Avianca is Making a Rapid Ascent to Exceed Customer Expectations

In few industries are expectations for service as high as in travel and hospitality. People are naturally excited about their upcoming trips and want every detail to go as smoothly as possible. Airlines in particular feel the pressure as consumers expect their travel providers to delight them while offering a challenging mix of low fares and exceptional services.

Rising traveler expectations have fostered a hyper-competitive industry in which airlines continually search for an advantage, even as they deal with flight delays and cancellations, price fluctuations, global events, and other factors outside of their control.

As consumer demands push the industry forward, airlines need to adapt by rethinking customer experiences at every touch point and delivering information and services that appear tailor-made for each passenger. It’s daunting, but airlines have a lot to gain by becoming leaders in Customer Experience Management (CXM), which is why many are tackling the challenge with a sense of urgency.

Colombian airline Avianca is forging a path toward more personalized customer experiences at scale. The company is celebrating 100 years of business this year, but its sights are trained squarely on the future, with a vision of becoming “a digital company that flies planes.” For Avianca, that means organizing technology and processes around the customer, reducing customer´s effort to fulfill dreams and simplifying the whole journey.

Treat every customer like a first-class passenger

Given traditional approaches to services and marketing, putting customers at the center of every interaction is not easy, yet Avianca is well on its way to making it happen. To solve this problem, the company has employed a robust ecosystem of tools, including Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Adobe Experience Cloud, running on Microsoft Azure, to better understand customer needs, deliver personalized experiences, and ultimately grow the business. Avianca works with Accenture to make the most of the technology, designing exceptional experiences that delight customers as they interact with the airline through email, website, text, kiosks, call center, apps, and beyond. With Dynamics 365, the integrated technology platform enables a 360-degree view of customers, enabling customers to interact through digital channels run on Adobe as they go from exploring their travel options to booking to check-in and beyond. And throughout their journey, Avianca can reach them in helpful, personalized ways thanks to extensive automation.

For example, imagine an excited customer finalizing details for a vacation to Latin America. Avianca might use Adobe Campaign to send emails with offers for rental cars or villas in the area—communications that are both useful and timely. For a traveler struggling to change a flight because of weather delays, Avianca can follow up with an email that acknowledges the issue and helps resolve it. It’s this kind of insight and sensitivity that has driven a 20% open rate and a 450% increase in direct sales through email marketing.

The airline extends that same level of personalization to its website with Adobe Experience Manager, Adobe Target, and Adobe Audience Manager—increasing traffic 40% month over month and boosting online sales to $350 million. The marketing team is launching digital experiences faster to gain a competitive edge by offering in-demand services. For instance, more dynamic content means Avianca can adjust pricing at a moment’s notice or quickly launch details about a new route from Bogota to Miami.

The sky’s the limit

Of course, technology is only one part of Avianca’s customer-centric business transformation. The company nurtures a culture that encourages agility, creativity, and data-driven decisions and looks to inspire the marketing team to respond to changing customer expectations, while challenging the status quo. Avianca’s commitment to innovation and experimentation equips the company to better absorb inevitable turbulence in the airline industry and soar past the competition.

Avianca uses Adobe Experience Cloud and its content management, personalization, campaign marketing, and audience targeting solutions, along with Microsoft Azure, to deliver Customer Experience Management. Learn more here.

Hear more from Avianca at Adobe Summit – the Digital Experience Conference, on March 26-28 in Las Vegas.