BalticMiles Crowdsources Growth Strategy with Its Customers

BalticMiles, the loyalty program of airline airBaltic, leverages on social media to modernise its loyalty program and received huge boost of con!dence from both frequent and non-frequent "yers,

winning global recognition with Loyalty 2013 award.

The Challenge Where the story begins BalticMiles is a multi-partner loyalty program that rewards members for their interactions with the airline airBaltic, and for shopping at partner retailers. While it is an extensive rewards program, airBaltic is not part of any airline alliance. As such, it faces strong competition from loyalty programs such as FinnAir Plus under oneworld alliance and SAS EuroBonus. To optimize customer loyalty and results, BalticMiles approached SimpliFlying to help it build closer relationships with its customers, as well as expand the customer base by tapping into the network of its partner merchants.

Strong regional competition Need to grow customer base Sought active member feedback and participation

SimpliFlying’s Expertise at Work Advise – Conceptualize - Coordinate Over the course of two days, SimpliFlying acquainted the BalticMiles team with case studies of airline loyalty programs from around the world. We facilitated an intensive brainstorm session to come up with ideas that would effectively leverage BalticMiles' biggest advantage as a small program - "exibility. Not being part of an airline alliance program meant BalticMiles could quickly innovate in accordance to the latest trends and feedback. In June 2012, BalticMiles Brainstorm program, was launched on Facebook to solicit from members ideas for creating the world's !rst user-generated loyalty level. Conceptualized with SimpliFlying and the application developed by Napkin Labs, Brainstorm sought to drive further engagement by putting its customers at the center of the company's growth activities. The Idea

Bal$cMiles  Brainstorm  is  a    crowdsourcing  pla5orm  that   allows   members   and   fans   to   directly   impact  their  use  of  the  loyalty  program.  

How It Works Members  could  contribute  ideas  on    •  The   poten$al   merchant   partners   to   include   in  

the  loyalty  program  •  The  types  of  benefits  or  privileges  desired  for  a  

par$cular  membership  level  

Making it Work Ideas   were   voted   through  Facebook   “likes”−  with   the   top  being  awarded  with  a  bounty  of  100,000  mileage  points.    The   winners   would   also   be  invited   to   work   with   the  Bal$cMiles   team   to   further  develop  the  their  ideas.    

Results & Impact BalticMiles and customers working hand in hand Within a month of the program launch, BalticMiles received a twentyfold boost in “likes” on its Facebook page, saw over 400 ideas and a swath of new page visitors. By the end of the campaign, BalticMiles Brainstorm had !elded about 6,000 comments. Three months later, BalticMiles announced their !rst fan-inspired project– a rewards project that sets a personal goal for each user. This not only encouraged shopping among the members, it helped to raise awareness about BalticMiles’ network of merchant partners, especially to the less active members. As a result, 5% of BalticMiles’ most active database segment has further multiplied their rewards points by 3.5 times. In 2013, BalticMiles Brainstorm received the Global Innovation in Technology Award at Loyalty 2013. Currently, BalticMiles is embarking on the second phase of the initiative, bringing in the winners of BalticMiles Brainstorm to form a board that would be working closely with the team to develop and implement the ideas.

Over 420 new ideas and 6000 comments First fan-inspired project implemented within three months Won award at Loyalty 2013

“We  were  very  happy  to  work  with  SimpliFlying  team.  Their  exper$se  allowed  us  to  excel  with  a  truly  innova$ve  campaign  that  was  very  much  appreciated  by  our  members.”

- Gabi Kool, CEO, BalticMiles

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