Frontier Airlines. Have you ever flown them? It's an experience...and the first experience for this traveler was a little, well, how should I say it? Conflicting...that's the word, conflicting. When flying a "budget" airline, my expectations are usually in line with the cost of the flight...low!
So let's start counting my surprises. There are parents with their children and the children's grandparents EVERYWHERE. Pretty much in line with my expectations...but this is when it happens. The little boy (who announces he has to go potty) runs to his mom and says, "don't tell me who it is, I want to be surprised." HUH? I ignored it and continued my walk to the gate. I pass a few airline gates and hear "I think it was the bear." Then I hear "I watched Rachael Ray on my flight." Now I'm listening.
The same little boy comes RUNNING...I mean flat out sprint as fast as his 5 year old legs will take him...running, "did I miss it?" This time, his dad yells back, "Hurry, the plane is pulling up now." All of this running and yelling and rushing and whispering was about the animal on the tail of the Frontier Airlines plane. Our partner in flight this fine Sunday was Montana the Elk. And everyone thought that was the coolest thing ever.
Frontier Airlines launched a brand awareness campaign asking its passengers and anyone within earshot of one of their commercials to vote on their favorite animal, each having it's own name and voice. This ran for what seemed like months, and everyone was talking about it, including our local news channels...and that was free for Frontier! The anchors of the evening news were talking about who they voted for...you can't buy that kind of publicity...LITERALLY!
When was the last time another airline asked you what you thought about them? Or for that matter, when was the last time ANYONE asked you what you thought of their business, especially about something so inane as the animal on the tail of an aircraft? I am guessing your answer was, "never." Right, mine too. But you don't get voted best in class if you don't.
Everyone was so happy. The ticket agent, gate agent, flight attendants, passengers, EVERYONE was smiling. I thought it was endearing. Then I learned that each seat on my plane had it's own DirecTV with 20someodd channels. Now I am smiling...Rachael Ray on my flight, and as much commercial surfing as I can do for as long as my flight is!
I could ramble on and on about this experience, and the several subsequent, on-time, plenty of frills Frontier Airlines flights I have taken. I gave up American Airlines Gold Status for DirecTV and Sun Chips.
So what can we, as professional marketers learn from this? I can't give away all the secrets, but I can ask you to think. And ask yourselves a few simple questions:
What makes us different? (Lower prices? Maybe. Better tchatchkis? Probably not.)
Do your customers/members talk about you? (What do they say?)
Do they look forward to their next visit?
Have your customers/members become indifferent about you?
A financial institution isn't that much different from any other retail or commercial business. You and your competition are offering almost identical products at almost identical prices...I challenge you to find what makes you different, what makes you better, faster and stronger and capitalize on it!!!
See you soon,
Jenna
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