9

British Airways launches Facebook messenger “BOTler”

Karima Kouidri — Tue, 29 Nov 2016 18:49:13 +0000

British Airways has launched a Facebook “BOTler”,

British Airways has launched a Facebook “BOTler”, offering London-bound customers a “best of the best” guide to the capital.

The Facebook messenger service is initially launching in Germany, France, India, Singapore, Japan and the UAE, and provides travellers with “live updates on exclusive deals and personalised recommendations on top attractions and experiences tailored for individual users”.

These include a 30 per cent discount on stays at the Rosewood London, and up to 60 per cent off at designer outlet shopping centre Bicester Village, as well as a VIP pass and discounts at Westfield London.

Customer just need to visit the carrier’s Facebook page and click on “Message” to be connected to the bot.

Commenting on the launch, Sara Dunham, British Airways’ Head of Marketing Retail & Direct Channels said:

“As an airline we are continually reviewing the ways in which we engage with our loyal customers, that includes providing them with added value before they even fly with us.

“By launching the British Airways BOTler across our core markets, we are providing our customers with a plethora of extra reasons – tailored to their personal tastes – to experience the magical city of London at its iconic winter best.

“Designed exclusively for Facebook Messenger, the British Airways BOTler will guide users through what to expect in the UK capital during the holiday season, highlighting exclusive deals across London to fuel that pre-holiday excitement.”

source : http://tinyurl.com/hr2m8ed

The Supertraveler’s Manifesto at Skift Global Forum 2016

Karima Kouidri — Thu, 17 Nov 2016 19:56:02 +0000

At this year’s Skift Global Forum in New York City,

travel leaders from around the world gathered for two days of inspiration, information, and conversation for panels such as this as well as solo TED-like talks on the future of travel.

Mobile chat apps and bots set to transform travel

Karima Kouidri — Sun, 13 Nov 2016 12:11:37 +0000

No more waiting on hold: mobile chat apps and bots set to transform travel.

Who enjoys queuing to check-in to a hotel? How about being put on hold for flight assistance? Or finding your way around a foreign city?

Chat can help with all these things and more. Recently at the Amadeus Online Connect event, I reiterated the opportunity we have to embrace chat and chatbots within the travel industry.

In a world where 41% of Millennials say they would be ‘truly satisfied’ to use chat as the primary means of connecting with the business and services they use, employing this medium to offer on-demand service just makes sense.

For travel players, there are big opportunities to reach out to travellers during their trips.

From chat-based front desk and ticketing agents to flight attendants and call-centre agents, chat-based applications could reshape the way we approach travel to make it a much more personalised and connected experience.

The next big thing in chat are ‘chat-bots’ that mimic conversation using artificial intelligence.

We’ve discussed how they could impact the travel industry, and the critical mass is there with chat apps like WhatsApp boasting one billion users already. Now, especially in Asia Pacific, where mobile penetration and chat app usage is already high, brands are becoming ‘friends’ with users.

In fact, 10,000,000 brands are on China’s most popular chat platform, WeChat.

China Southern Airlines uses WeChat at all stages of the travel cycle – from inspiration all the way to the post-trip experience. Its more than 8 million WeChat followers can even pay for their flights with WeChat pay, which stores credit card information.

In December 2013, the airline announced that it handled more than 700,000 flight check-ins through its WeChat platform since launching the service in January 2013.

On the hospitality side, the LINQ Hotel, part of Caesars Entertainment, Las Vegas, allows hotel guests to converse with ‘Ben’, an artificial intelligence robot, through WeChat. Guests can send WeChat messages asking for nearby dining, entertainment and nightlife options and ‘Ben’ will reply back to them with suggestions in real time.

Once inside the room, guests can use WeChat to control lighting, thermostats, and curtains or choose the pre-set atmosphere, for example a sleep scenario. Guests can even circumvent the front desk and be issued a virtual WeChat key to use to open the hotel door.

As mobile penetration further increases and artificial intelligence becomes even more ‘intelligent’ the use of chat apps and chat-bots in the travel industry will be limited only by our imaginations.

Stay tuned to this blog as we explore further the use of this technology in the travel industry and send us a Tweet to share your opinion.

source : http://tinyurl.com/j6fpo2x

Frustrated fliers listen up: Airlines hear your rant on Twitter

Karima Kouidri — Wed, 28 Sep 2016 08:22:52 +0000

Frustrated fliers listen up: Airlines hear your rant on Twitter

Getty Images

Passengers wait for flights at O’Hare International Airport.

If you’ve ever had a bad flight or sat in an airport for hours waiting to take off and decided to rant about a your experience on Twitter or Facebook, a new study shows those complaints are being heard.

The analysis is important since social media has become a preferred method for customers to interact with airlines, especially when they are in the midst of a bad experience.

Conversocial, a software firm that works with airlines and tracks social media interaction by carriers around the world, says North American airlines are more responsive than airlines in Europe with 9 in 10 carriers in North America responding to at least half of the mentions targeting the company on social media.

“It has really become the natural way for the social mobile traveler to engage with an airline and so everyone has recognized that, but there is a pretty wide disparity in terms of the actual performance that these airlines are really giving,” said Joshua March CEO of Conversocial.

Among the largest U.S. airlines, two carriers stand out for how they interact with customers on Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms.

Alaska Airlines is the fastest at reacting to social media mentions with an average response time of 2 minutes, 34 seconds, according to Conversocial. The average response time for airlines in North America is 1 hour, 5 minutes.

Conversocial ranks Southwest Airlines as the most responsive U.S. airline with a response of some fashion 43 percent of the time it was mentioned on social media sites. The study finds airlines in North America respond, on average, to just 24 percent of the social media comments posted every day.

At Southwest Airlines’ social media center in Dallas, the constant flow of on-line posts mentioning the low-cost airline are watched 24 hours a day. Every month, the airline is named in an average of 86,000 tweets and Facebook posts. Some, like those that praise a flight crew, may not get a response from the social media team. By comparison, the social media posts where customers complain about a canceled flight, poor service or some other problem become a priority for the Southwest team.

“The approach is. ‘Really, how can we help? What is going on? Give us some information and let’s see what we can do to straighten this out,'” said Lisa Goode, Southwest’s senior director of social business. “Usually we can resolve it, help them, get them the information.”

Goode and her team have been tested this year. In July, when a computer outage led to Southwest scrapping 2,300 flights, the airlines social media team wound up dealing with 93,000 social media messages over four days.

“A lot of what we did was go out and post proactively just to say we are still working on it, here is what we are looking to do, here is where you need to go and get your information.”said Goode.

In some cases, there may be only so much airline social media teams can do when a customer complains. If a flight is delayed for mechanical reasons, social media teams cannot fix the plane, but they can give passengers up-to-date information and try to ease their frustration.

So what’s the best approach the next time you have a complaint and feel frustration with an airline building?

“Don’t just use this as an opportunity to vent,” said March. “You can actually use this as a channel to really resolve your issue. Send them (the airline) a private message, give them more details and I think you would be pleasantly surprised at just how many airlines have invested into this.”

source : http://tinyurl.com/zdflojt

London City Airport introduces Facebook Messenger

Karima Kouidri — Sun, 31 Jul 2016 17:00:14 +0000

London City Airport introduces Facebook Messenger to check flight information

London City Airport is the first airport in the UK to enable passengers to use Facebook Messenger to find out the latest real-time information about their flight.

Following a short trial period, from today any passenger who has Facebook Messenger on their device can send their flight number on the day of travel to the LCY Flight Info Facebook page and receive personalised flight information.

The automated messages provide up-to-the-minute information on flight status, including departure and arrival time and boarding gate numbers, removing the need to constantly check flight information screens. Both departing passengers and those waiting for passengers to arrive can get the information relevant to them.

The new Facebook Messenger functionality coincides with the latest passenger analysis for the first quarter of 2016, which found that for the first time ever the proportion of under-35 passengers reached 35% at London City Airport. It is expected that millennial travellers will be among the first to use the service.

Alison FitzGerald, Chief Information Officer at London City Airport, said:

“The majority of our passengers are connected to social media and many of these are business travellers, so it makes perfect sense to offer flight updates directly to their smartphones via Facebook Messenger. We already offer free Wi-Fi and a check-in time of 20 minutes or less, and this is another way of ensuring a hassle-free, personalised customer experience.”

Last week it was announced that there are 1 billion active users worldwide of Facebook Messenger, and this new integration joins an existing personalised Twitter update service @LCYFlightInfo, which is also provided by BizTweet and developed by TIC (Technology Integration Consultancy). In the first 12 months since it was introduced in June 2015, Twitter flight information was used by 13,568 registered users.

The airport is located in the heart of East London, a growing technology hub, and the new Facebook Messenger service joins several innovations which simplify and enhance the passenger experience. These include AirPortr, a personal luggage transfer service which collects bags from customers and delivers them straight to their final destination, and Crowd Vision, which provides analysis of real-time passenger movements through the airport via live-feed video, ensuring that transit through the terminal is as quick as possible.

The automated Twitter and Facebook updates pages sit in parallel to the airport’s main Facebook page and @LondonCityAir Twitter page which are the primary points of reference for customer information, engagement and news.

source: http://tinyurl.com/jv6m25u