Immediately after an international flight that my daughter and I took on Emirates we were served with the following survey…
I’ve been extremely fortunate to have been able to travel both domestically & internationally nearly my entire life. Be it as a child heading to in India to visit family, studying abroad in college, heading to southeast Asia for our honeymoon, and this most recent trip to India with my daughter.
My role as traveler and my expectations have all evolved over the course of my life. This got me thinking about how data from this survey can be interpreted and used to make a measurable difference in a traveler’s experience.
Here are some observations and thoughts that came up when I engaged with this survey…
- Language & localization matters. This survey was served to me in English, but I wonder how many surveys weren’t filled out because English isn’t the travelers primary language.
- First impressions matter so much and I believe the reason why people should engage with the survey in the first place should have been provided at the very beginning with an option for language selection. For example, “We love our fliers, help us make your next trip even better by answering these 3 questions”
- How does Emirates analyze the survey data? How does their data allow for cohort analysis to directly impact Emirates’ bottom line?
- From a revenue perspective, what is going to matter more/attract the cohorts that are responsible for driving financial KPIs? Do you have different strategies by class (economy, economy premium, business, first)? How do you balance feedback that with the lower classes/overall trends?
- Having a solid measurement orchestration, complete with attributes about the flier, can help identify trends and uncover insights that would be hidden if the data didn’t collect these data points.
- Travelling across countries requires a TON of moving parts. The questions felt like things that are directly related to what the airline has control over, specifically inflight experiences.
- A survey with questions that can be directly associated to what a customers sees & feels will return more visceral & concrete responses.
- In total we flew 4 legs and were in the air for 39 hours. Emirates has my data, i wonder if they track satisfaction throughout my literal journey.
- Understanding the data based on the position in my journey could uncover trends, especially as many future behaviors are impacted by the last touch that a customer has with a brand.
As a final thought, surveys and feedback requests shouldn’t be a one way street. They are just another situation of a give and take between a customer and a business. Being clear on what the business is trying to learn that they don’t know already and how that data will be used to improve that specific customers experience are necessary to receive actionable insights.