Key Takeaways
- Reclaim your customer journey. Use verified offers to bypass OTAs, book customers directly, and collect permissioned data to drive personalized re-engagement.
- Stop revenue leaks. Use authoritative verification to prevent offer abuse and increase ROI.
- Create a modern loyalty program. Use verified data to create truly personalized loyalty programs that recognize who customers are and lead to a lifetime of bookings.
Every year, airlines spend millions of dollars to get travelers to book flights, but many passengers book through online travel agencies (OTAs). This leaves airlines paying high commissions for customers without any means to re-engage them to nurture their loyalty. It’s a costly acquisition strategy that always leads to a dead end.
But there’s a way to own the entire customer journey. With verified, exclusive offers airlines can attract and book key customers on their website, protect their margins, and collect data to build loyalty to their brand, not a third party.
The Triple Threat to Airline Growth
You already know your airline faces tight margins, earning an average of just $7.90 profit on every fare. Three major issues squeeze your business even further.
Lack of Customer Ownership
When travelers book flights through third-party channels, the OTA retains your customer data and contact information. You have to repeatedly pay high acquisition costs to reach the exact same customer for future trips. It’s a vicious cycle that drains profits.
Offer Abuse and Margin Leakage
Some airlines try to attract direct bookings by giving exclusive offers to groups like students and the military. But without an authoritative way to verify eligibility, these offers are widely leaked, cutting into profits when ineligible travelers redeem the discount. Airlines lose approximately 1.2% of total online revenue to fraud annually. With profit margins a slim 4% across airlines, that’s nearly 30% of their entire net profit potential.
Ineffective Loyalty Programs
Most loyalty programs track financial transactions through points and tiers, essentially treating all travelers the same. This leaves passengers feeling anonymous, when what they really want is to be seen and rewarded for who they are.
They also expect more from a loyalty program, and are more willing to switch or cancel programs if they’re not satisfied. In the coming year, more than 50% of consumers plan to cancel their membership in a loyalty program, and as many as 10% of consumers will switch loyalty programs within an industry.
Without a means to verify consumers, airlines can’t really own their customers, protect offers from abuse, or give travelers the kind of personalized rewards they want.
How Airlines Can Own the Full Customer Journey
Audience verification gives you full control of your customers from the moment they book. Instead of relying on OTAs, or running universal offers that eat into margins, you can give verified, exclusive offers to your key customers. This creates direct booking and an ongoing, profitable value exchange. Here’s how it works.
- Launch an Exclusive Offer. Create an offer that recognizes a group you want to engage, like a discount for college students heading into spring break. Promote it through all your channels.
- Instantly verify customers on-site. Use an audience marketing platform to instantly verify a customer’s eligibility within your booking flow.
- Protect your margins. Verification that uses authoritative data sources prevents offer abuse and increases ROI.
- Nurture passenger loyalty. Use the verified data you collect to re-engage customers with personalized offers, like giving students a free checked bag when they return to book their summer travel.
Reclaim Revenue and Loyalty with Verified Offers
Giving exclusive offers to key groups and verifying a traveler’s eligibility for them eliminates the business threats you face by empowering you to build direct, profitable, and lifelong relationships with them.
Reclaim Customers
Exclusive offers are highly appealing. More than 80% of consumers check to see if a brand offers an exclusive deal to their community before making a purchase. Giving them to key groups is a highly effective way for you to bring customers directly to your website, bypass OTAs, and avoid costly commissions.
And, when a customer redeems your offer, you collect valuable permissioned data that gives you actionable insight. This enables every subsequent exchange to be more personal and relevant.
Plug Margin Leaks
Verifying eligibility for an offer using authoritative data sources avoids the pitfalls of the honor system, which gouge profits. Secure offers protect your margins, lower CAC, and drive higher ROI.
Transform Loyalty through Recognition
Travelers don’t want generic loyalty points. They want genuine relationships with airlines that see and value them. With verified offers, you can stream the permissioned data you collect into your CRM, loyalty, and other martech platforms and create personalized rewards that make your airline stand out.
And rewards don’t have to be discounts to be effective. You can:
- Give students a free carry-on, even with economy fares
- Have a free wellness kit waiting for healthcare workers at their seat
- Waive seat selection fees for educators
- Give the military priority boarding and complimentary lounge access.
Rewarding a passenger’s identity is a more meaningful exchange that makes them remember your airline and choose it first.
Build a Flightpath to Modern Loyalty
The airline brands winning today are the ones using verified offers to bypass OTAs, make customers feel seen, and collect data that provides actionable insights that lead to greater loyalty. Don’t let third-party middlemen control your audience and erode your margins. Visit our airline web page to learn how verified offers can help you turn one-time flyers into lifelong brand advocates. Or contact us to book a demo.