RIPPLE100 Micromarketing

Southwest Airlines (SWA) created Nuts About Southwest blog way back in April of 2006 to give people a chance to learn more and interact with the company.  The blog itself is a start but it’s the other efforts by Southwest that push them to an “A”.

• A for Authentic As much as I try to be a stickler about this topic, SWA is doing this by posting opposing comments, offering a wide range of media (video, podcast, blog, etc), and most importantly laying it all out there.  It’s plain spoken, simple language that doesn’t seem to be hiding any tricks.
• A- for Inclusive  Being able to post comments, pics and the like is good for opening the conversation.  The blog itself doesn’t allow users to really start any conversation, so its completely guided by the company.  I don’t have any issue with this since it provides a needed structure but what SWA could do is emphasize their Facebook fan page more.  Here there’s more of a conversation.  On the blog there are links at the bottom to SWA’s Facebook, Twitter, etc. They push the Flickr but not Facebook.  Also their Facebook page doesn’t mention their blog, at least in the info section they should fill in a little more info at with their blog link at the very least.
• A- for Constructive Feed back is a wonderful tool.  Opening themselves up for comments and even posting not-so-desirables, allows SWA to grow + learn from consumers which equals brand builiding + loyalty. Consumers in the meantime get to have their voice heard and concerns addressed.  Not all concerns will be addressed but the major ones are important to take care of and keep the conversation going.  On the downside, SWA needs to do a better job with their flow between and across sites.  As mentioned above they need to develop more seamlessness between their blog and social media sites better.  This will help consumers to piece together SWA’s view and voice with the more consumer sided voice from their Facebook page.  A stronger connection between the voices will help make the relationship more constructive.
• A for Mutually Rewarding  Airports can be a pain in the butt, it’s apart of the nature of travel: stuff happens.  Also- big surprise here- companies make mistakes!  Having outlets for consumers is important to taking the temperature on what’s happening.  Southwest has basically given itself (through Facebook) a way to test out new ideas, poll travelers, gather testimonials and maybe even learn something they never thought of.  The company knows what the consumers want and can act on it.