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Hotfoot Consumer Marketing Award: Air New Zealand

Youtube VideoAt the beginning of 2007, Air New Zealand identified that to remain competitive and continue to build revenue and value it had to escape the ordinary and take a leadership position by creating a best-in-class long haul experience—and not just for the front of the plane, for everyone on the plane. Not only that, it also aimed to provide a story of Air New Zealand’s—and New Zealand’s—innovation to the world, build international talkability around the brand and give it a two-year leap on the competition.

This led to improvements to ‘business premier’, the creation of the three-seater Skycouch ‘Cuddle Class’ in economy and the Spaceseat in premium economy. It also led to other changes, like touch-enabled in-flight entertainment screens, a new menu and on-demand touchscreen food/beverage ordering.

An international PR campaign garnered 400 million media impressions in the US alone and, love him or hate him, Jim Henson-created brand ambassador Rico did his job and gained an international following by gaining close to three million views on YouTube to date.

The launch of the new fleet transformed an entire generic category. And there is now interest from some of Air New Zealand’s biggest competitors in purchasing the innovations. It’s a story that shows the importance of listening, innovative PR and communications, teamwork and a chief executive who fully understands the role marketing plays in business. In keeping with the theme of the awards, there’s no doubt the new plane—and the way it was designed—was a game-changer.

  • Full case studies of all the winners are available in the latest edition of NZ Marketing and the first 20 humans to subscribe here will receive a copy of James Hurman’s new book The Case For Creativityvalued at $40.

CATEGORY COMMENT: “The field was fantastic. It was very varied we had everything from Air NZ to TVNZ, 2degrees, NZ lotteries and Frucor. So really the span of the economy and there were some fantastic entries there.”

THE PEOPLE: Jodi Williams, Mike Tod

THE PARTNERS: .99, OMD Media, AIM Proximity, Ideo, Society Insight, Synovate, Colmar Brunton

THE FINALISTS: 

TVNZ Shortland Street Summer Fling

2degrees Year 2, the Coming of Age

New Zealand Lotteries Lotto Glisten

Frucor Beverages New V Energy Frontiers

TVNZ TVNZ interacts with U

 

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