Swiss twittering live about maiden flight of new long-haul connection between Zurich and San Francisco with flower power design.
Swiss' Twitter time line during flight LX83
When the ash cloud impaired air traffic above Europe for days on end this April, Swiss airline Swiss gave an impressive demonstration of how social media can be used in customer service. Now Swiss has turned the maiden flight of LX38 to San Francisco into a live event on Twitter.
More than 20,000 people already follow Swiss’ profile on the social networking site Facebook. When the European skies were empty in April of this year, the airline provided information about the current situation faster on Facebook than on its own website. During the maiden flight to San Francisco, Swiss used Twitter and Facebook to support its marketing communication.
Twitter log from the LX38
“Crew briefing will start in about 40 minutes. This will be the kick-off to some live action from our inaugural flight to @SFOgal. #LX38” Swiss announced on Wednesday morning on Twitter and Facebook. Pictures of the crew of the Airbus A340 with flower power design followed. During the 11-hour flight, the crew twittered about the course of the flight: “#LX38 > Lunch service finished, 27 tons of fuel used up to now. Passengers now enjoy SWISS inflight entertainment: http://bit.ly/cXgyuz”.
The Tweets were transmitted to the ground station via the digital data radio transmission system and published on Twitter by the person responsible for social media at Swiss.
From the Hudson River to San Francisco
The short messaging service Twitter first reached worldwide public attention when a US Airways jet had to make an emergency landing on the Hudson River on 15 January 2009. On that day, businessman Janis Krums twittered the following message: “There’s a plane in the Hudson. I’m on the ferry going to pick up the people. Crazy.” A short time later, Krums also published a photo on Twitter, taken with his mobile phone, of the slowly sinking Airbus A320. The picture travelled across the world.
Seventeen months later, on Wednesday 02 June at 4:30 pm local time, the twittering LX38 touched down in San Francisco: “Landed safely @SFOgal! Everybody is very happy and the atmosphere is fantastic.” Those at home were able to follow the flight via Twitter and Facebook, and spread it virally through “Like” and re-tweets.
Real-time communication via social media
The example shows the potential of real-time communication via social media – be it in classical customer service, such as in the case of the ash cloud, or for specific activities in marketing communication. Other Swiss companies have also long since recognised this opportunity: our customer Ovomaltine holds a regular dialogue with almost 20,000 fans on Facebook, and Swiss outdoor market leader Mammut and Mövenpick Wein also take advantage of the new channels.
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