Author Archive

15 September 2017

You don’t have to look too far to see that any well-meant efforts by loyalty and customer experience departments often don’t translate into something tangible in practice at airlines. They often stop even well before you ever board the plane.

05 September 2017

This year has already seen two major failures of spin-off FFPs, putting a likely end to what many claimed to be the big trend a few years ago. But some elements in the spin-off model might be worth to be kept with a slightly different approach.

22 August 2017

Compared to other industries, the travel industry has the advantage that many customers have a natural high level of engagement. This is, first of all, a tremendous opportunity for our industry. But at the same time a risk, too.

16 August 2017

While Air Berlin had time to prepare for that moment, the worst communication scenario is unfolding right now, especially for its frequent flyers. It is a bit surprising that anything like that can still happen these days.

02 August 2017

Well-designed loyalty programs should manage to increase revenues, through increasing revenues with existing customers and/or through reaching out to new customers. But many programs fail to do so – and might still be considered successful.

28 July 2017

The three big Gulf carriers find themselves, all of a sudden, in difficult conditions, although for very different reasons. As this is new territory for at least two of them, it will be interesting to watch what this will mean for their FFPs.

13 June 2017

Earlier this month, the latest low cost carrier, Level, took to the skies. It has opted to use the Iberia Plus program as loyalty product, underlining how different strategies at LCCs actually are. Its short-haul sibling Vueling, for instance, has an own program.

31 May 2017

The best loyalty work sometimes evaporates in the blink of an eye if something goes wrong beyond the boundaries of the loyalty program as such. But is this really just fate or can (and should) businesses prepare for such situations?

12 May 2017

Air Canada’s announcement to launch an own Frequent Flyer Program in 2020 did not come as true surprise, but marks nevertheless an important turning point in the industry. The spin-off of loyalty programs is dead. Well, it was never really alive.

07 April 2017

The best days of airline alliances seem to be over, with other forms of cooperation models gaining importance in the airline industry. This might complicate things for frequent flyers, but doesn’t make them necessarily worse. And new challenges are on the horizon for loyalty managers.