AirHelp Solution ReportTeam 7

e-Concept Development1 semesterProject 2

Veronica Andersen, Doug Costello, Jonas Hertz Kristina Peledaite, Christine Braun Haugaard, Hellai Ahmadi, Group 4

1

Christine Braun Haugaard

Kristina Peledaite Hellai Ahmadi

Doug Costello Veronica Andersen

Jonas Hertz

Group 4

2

INTRODUCTION 3Company 3Client goal 3Summary of insight report 3Project management break down 3SOLUTION DESRICPTION 4Overview/ Description 4Remaking Airhelp’s communication 4Launch Plan 4DAGMAR Marketing Communication Model 5Budget 6Feasability 6Sub-conclusion 6Users 7Persona 7User scenario 7Graphic concept 8Needle communication model 8Graphic design solution 9

Future possibilities 10CONCLUSION 10APPENDIX 11

3

INTRODUCTIONAfter examining the market and establishing the main competi-tion and obstacles AirHelp must overcome, a solution can then be produced to implement the changes needed, in order to meet the clients demands. In order to create a successful and long term strategy for Airhelp in the global market, it is necessary to test the solution on a small-er scale, with a plan for future growth. Therefore Denmark will be used as the test market. This was chosen due to the proximity and knowledge of the customer base and culture.

Client goalAs stated in the client pitch on 08.04.2012 AirHelp’s goal is to cre-ate a social media campaign, with the aim of raising awareness of their service, promoting their company and turning the interest into claims.

Now that the back of house operations can handle a larger flow of traffic, the main objective of the company is PR to bring in a large and constant flow of new claims which will turn into success-ful compensation pay outs.

AirHelp aims to break into the global market and therefore they need to create strategic partnerships in order to provide and manage their service in many different languages and cultures.

Summary of the insight reportAirHelp’s service is only for air travellers, whose flight has been delayed, overbooked or cancelled and in the insight report it has been established that the highest potential from a target group is air travellers between 30-49 years old, who often travel with their family, one to three times a year.

According to the insight analysis AirHelp has to make sure that they are perceived as a trustworthy and competent service to at-

tract the B2B connections, and be less aggressive in their commu-nication on a B2C level. To gain the market leadership they desire, it is necessary to change their communication angle and it is also very important for the company to establish a professional identity that is reliable and clearly states its aims and values.

Project Management BreakdownDuring the insight phase the group wrote post-its with any ideas that came to mind for a later reminder. The group agreed from the beginning of the solution phase, which direction the solution should take, and then roughly formulated the description togeth-er, so everybody kept the same mindset.

As a starting point the group discussed the individual skills and ambitions, which gave an overview of what was possible to cre-ate. The composition of the group were very diversified, which meant everybody could contribute with their own knowledge and expertise. Even though the group were a ahead of schedule, time was limited and a delegation of all tasks were needed. A Project Breakdown Table were created to give an overview of the struc-ture of the report. The subjects were extended to an Information Radiator, which were supplied with additional practical tasks. The tasks were delegated to each group member according to skills and interest.

Even though the responsibility of the tasks relied on single persons, it was everybody’s responsibility to make sure every aspect of the solution was handled. The agreement basically consisted of help-ing others and exchanging tasks whenever a person were done with his or her own tasks. Due to the shorter time span for the solu-tion phase, a detailed deadline plan were created and working hours agreed.

As in the insight phase, the communication tools were dropbox for larger file sharing, google docs for writing report and Facebook for communicating and sharing links.The working structure from the insight phase were continued with morning status meetings as well

4

as an afternoon agreement of individual tasks. The biggest concern of the solution phase was the possibility of confusion and misunderstanding of each other because of sep-arate group work in the beginning, but a clear agreement about being online and supporting each other prevented these obsta-cles. The group has in general worked very efficiently together, which were mainly caused by the diversity of personal skills and same level of ambition.

SOLUTION DESCRIPTIONOverview/ DescriptionThe solution is based on forming links and a working relationship with Danish travel agencies, such as Spies, Apollo Rejser and Star Tour. The research shows that the target group the solution should aim to communicate with uses these services to book their travel. These companies have an established community following in social media AirHelp could exploit and a possibility for adding Air-Help as part of their product portfolio to present to new customers.This would be a mutually beneficial link, as it provides the travel agencies with an extra service, or after service, to their clients for no cost. Currently the travel insurance they can offer their clients does not cover flight delays or cancellations. However they could present to their clients that, if there is such a case, Airhelp can provide a no risk service with the expertise to fight for a rightful compensation.

To AirHelp this not only increases the awareness of their service, but also opens a communication channel to their target group, through the use of the partner companies social media following, which, between the three mentioned travel agencies, currently consists of approx 250,000 likes on Facebook. If the partner com-panies were to post on their Facebook wall that any of their cus-tomers that have experienced delays or cancellations, within the

last 3 years, could be entitled to compensation, all the customers have to do is send their flight information to AirHelp, with zero risk. If AirHelp don’t win they don’t get paid.This would create a huge amount of new business for AirHelp, whilst providing the travel agencies with an extra, after service to their customers.

Remaking AirHelp’s communicationThrough research of AirHelp’s communication on online platforms, it is found that they have a very hostile and aggressive attitude towards the airlines. Most of AirHelp’s communication with cus-tomers appears through Facebook. They appear to make the airlines “the bad guys” that they have to fight against. Every time they win a case, they post a banner on their Face-book wall among other posts with “9 gag jokes” and posts like this: The posts and banners up until now are clearly aimed or would be appreciated by a younger audience. They are targeting active Facebook users in an attempt at producing a viral effect of shar-ing funny pictures. This does not fit into the method of B2B profes-sionalism the solution is aiming for. It also limits the accessibility of reaching the target audience, which is an older and more mature segment of the population. In order to attract the frequent flyer segment, which is the target group of our solution, they need to change the tone of this to be clear, believable and honest.

Launch PlanThe first step is to update and re-brand AirHelp. Their current atti-tude of communication focuses on the battle of beating airlines, which they continually emphasise as trying to avoid at all costs

5

paying out compensation. Publicly trying to shame other com-panies, no matter what amount of truth behind, can be seen as highly unprofessional and diminishes AirHelps ability to form lasting and constructive links with other companies.So therefore there is laid out a new and more productive form of communication that AirHelp should implement in all of their social media efforts.

Once this is in place, and when AirHelp appears to other compa-nies as professional and reliable, the process of forming links with the travel agencies can start, which is seen as the most effective and useful to further the growth of AirHelp. By emphasising the selling points as being an extra service they can give to their clients, it will tempt these large companies into forming a working relationship with AirHelp. The most simple and cheapest way to get the message out to the target group would be to use the travel agencies already established followers on Facebook.

Simply having the agency to post a message along the lines of “To any of our customers that have experienced delays of 3 or more hours, flight cancellations or overbooking, we would like to help you obtain compensation that you are legally entitled to. By emailing your travel details to our partner company AirHelp, they will handle the claim process and will not charge anything at all unless you win the claim, at which point they would take 25% of the compensation to cover their time investment. There is no risk, if you don’t win you don’t pay, so therefore goodluck and we hope you will receive compensation for your bad experience”, with a link or advertising material to AirHelp. This will surely bring in a huge increase in claims for AirHelp, which they then can turn into suc-cessful claims.

DAGMAR Marketing Communication ModelDefining Advertising Goals for Measured Advertising Results. Ac-cording to the DAGMAR Model the ultimate objective of advertis-ing involves a communication task, intended to create awareness,

impart information, develop attitude and induce action.The ultimate objective is to carry a consumer through four levels of understanding: AwarenessThe initial communication task is to increase the consumers awareness of the product. Before the purchase behaviour is expected from the target audience, it is necessary to make the audience aware of AirHelp’s service. This is done through using the partner compa-nies existing customer base, through the use of social media.

ComprehensionExclusively awareness is not sufficient to stimu-late a purchase, knowledge and information about the service AirHelp offers is necessary. This step involves the target audience to learn that they have rights under EU law and that AirHelp can take away all the hassle and fight for the claim for their customers.

Attitude or ConvictionAt this step the communication task is to mould the audience’s beliefs about the product. A sense of conviction should be established. By creating interest and providing all the necessary knowledge, the target audience can be moved into a position, where they are convinced that AirHelp is a reliable service that fights for their rights and therefore should be used at the next opportunity.

ActionFinally, the communication must encourage the target group to act on what they have learned and to send their flight information to AirHelp to facilitate the claim process

DAGMAR marketingcomunication model

6

Budget 0 DKK• internal hours (handling claims and contact to travel agencies)• external hours (making graphical work for advertisement and

new identity and develop new concept)• advertising (through Facebook, travel agencies and second-

arily google)

This concept is build around the constraint that there is no budget, which is considered exclusive working hours both internal and ex-ternal. The internal labour is already established within the compa-ny. By external labour means Group 4 working for free analysing, developing the business model and doing the graphical work for the solution and advertisement.

The advertisement should primarily go through channels of travel agencies and their Facebook sites. This way AirHelp can advertise without any costs. Secondarily, awareness of the concept can be gained for free through their earned media on Facebook and when a marketing budget is available they can further the aware-ness of their service through Google adwords and search engine optimisation (SEO).

FeasibilityTaking into account that AirHelp expects a solution with a budget of 0 dkk. the concept has to be presented with the right angle.After successfully rebranding AirHelp as a customer based service, presented as professional and trustworthy, the different travel agencies based in Denmark can then be contacted.

The most established agencies such as Star Tour and Falk Laurit-sen Rejser have a huge following in social media. Between these three companies alone they have approximately 240,000 likes and followers on Facebook. This presents a unique opportunity to communicate on an extremely large scale with our target group, for little to no money.

By presenting the partnership as only beneficial to these com-panies, they are able to offer their clients an additional service during the booking procedure. As well as being able to offer an after service in case any of their clients have experienced difficul-ties in travelling over the last three years. The major selling point is that this comes with with zero investment or expense on their part, therefore the client can expect increased interest.

To fully investigate the likelihood of success for the solution con-cept, two danish travel agencies have been contacted; Start Tour and Apollo, to clarify whether these companies would be interest-ed in this partnership.

Through the replies from the phone- and mail interviews(Appendix 1.1), it can be concluded that travel agencies have been han-dling complaints and compensation in- house, but only in case of extraordinary circumstances.

As the media awareness has spread the message of the EU reg-ulation and the possibility of filing in claims in terms of delays and cancellations, they will need to adjust their business model and in-clude a service, similar to the service AirHelp is offering. Right now the travel agencies don’t see this as adding an extra value to their product and do not take a percentage of the successful claims. Both of the companies contacted had trouble seeing themselves as partners with companies as AirHelp.

Sub- ConclusionIn principle, the solution is beneficial to both parties involved, and should be a successful union. However the responses received from the travel agencies, that have been contacted, suggests that although they are aware of the concept as a new business, they are very hesitant to being involved and offering it as a ser-vice.

One major factor that must be considered is that travel agencies work with the airlines to provide their customers with the best offers

7

that are available. They must therefore be hesitant to provide a service that directly affects their other working relationships.

However, the agencies have acknowledged that because of the media attention about travel compensation, there is a larger num-ber of the population that is becoming aware of their legal rights. They have therefore handled any claims that have come from their clients in- house, without taking any percentage. With increased awareness they can expect an increase in the number of claims they must deal with. They must therefore make the choice of whether to increase their in- house service, without gaining any income from it. Or to be given the opportunity to fully cover this as a part of their product portfolio, without any expense or extra labour, by partnering with a company such as AirHelp.

To counter the hesitancy AirHelp must present the benefit of the partnership in the right manner, They will have to make the travel agencies aware of the increase in this market, with honest and reli-able data. Again the form of their communication will be key to a successful partnership.

UsersPersonaA persona will create an image of the targeted family to whom the solution will be tailored. The Jensen’s are a Danish family that live in Copenhagen. Both parents Maria and Tom are working and they have an average Danish income each month. Tom is 40 years old and he works as a manager in Shell department. Maria is 34 years old and she is a biology teacher in Frederiksberg Gymnasium. They have a seven year old daughter, Diana, who has just started primary school. Everyone in this family have a busy schedule and engage in many activities after work, meaning they do not have a lot of time to be together. During the summer they plan to have the vacation in Greece. They order online tickets by using Star Tour travel agency. The

family has pre- ordered their flights three months in advance. Their flight date is 15th of July. In the morning of the flight day they arrive to the Airport to check in and find out that the flight was over-booked, they have lost their place on the plane and are being moved to a new flight two days later. They already have booked and paid for hotels and cannot have extra time off work, meaning their holiday is cut short and they still have to pay for the nights at the hotel they cannot use. Clearly this is a very upsetting and frus-trating experience, one in which they should be entitled to being compensated for.

User scenario

8

Graphic conceptThe overall graphic style of AirHelp is clean and minimalistic, which is directly integrated in the banners and ad-work for this solution. The photos AirHelp use for their website is in the moment darkened Stock’photos with white text across. The Facebook and ad-work has a broad variety of different styles, which sends mixed signals that have the possibility of leaving the customer confused of what AirHelp stands for. Therefore it is very important that AirHelp cleans up their graphic communication, so the expression is clear and coherent which would minimize potential confused customers.

The website of Airhelp is generally having a very clear professional massage, and hereby does not need any major make-over. There are a few minor details that AirHelp should consider implementing on their site. These concerns social icons, which generally more and more have a standard placement and looks on professional pages.

The readability of the page would be improved by using a black and white photo of the background image. The colors used at AirHelp’s website is reused in the solution graph-ics, which is a color span of green, blue, grayscale, black and white. The symbolic meanings behind blue and green adds the qualities of truthfulness, honesty and playfulness which match the message the solution.

The graphic part of this solution is mainly based upon a re-make of their Facebook profile, by removing all of their pictures that does not match with the solution design. All the platforms that AirHelp is using should be coherent and state the same message and style. The banners and ad-works takes base in the black and white background image with coloured text across, with a short very clear message. To collaborate with the travel agencies look and style the black and white background should be incline to a whiter look.

Needle communication modelThe needle model is used as a newer version of Laswell’s 5 H’s , and is directed to send a message to a recipient.

• Sender: The sender is Airhelp. The company’s views and opin-ions are expressed throughout the solution.

• Encoding: The solution will be produced on web-based plat-forms, so information may be spread over the Internet.

• Message: The message of communication is that Airhelp is an simple way to claim, that the company will take the stress of confrontation away and handle all aspects of the process, only informing the client once their claim has been rewarded.

• Noise: Social media can distract people because lots of peo-ple are spending their time by navigating through different so-cial media sites, where the possibility to lose focus of the prima-ry task. AirHelp’s competitors can also act as noise as they can steal attention away from the company.

• The media: The solution is tailored to be used through social media, which can be accessed by any device connected to the internet.

• Decoding: The target group is Danish families that use social media, which means that the target group has a high accessi-bility to decode the message.

• Recipient: The recipient will primarily be the target group.• Effect: The effect of the message can be seen on the increase

of claims.

Needle communication model

9

Graphic design solutions

10

Future PossibilitiesThe focus initially will be on the Danish market and therefore fo-cus on Danish travel agencies. However, once the partnerships are in place and AirHelp can clearly document the benefit it has brought to each party involved, they can start to construct simi-lar links throughout Europe. One of the major constraints that has been established in the insight report, is that each country will have a need of different communication, depending on culture.

Establishing links with large and experienced travel agencies, such as Expedia that operates throughout Europe removes this issue. They will know their client base and know the correct tone in which to communicate to them, they will also have the multiple language options in place. Expedia currently has a 1.7m following on Facebook. If the larger market leaders are unwilling or unable to form part-nerships, AirHelp can also target the middle players in different countries around Europe. Similar sized companies as in the Danish market. In this way the awareness can spread throughout europe, being specifically targeted to the countries most likely to use their service.

If AirHelp is simply the experienced and trustworthy middle man, that will handle the claims to benefit the customer and fight for their legal rights, this message should translate to any culture.If this is successful, AirHelp can spread the awareness of their ser-vice all around Europe through the use of social media, without the need of individually targeted marketing campaigns and also without the need to invest in marketing.

ConclusionThe solution depends on AirHelp’s ability and open mindedness to adapt their communication. Creating B2B partnerships is the most effective and cheapest way to further the awareness of their ser-vice. However large, established businesses are currently unlikely to want to form these links with a company that comes across as overly aggressive and publicly mocks airlines.

By re-branding AirHelp’s tone and method of communication towards the customers, they will appear much more professional and more likely to capture the support of their target group, mak-ing the customers ambassadors of their service.

The B2B partnerships need to be presented as a mutually benefi-cial cooperation. AirHelp can provide the travel agencies with an additional service to give to their clients, as well as an after service for existing customers, for no cost. Whilst the travel agencies can provide the established customer base and communication plat-form through their social media following, again for no cost.

AirHelp must counter the hesitancy of travel agencies to be in-volved in the claim process. It must be made clear that as the agency covers all manner of details for their clients travel plans, and because of an increase in the publics awareness, they will be expected to handle compensation claims. They must be made to see that partnering with AirHelp will give them the option of pro-viding their clients with an extra service, whilst having no extra cost or increased labour.

Once the partnerships have been formed in the Danish test mar-ket, AirHelp can collect quantifiable data proving the benefit of the co-operation, present this to travel agencies that operate throughout Europe with a large market share, such as Expedia and form a similar working relationship with them.

If this partnership is obtainable, companies such as Expedia have a following of around 1.7m likes on social media, throughout Eu-rope. If AirHelp can gain a communication platform with such a large customer base, they company will grow exponentially.

Our clients goal was to spread the awareness of their service, using a social media platform with 0 dkk. budget. They also state they intend to form strategic partnerships in order to expand to a global market. This solution fulfills the criteria.

11

APPENDIXAppendix 1.1 - Interviews with Star Tour and Falk Lauritsen Rejser

We contacted the following companies either by phone or mail and got replies from Star Tour on telephone and Falk Lauritsen Rejser through email.

www.Bravotours.dkwww.Jet-time.dkwww.Hojmark.dkwww.Suntours.dkwww.Kronegolftours.dkwww.Green2green.dkwww.Falklauritsen.dkwww.Temarejser.dkwww.spies.dkwww.apollo.dkwww.startour.dk

Interview guide:Hej, mit navn er Jonas Kan jeg blive stille om til en ansvarlig for marketing? - jeg kommer fra Københavns Erhvervs Akademi og er i gang med et projekt vedrørende kompensation ved flyforsinkelser. Må jeg stille nogle hurtige spørgsmål. Det tager højst et par minut-ter.

Spøgsmål:● Kan i forestille jer et fremtidigt samarbejde med en virksom-hed som kan hjælpe jeres kunder med at inddrive kompensation fra flyselskaber ved forsinkelser eller aflysninger? ● Tror du at det kan skabe en ekstra værdi for jeres kunder, hvis i tilbyder hjælp med inddrivelse af potentielle kompensa-tioner?Tak for hjælpen. God dag

Answers:STARTOUR Telephone interview tlf: 70 10 10 50/ Head of marketing, Jacob

1) We can not imagine a such cooperation. Companies like those we see as competitors. Besides that we do not believe that their numbers are as good as they present them, and if we could see their statistics I guess it would not be an attractive market.

2) Yes and no. requires that you are entitled to it and the fact that 99 out of 100 goes in vain, means that we do not see a value. We are afraid to love our customers too much, plus there is a lot hap-pening with the law these days.Besides that, we are part of http://www.airsweden.aero/en/.

FALK LAURItSEN REJSER Mail interview / Owner, Søren Falk Lauritsen)Thanks for your mail. 1) Since we are a holiday-organizer, and produces only travel with our own aircraft, we operate under slightly different rules than passengers traveling on scheduled flights in case of delays. For example, you have the possibility to cancel the flights are not in our terminology.Your question is not very relevant for us since we will always take action on customer / guest’s behalf - as we are each guest’s con-tractual partner. 2) So the bottom line is that we can not imagine working with an external company for recovery of compensation, and it will not be able to create additional value for our customers, as it is already one of our tasks to ensure compensation to our guests when the conditions are met.

Good luck with the project.Med venlig hilsenFalk Lauritsen Rejser