SAGE Advice: Newspaper Ads Can Help Save the Airlines

By: Leo J. Shapiro and Steve Yahn Now is the time for newspapers to intensify their efforts to sell brand image advertising to an airline industry at a crossroads in their newspaper advertising as well as many other ways. As cost differences between airlines narrow, the battle for market share will increasingly be fought on the bases of actual and perceived amenities, from keeping flights on schedule to onboard service: that is, non-price aspects of the brand.

Brand is identity, everything an airline is or does and everything passengers think it is or does, good and bad. Brand names and logos are symbols that evoke memories of real and imagined experiences.

Air travel tends to be an unpleasant experience. As airlines cut corners and reduce passenger services to cut costs, they whittle away the amenities that soften the misery and so diminish brand equity. The percentage of passengers in our Leo J. Shapiro and Associates surveys giving unfavorable ratings of how they felt during their most recent trip increased six points from 26% in July 2002 to 32% in September 2005.

Airlines, challenged to enhance their brand image, turn to advertising and other communications to try to soften the negative impact that the unhappy travel experiences might have on their own brand as well as to denigrate the brand image of competitors.

In terms of brand image, our surveys indicate that passengers on Southwest recall every stage of their trip more favorably than other airline passengers recall their feelings about their most recent trip on a legacy airline such as United, American, or Delta. This is in part because Southwest concentrates not only on customer relations but also on effective media buying. According to Mike Bierne of Brandweek, Southwest spent more on media in 2004 than any other airline -- in fact, nearly as much as United, American, and Delta combined -- and continues to outspend its competitors in 2005.

Airlines have a leg up on many other categories when it comes to reaching interested eyeballs. Consumers reading ads as they shop actively for airline tickets happen to be heavy users of newspapers and other media. Our survey work indicates that active shoppers for air travel use a greater number of different types of media in a seven-day period (3.3) than planners who are not shopping (2.9). Those who are not in the market for air travel use the fewest number of different types of media in a seven-day period (2.6).

In a sample seven-day period, 38% of active shoppers for airline travel read a national newspaper such as the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and/or USA Today. In contrast -- in the same period -- only 14% of those household heads that are not in the market for air travel read one or more national newspaper. Among active shoppers for airline travel, 84% read a local newspaper in a seven-day period. Among those who are not in the market, 74% read local newspapers.

There is also a striking difference in use of the Internet for news in the past seven days between active shoppers for airline travel (66%), planners who are not shopping actively (51%), and those who are not in the market for air travel (32%). Similarly, use of blogs in the past seven days is more frequent for active shoppers (12%) than for planners (8%) than for those not in the market (3%).

Media not only carry news and advertising messages to prospective airline passengers, they are also useful to entertain and mitigate the misery of air travel. At a time when airlines should be encouraging media access, many are whittling away the magazine offerings available to passengers.

Why did it take a new airline company -- JetBlue -- to give every passenger access to a TV? The older airlines -- like American -- learned in the age of regulation to trim costs without regard to resultant change in passenger benefits. The newer airlines don't have this institutional memory, and are more likely to concentrate on passenger benefits, and then concern themselves with costs.

In summary, all airlines need to get news to passengers about traveler benefits they are providing. To tap the increasingly competitive market for air travel, airlines must advertise in newspapers to enhance the appeal of their brands. This represents an opportunity for all players in an advertising partnership -- newspapers themselves and their advertising and marketing staffs, as well as the airlines and their advertising agencies -- to forge strong brand associations, especially related to relative high points of air travel identified in our research, landing safely and leaving the airport.

The trick is to sell airplane tickets by marketing the joys of visiting friends and relatives and visiting special places. But the time to do so is now, with holiday and winter resort ticket buying coming to the forefront of the minds of consumers.

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-- As Christmas approaches, SAGE will chart and analyze holiday sales outlook trends and developments for both Editor & Publisher and atwww.sagegrowth.com, a site that tracks a variety of business-minded consumer behavior and media trends.