I’m not afraid to admit I’m a type-A personality who sometimes sleeps with my Blackberry and considers someone tardy five minutes before a scheduled appointment. But for some reason when I step on a plane I consider it my excuse to sit back, relax, read a People magazine (print!) or watch a good chick flick on the in-flight entertainment system. I don’t especially like or dislike flying, but it’s my chance to catch up on some of life’s indulgences off the grid.

In the past several weeks I’ve made two cross country flights on major carriers (which I’ll refrain from mentioning), complete with rude flight attendants, lost luggage, no on-flight entertainment, and even running out of bottled water. The days of cushy and comfortable air travel are gone, thanks to packed flights due to decreased trips. It’s a pain, and speaking for other business travelers, I’m more closely weighing the benefits of enjoying my flight at the risk of shelling out more money. So what does this have to do with social media?

After one flight I complained about my luggage being misplaced until two in the morning by one of the biggies. Shortly after that Virgin America’s saucy Twitter account started following me. I followed back, as I’d never flown them but had heard some positive buzz. Watchers of the social media landscape recognized the savvy of popular airline JetBlue a couple of years ago (which boasts more than 1.4 million Twitter followers), but Virgin America is making some significant headway connecting with travelers online. According to a story by Damian Joseph of BusinessWeek, the company relies heavily on sites like Twitter and Facebook, as opposed to significant, traditional ad spends.

I‘m assuming that the follow of me was intentional, as someone saw my frustration with a competitor. Needless to say the other airline didn’t apologize, showing me they weren’t watching their brand on line as well as Virgin may have been.

Virgin America’s own Tweeter isn’t the only one singing the airlines praises– the company has an incredible set of satisfied customers eager to share their enjoyable experiences. A quick Twitter search tells me they have free WiFi right now, as excited travelers are sharing their joy.

It isn’t just WiFi that’s fueling this consumer-propelled word-of-mouth endorsement; it’s pretty easy to see that customer service is also a benefit for flyers, who in turn are spreading the word via Twitter.

As marketers, we know there is no more meaningful advertising than that which comes from an army of brand ambassadors. I’m sold, and I’m eager to try Virgin thanks the buzz I can’t seem to get away from.  I asked Nick Schwartz, social media lead for the airline and the human behind the Twitter account, to tell me a little more about the social media strategy.  Here is the company’s take.  

1)      What is your title and role with Virgin America? 

Nick Schwartz.  I’m the guy behind the tweet, and work closely with PR, marketing and our guest care team. 

 As the only California-based airline (and being based in Silicon Valley) we actually had a lot of staff who were already active in the digital space and Twitter even prior to our launch in Aug. 2007.  Launching as a new airline we have some interesting new technology on our planes, so we also had a lot of organic interest and fans on-line even before we started flying – so our social media sites were a natural extension of this and a great place for us to connect with our core fans and guests on sales, city announcements, and any new products – like our fleetwide WiFi roll-out.   Although we used Twitter informally for promotions and with staff in 2007, we formally launched the channels in early 2008. 

 2) BusinessWeek reported that Virgin America has replaced much of its traditional advertising with more affordable social media.  How would you say that’s benefited your overall marketing and PR efforts?                                    

We utilize our social media channels to help promote all of our launch events.  For our recent Fort Lauderdale launch event we encouraged people on the ground to tweet to guests onboard the inaugural flights at 35,000 feet – and for every one we pledged $1 to Virgin Unite’s Young Entrepreneurs program   The Young Entrepreneurs program will provide mentorship, business skills training and seed funding to young people facing difficult social and economic circumstances in the U.S.  Many people sent messages to the inaugural flights on November 18^th (hashtag:  #HelpVirginUnite) and we raised more than $2,500.  Additionally, on our Orange County launch flight on April 29, we hosted a social media experiment with two high-profile Twitterers — Hammer and iJustine to find out how people are using social media in the air.  We also hosted a Twittologue interview with Sir Richard Branson on that flight.   As a relatively new company, we generate a lot of interest on our new announcements and sales via PR and social media sites like Twitter.  We don’t have enormous ad budgets like most of our competitors – so it is a cost-effective way to inform guests and potential guests about us.  For example, we launched our new Boston-SFO and BOS-LAX service on 12/8 using primarily PR and word-of-mouth via social media (ads kicked in later) — and it was one of our highest single web traffic days of all time.

 3) It seems that the in-flight and customer service experience is fueling consumer endorsement online. Tell me a little about the companies philosophies? How do you get consumers to tell their friends about you via their social networks?

The informality and the real-time aspects of it gives us an instant connection to our guests, so we get immediate feedback about what’s working and what’s not – which is critical for us as a new carrier that is known for its award-winning guest service. (We recently won Condé Nast Traveler’s Best Domestic Airline Award for the second year running).  Probably, most notably for us is the fact that with WiFi at every seat – we’re getting feedback from people in the air.  For example, we recently received a message in-flight from a guest who was having trouble flagging down the in-flight team to order a meal. We sent a message to the plane and alerted the crew – and he was served.  It is also just a very different and more interesting way to engage our guests – who are very tech-savvy, appreciate the fact that we have power outlets under every seat and WiFi.  

 4) What is your social networking strategy?

Our social media efforts really came as a natural extension of who we are and who our customers are.  Launching as a new airline (and being based in Silicon Valley) we have some interesting new technology on our planes, so we also had a lot of organic interest with bloggers and other online audiences even before we started flying.  Our social media sites were a natural extension of this and a great place for us to connect with our core fans and guests on sales, announcements, and new products – like our fleetwide WiFi roll-out.  

5) You’ve also gathered a number of friends on Facebook. How do you keep them engaged?

We’ve found that updates have to be attuned to our audience around real news and updates that travelers would find useful or interesting – with a mix of interesting promotions.

6) I’m assuming you are closely monitoring the conversations happening around the brand online. How do you insert yourself in those conversations and decide how and what to respond to?   

It is a great informal engagement tool and for us – as a new carrier with some pretty unique features, it has been an amazing platform to build a community of “converts” and bring together our brand evangelists.  We have posts from people saying “I wish my flight was longer” or raving about being able to play DOOM via the touch-screen.  And with full WiFi on every flight, guests are now connecting in real time to us from 35,000 feet.  It is a great informal way to connect with those guests. 

7) Do you think customer service is evolving due to social media?

Certainly.  And again, for us the fact that with WiFi at every seat means that our guests can and often do provide us with real time feedback while they’re at 35,000 feet.

Rachel Kay is president of RKPR, a boutique agency specializing in national consumer brands. In addition to co-founding SoCalPRBlog, she also writes at www.CommuniKaytrix.com. You can follow her on Twitter here.

3 Responses to “Nice to Tweet You Virgin America”