American Airlines is getting downright social as it launches Black Atlas, a community website where African-American travelers can “explore stories, reviews, travel tips, videos and photos as seen through the eyes of black travelers” — and also book some AA flights.
The airline is set to roll out more functionality for the website in about a week, around Oct. 15.
It is great that American, like other airlines including British Airways with its MetroTwin initiative, see some value in social media. American already has community websites for women, gays and lesbians, and business travelers.
But, with the exception of some stars like JetBlue, Southwest, Virgin Atlantic and Air New Zealand, as outlined in The Airline Industry and Social Media, the aviation community generally is afraid of its own social-media shadow, and is floundering.
For example, the report’s authors, Innovation Analysis Group and the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation, found that 80% of the surveyed airlines had just one person handling all of their social-media activities.
But, before I get further into that, I have to say I’m a bit skeptical about AA”s BlackAtlas. Will the airline really engage with the Black community and permit the free flow of information? Or will this be just another stilted effort and more corporate-speak?
The terms and conditions of BlackAtlas forbid users from hyperlinking without written permission. That kind of puts a damper on show and tell.
And, when I submitted a story about my alleged travels so I might take BlackAtlas for a test-run, I received the following message:
“Thanks for the story! We review all submissions for content before they are posted to the site. We’ll send you an email with the status of your story within two business days. Thanks again and keep the stories coming!”
Two business days is an eternity, of course, in the social-media universe.
Steven Frischling, who has written about airline community websites and worked with IAG on the report, says American “never promotes, advertises or talks about them [its social media sites] and they wonder why no one ever talks about them.â€
And, the airline’s seemingly disorganized approach carries over to its Aairwaves account on Twitter, Frischling says.
American wasn’t included in the report because it didn’t respond to surveys and it was difficult getting an answer from the airline about social media because the airline outsources its Twitter efforts to a public relations firm, Weber Shandwick, he says.
“ Five people claim to be in charge and none of them actually work for American,” Frischling says.
Like some other airlines, American Airlines does a great job of promoting fare sales on Twitter, he adds, but falls short on other aspects of social media.
“They don’t search to engage in the conversation,” Frischling says of American’s Twitter efforts. “They sort of passively wait for the comments to come to them.â€
“The Airline Industry and Social Media” report provides a very useful breakdown of each participating airline’s Twitter efforts, and draws conclusions about the industry as a whole.
The report cites numerous issues pertaining to airlines’ social media engagements, and staffing levels are particularly problematic.
“Airlines have eviscerated their staffing levels to a minimum,” the report states. “This is especially true among the U.S. airlines, where people involved with social media are frequently doing the function as a part-time job (intern) or simultaneously with another job. Given the flow of information, this is virtually a guarantee of failure.”
And, besides the staffing issue, there has to be a commitment to social media from the highest levels of the corporation — and the will to succeed.
When will these legacy ever learn what it is all about in today’s world. Just posted a great article about how Air New Zealand is successfully marketing itself on the social web. It all starts with the corporate culture. If that is as closed as an oyster as it seems with AA and other major carriers, or (near) dysfunctional based on a long history of labor strife, we can’t expect them to truly get it. The results will be further brand erosion and points of attack for the nimble competitors out there.
Joe: Your point about changing corporate culture is right on the mark. Even if you have passionate social media employees within your ranks, they will hit a roadblock every time with a lack of buy-in at the top. That’s why is was sort of shocking to see United Airlines playing around on Twitter. The airline has been great on its fare sales, but apparently its engagement with customers has leveled off. And, one doesn’t go without the other.
The US airline industry has proven slow to adopt social media as a tool for engaging and communication with customers. No surprise considering airlines continually receive low marks for communicating with passengers especially during weather, system or mechanical related delays. Southwest Airlines is a standout given their dedicated staff monitoring social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter for passenger comments both good and bad. By monitoring what their customers are saying online, Southwest can address negative issues faster and continue programs receiving positive comments.
Twitter stepped in and took over the real-time communication aspect of social media, something that even news websites had failed to execute. The witnesses and participants of events were now ‘tweeting’ their experiences as they were happening, feeding audiences with pure insight and uncensored content. Although Twitter feels like a lose end waiting to be tied, its unusually exponential world-wide growing will sustain its community and – more importantly – create a connection among audiences that neither Facebook nor any other media can come close to reach.
To effectively use Twitter for marketing, without spending all your prescious time on Twitter, you need to set up a system. An efficient system that builds your Twitter following will establishes you as an authority in your niche, and will effectively promote your product, service, business.