Due to the advent and
the widespread use of the Internet and the World Wide Web, many firms today
have come to adopt many of the services that are being offered by the Internet
like use of websites, the social media among others. This has led to the growth
of the presence of many firms online so as to gain a competitive edge in their
areas of operation. For the success of any business today, it has to have its
presence online, advertising its products through the social media and also
their own websites. I will be looking into the virtual PR of two rival firms in
the UAE – Etihad Airways and the Emirates. I will analyze their websites, their
efforts in the use of the social media and their establishment of a presence
online.
Etihad Airways
The first thing a person sees when they access the
Etihad website is their logo that is on top of the page. Then there are some
tabs and drop down menus that are also on top of the page. These serve various
functions and are labeled differently as can be seen above. They aid in making
the customer experience better either in booking or even knowing of the
services that are offered by the airline. For instance, the Plan and Book tab,
drops down a menu with various options like:
- They have a guest log in and sign up option where one can log in so as to access the various services offered by the airline.
- Book a Flight (here, one is given the payment options),
- Book flights with Miles
- Book Stopovers
- Multi-city booking
- Book cars
- Book chauffeur
- Book rail
- Book coach
- Book groups
- Etihad Meet & Greet
- Flight timetables
- Our home Abu Dhabi (shows what Abu Dhabi has to offer like: Sporting activities, Shopping guide, Famous landmarks, Family entertainment, Culture and Heritage, Hotels and Resorts)
- Extra legroom seating
- Branded Fares
The Etihad Experience tab shows the services that
are offered when one is flying Etihad. They include:
- Family Travel
- Special assistance (for expectant mothers and medical assistance)
- On board (these are services offered while on board like Diamond First Class, Pearl Business Class, Coral Economy Class, Inflight entertainment, Fine dining, Duty free, Younger guests,
- Airport lounges (First class, Business Class, and Worldwide).
- Etihad TV commercial
- Etihad Chauffeur
- Etihad Express
- Our fleet
- Premium Connect
Before you fly tab shows the activities that can be
done before boarding an Etihad plane. They include:
- Manage my booking
- Check-in online
- City check-in
- Flight status
- Baggage information (shows the various issues concerning baggage like: Allowances and charges, Allowances for US/Canada/Brazil, Excess baggage discount, Delayed or missing baggage, Prohibited items, Pets and sports)
- Airport information (Terminal 1 Abu Dhabi, Terminal 3 Abu Dhabi, World airports)
- Visas
There is also a Deals tab that shows all the deals
that the airline offers and even how one can subscribe for emails that show the
deals and promotions
The Destinations tab displays the destinations that
the Etihad Airways fly to. They cover almost all continents.
There is also the Etihad Guest and the About Us tab
that shows the general information of the airline.
As a means of showing their consumer their superior
service quality, they have a caption ‘Consistently Serving the Best’ where they
show their award of the World’s Leading Airline since 2009 t0 2013. The website
provides a form to be filled by customers when they want to book a flight, cars
or a Chauffeur. It makes work easier for the customer to fill in the details
that concern what they want to book and their destinations.
The website also shows the various deals offered
with respect to the location of the customer and also the destinations the
deals apply to. They also show various promotions that are offered at a
specific time by the airline. They also show case some of their services by use
of pictures like the luxury coach services, they chauffeurs among others.
At the bottom of the website we see the following.
These
are links that go into aiding the consumers know more about the airline.
Strengths
and Weaknesses of the Site
·
The site is easy to navigate.
·
Fast access to various services.
·
Self-sufficient where all the services
offered are found at one place with the services that come about due to the
presence of the airline like hotels.
·
It is safe to navigate as it does not
have links that lead to malicious sites.
·
Has a login and sign up option that aids
the customer to access their services.
·
Use of graphics is also strength.
Weaknesses
·
As compared to the Emirates website, the
graphics and the color choice used by the website is not good. Their color
choice is dull and not attractive to the eye.( www.etihad.com)
Media
relations
The
Etihad Airways has a widespread presence in the social media. In Facebook, they
have a page Etihad Airway/Facebook. It has 587, 309 likes.
Their presence on Facebook thus can be seen to be big as they have a massive
following. They also have various contests on the social site. Also they have
affiliated pages like Etihad Airways Cabin Crew which has 2,039 likes. There is
also an Etihad Airways fan page. It can be seen that the Airline has taken the
advantage of a social site like Facebook to propagate its presence online.
Their
prowess is not limited to Facebook only. They are also on twitter where they
have 39, 294 followers. Their twitter handle is @EtihadAirways. They also use
twitter for various things like customer care and help via their twitter handle
@EtihadHelp. Their deals can be accessed through @EtihadDeals. Guest rewards
through @EtihadRewards.
Consumer
relations
They
treat all their customers well and they have various packages tailored to suit
various customers. They also provide various services that are affiliated with
the airline business like car and hotel booking. They also provide online
booking of these services through their website so as to enhance the services
delivery. Their hostesses and the air crew also treat their customers well
ensuring customer satisfaction. The customer relations between Etihad and their
consumers are well maintained. For instance, the consumers are given a chance
to contact the firm through their website in the Contact us section or the help
section. They also have an email to use when one wants to contact them which is
guest@etihadguest.com. They also have Etihad
Guest Centers that are located all over the world so as to ease on their access
by their customers. Also, they have Etihad offices all over the world and one
can get their numbers from their websites. They also have customer relations
online through various social sites like Facebook, Twitter among others. They
have special contacts especially on twitter to deal with the needs of their
consumers (www.etihad.com).
Community
relations
The
Airways has gone a long way to give back to the community by promoting sports.
This can be seen by it sponsoring the football club Manchester City. It is also
a participant in the Abhu Dhabi Grand Prix. It also sponsors Scuderia Ferrari
in the Formula 1. This is a few of the sport and games it has sponsored. The
airline also has various social responsibility acts towards the environment,
the people and the communities globally. It can be seen where it aided in flood
relief in Pakistan , sponsoring Special Olympics team and the support for Deaf
Research Schools and Training Centres.
The
Emirates
The first thing one
notices on this site is the air hostesses who are attractive and dressed in
colorful attire. The passenger behind them seems happy to have used the
airline. For ease of access, the top of the website has various tabs and drop
down menus that show or aid the customers in navigating the site (www.emirates.com).
They have various functions like:
·
The tab – The Emirates Experience shows
the various services that are offered when one flies Emirates. The drop down
menu that comes out has the following features:
-
Cabin Features – these include
categories like: First Class, Business Class,
Inflight Entertainment,
Seating, Staying Connected, Services by Flight.
-
Dining – First Class Dining, Business
Class and Economy Class.
-
lounges, Chauffeur-drive, Young Flyers,
Our Fleet and Emirates Executive
·
Destination Tab shows their various
destinations all over the world. Here the route map is also displayed by
clicking on the link provided. One may also discover the world virtually by use
of the various links provided by the website.
·
The Special Offers Tab shows the offers
that are given for a specific location to other parts of the world and the
prices quoted. One can also signup for special offers from that tab. The offers
vary with the location of the customer. They tailor made for each customer in
regard to their location in the world.
· The Plan and Book tab has the following sub menus; Make a Booking – here, one can book a flight, a car or a hotel or one can check out the Emirates Executive. The other sub menu is Plan and Manage a booking; here we see how one can Manage a booking, Change a Booking, Check in Online, Flight Status among others. Here there is also Essential Information Sub menu that contains links to information on Baggage, Visa and Passport and Dubai Connect.
· The other tab is the Help Centre. It contains the Frequently Asked Questions (the links) and their Contact Information.( www.emirates.com)
· The other tab is the Emirates Skywards & Business Rewards. Here we see the following links:
-
Emirates Skywards: links -Earning Miles, Spending Miles, Membership Tiers, Skysurfers, The Emirates High Street, Our Partners, Emirates Skywards Future
Artists.
· The final tab is the Login tab that gives the customer a chance to log in and access various services as offered by the airline. Here one can also signup so as to be able to login and see what the airline offers.
There are various links that aid the customer to access their services if they don’t want to click on the tabs mentioned above. There is a straightforward menu that can be seen on the right hand side of the website. There is also a link that shows a review of the year 2013 for the airline. Here, the customers can click and see how the airline performed in that given year.
The following can be illustrated below
(www.emirates.com)
When scrolling the website, a pop up menu comes up that helps the customer book a flight, check one, search a flight or even manage. This makes it easier for the customer to complete their transactions without wasting time. The pop up menu comes as a form where one can book a flight and pay up for it without any inconveniences. The site also offers a guide where one can know what Dubai offers, the attractions and the sites present. The inspire me section talks of convincing or giving inspiration to customers so as the can go to Dubai and also use the Emirates.
The summary of the site at the bottom is as follows:
Strengths
and Weaknesses of the Site
Strengths
·
The site is easy to navigate.
·
Fast access to various services.
·
Self-sufficient where all the services
offered are found at one place with the services that come about due to the
presence of the airline like hotels.
·
It is safe to navigate as it does not
have links that lead to malicious sites.
·
Has a login and sign up option that aids
the customer to access their services.
·
Use of graphics is also strength. The
graphics and the pictures are attractive and makes the site enjoyable to
navigate
·
It has a good choice of color that is
attractive to the eye.
·
Has a pop up menu that aids the user to
do various things like book flights.
·
The site holds different media like
videos.
Weaknesses
·
Does not offer information on their
community relations, their awards or affiliated partners.
·
The social media on the site is not well
shown. It is almost invisible.
Media
Relations
The
Emirates has a widespread presence online and especially on the social media
this can be seen where in Facebook their page Emirates has 2,425,305
likes. The Cabin Crew (Emirates Airlines) has 5,316 likes. Affiliated pages
like Pan Emirates has 22,296 likes. This shows that the airline has a
wide following on the social media Facebook.
They
are also found on twitter. Their handle is @emirates. They have 23, 703
followers and they have tweeted once. They are not very active on twitter.
They
are also found on YouTube, Google+ and Linked-in. The massive online campaign
gives them a competitive edge in the Airline industry. The Emirates has been
said to engage in a massive campaign in the social media especially Facebook to
gain a competitive edge against their competitors. (www.emirates.com)
Consumer
Relations
They
treat their customers well and they have a good relation with them. They
provide tailored services for the varied needs for their consumers like First
Class, Business Class among others. They also provide other affiliated services
that suit their consumers like hotel bookings. They also provide online
services to aid in the booking and scheduling of flights. In the social media,
they have presence online in Facebook for instance where they have an official
page and also a fan page for their customers. The Emirates Airlines have
customer phone numbers that the customers use when they want to reach them.
They have toll free numbers for their consumers for this purpose. They have a
help center in their website that provides all the feedback and numbers that a
consumer can need.( www.emirates.com)
Community
Relations
They
take their community relationship seriously. This can be seen where the airline
foundation helped buy a vessel that was to become the Emirates Friendship
Hospital Ship. They advocate for the environment as seen where an Emirates
flight in 2008 from Dubai to San Francisco to promote the going green for the
environment. They also promote sports from football – Arsenal FC to Rugby,
racing. They help the community and the members to enhance their talents and
also earn.
Compare
and contrast the two companies’ online PR presence and activities
Facebook
Both
Etihad and Emirates have a presence online in this social media platform. Here
they hold various pages that give their customers various bits of information
as per their needs. They have a massive following as can be seen by the number
of likes their pages have. They also have affiliated pages like Cabin Crew
pages and groups that propagate their various PR efforts online. They are
tapping into this social media outlet to better their customer experience and
also advertise their services.
Twitter
They
both have twitter accounts that are active. Here also, it can be seen that they
are popular as they have many followers. Also, they have special twitter
accounts that deal with specific issues. This helps in customer care and help
as it becomes fast to deal with the issues as they arise.
Both
have presence in other platforms like Google+, YouTube, Linked-in among others.
The social media helps the two firms and their PR efforts to reach millions of
people.
Contrast
Twitter
The
presence of Etihad on Twitter is more than that of the Emirates. The Etihad has
the following on Twitter: customer care and help via their twitter handle
@EtihadHelp. Their deals can be accessed through @EtihadDeals. Guest rewards
through @EtihadRewards. They also have more followers than Emirates with more
than 39,000 followers while Emirates has 23000.
Facebook
In
Facebook, the Emirates are the champions. They have more followers than the
Etihad. They even have a fan page dedicated to their fans. They use the social
media platform as a tool for competition against their competitors and they
have even started a campaign in Facebook to create a competitive edge and this
has paid off as they have more than 2 million followers in Facebook.
The
Emirates campaign on the social media is more effective than that of Etihad. In
Facebook alone, the airline has more followers than Etihad in the other social
sites combined. The Emirates has a better online PR especially in the social
sites. It has only to improve on twitter and it will have a better competitive
edge than its competitors.
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