KLM has started to
utilize messaging apps to simplify customers’ airline journey. As mentioned
before in one of our articles, KLM began to offer their passengers
the availability to rebook their cancelled flight through WhatsApp at Amsterdam
Airport Schiphol. This time, they are working with Facebook Messenger! It is a
known fact that currently, airline passengers are increasingly using QR code
boarding passes on their phones to pass boarding gates. Alongside the rising
awareness of environmental concerns and increasing widespread knowledge and use
of smartphone technology, paper use in airlines can be reduced.
How it works:
When the passenger books their
airline ticket via the KLM website, they must check a box to receive messages
through Facebook Messenger. Consequently, KLM will send a booking confirmation.
When the flight date comes closer, a check in update will be sent for the
passenger to access their boarding passes in the chat thread. This QR code
boarding pass with all the flight information will then be used by the
passenger to pass through security and the boarding gate. It will decrease
passengers’ stress of thinking about accessing their information through their
email and downloading their boarding passes onto their mobile phones or rather,
printing. This ease of use also arrives with the availability of communicating
with KLM customer service staff right from the chat thread. Passengers’
questions will be answered 24/7 in 13 different languages which are: Dutch,
English, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, French, Norwegian, Russian,
Japanese, Chinese, Korean and Thai.
In an interview by Conde NastTraveler with KLM’s Senior Vice President for Digital, Tjalling
Smit, he mentions that airlines can have a more efficient contact with their
customers through the apps that they use on a daily basis rather than pushing
them to download the airline’s app. This increases their exposure.
As mentioned earlier in one of
our previous blog posts, a transactional relationship between brands and
customers through messaging applications may not be ready to evolve just yet.
However, they can definitely be used for information purposes and increasing
the ease of communication between the company and its customer. It seems like
we will definitely see KLM taking the front in this trend with other social
media programs.
By Gizem Tüdes and Tomasz Wawrzeniec
References:
http://www.theverge.com/2016/3/30/11331168/klm-facebook-messenger-boarding-pass-chat-integration
https://messenger.klm.com/
http://www.cntraveler.com/stories/2016-04-01/you-can-now-get-your-boarding-pass-on-facebook-messenger
No comments:
Post a Comment