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Airlines must respond to emerging traveller behaviours: Amadeus report
In a world where travellers are no longer defined by their demographic segment but by their values, behaviors and motivations, airlines and other travel providers will need to harness the wealth of data and social media information now available to create bespoke ‘purchasing experiences’ that cater to individual needs.
June 2, 2015 By Amadeus
That’s the key finding of ‘Future Traveller Tribes 2030: Building a more rewarding journey’, which outlines precisely how airlines and their complementary service providers can better serve traveler needs in the future through more effective merchandizing strategies, explaining also how the traveler journey itself will change by 2030, thanks to better use of traveler data, new technologies and a widening range of sales channels.
At the same time, personalized bundles of products and services, perpetual touch points between the travel provider and traveler, and frictionless purchasing will all characterize the traveler experience of the future, the report says. New sales channels will emerge in tandem, and can be divided into ‘inspiration’ channels (smartphone, tablet, virtual reality headset), which offer more immersive experiences and will be used as discovery tools; and ‘information’ channels (smart watch, augmented reality glasses and service robots), which will focus on short-form content and purchasing.
With these developments, data will become the most important resource available to airlines, giving the competitive advantage to those that can most effectively collect and use it. Moreover, the report also outlines how new technologies and techniques for collecting and using data will drive ever-greater personalization of the travel experience in the coming decade.
“The first phase of our Future Traveller Tribes study identified who travel providers will need to cater to in the future; this report provides airlines and their complementary service partners with practical advice about how they can prepare for and cater to emerging traveler segments at each of the nine stages of the traveler journey,” said Robert Sinclair-Barnes, Strategic Marketing Director, Airline IT, Amadeus.“Ultimately, understanding traveler motivations and the evolution of purchasing behaviors will equip airlines and other providers to build a more rewarding and connected traveler journey for tomorrow’s travellers.”
“As travel providers devise strategies to become customer experience providers, it’s essential that they consider how to build purchasing experiences that meet the needs of future traveler groups,” said Lawrence Lundy, Principal ICT Consultant, Frost & Sullivan. “Social Capital Seekers, as just one example, will seek inspiration for travel from their social media networks and will expect a very high degree of personalization from providers. They’ll be open to new services at any stage of their journey, readily trading their data to receive priority treatment, and comfortable with new technologies such as service robots or augmented reality applications.”
‘Future Traveller Tribes 2030: Building a more rewarding journey’, will be launched at Amadeus’ Airline Digital Merchandising conference taking place in Bangkok June 1-3, 2015. During the conference over 100 airline digital leaders will come together to discuss and debate the latest Amadeus and industry developments, which this year include personalization, customer experience management and user design.
The report follows another study recently commissioned by Amadeus, Future Traveller Tribes 2030: Understanding tomorrow’s traveller, written by the Future Foundation and published earlier this year, which identified the six key ‘traveller tribes’ or segments that will emerge by the end of the next decade.
