First Choice Holidays - Public Relations - Case Study Example

First choice holidays. http://www.firstchoice.co.uk/ Public Relations Plan Executive Summary The company is in two major segments, Holiday and Air travel. A common niche for both the segments are identified as corporate tours and commuting packages. Audience for this segment – corporate users are identified and targeted. Direct selling, and projection of the company as an ideal choice for companies offering packages for employees and also for inter city and international fliers is envisaged. Marketing plan for the segment is created with appropriate materials and tag lines. The company is projected with the new image by personal contact, fliers, corporate gifts, personal canvass, and sponsoring travel events for sports and public events. Charitable activities conducted are advertised with a small part of revenue being adjusted to it. Introduction This project attempts to enhance the public relations position of First Choice Holidays & Flights Ltd, a subsidiary of First Choice Holidays PLC. This company is a leading international leisure travel company operating in 4 sectors: Mainstream, Specialist, Activity and Online Destination Services. It also operates as a joint venture in cruise and Island Cruises. It is a major airline operator having its business in the mainstream holiday sector. The common brand for all services is ‘First Choice’. The company is based at First Choice Holidays PLC, First Choice House, London Road, Crawley, West Sussex, RH10 9GX. The objective of this study is to find a solution to enhance and make popular the brand name ‘First Choice’ and see how information can be disseminated among audience that are likely to require its services. Public Relations Mission Statement The mission of this report shall be to explore ways in which the brand ‘First Choice’ can be made to be positioned in the first rung in the audience mind in the slot for ‘holidays’ and ‘air travel’. It also shall focus on the Travel Shops, First Choice Airways, First Choice Holidays and the fact that the company is very caring to the environment and people. Public relation is about building a strong presence for a corporate organization in the minds of its prospects. Our aim is to find the proper tactics to be employed to create a corporate identity. Corporate identity means creating the right image and communication it effectively to employees, shareholders and consumers. Public relations are built around events and happenings. The equation is shown as Reality + Newsworthiness + PR Efforts X time - Memory decay = company image1. Corporate identity is a planned self-presentation of the organisation to the outside world. It is influenced by behaviour, communication, symbolism and personality. Corporate image is the cumulative effect of all the impressions of an organisation that develop in peoples minds. This project attempts to enhance the corporate image of ‘First Choice’ using the tactics enumerated, and in keeping with the principles of brand building and ethics. Audience Analysis The key target audience for the organization are tourists, holiday makers and air travellers to destinations offered by the organizations’ airlines. This audience are important to this organization because they constitute the core business and there are many alternatives available to them. Attracting and retaining their loyalty is very important because both the airline and the holiday segment are volatile and unpredictable. The organization wants to project itself as a leader in many types of holidays. It wants to assure its customers that it offers them the best facilities in both travel and at the destination. It wants to project itself as the ‘First Choice’ when ever the consumer thinks of holidays or travel. Key target audience The key audience are different from what is commonly believed to be in this type of business. In the holiday segment, popular notion is to target travellers seeking a holiday package. In the Air line sector it is about air travel and flights. In this case, the audience are: Corporate companies, firms and organizations in Britain, Ireland and the U.S who use airlines for business purpose and who also give employees paid vacations. Importance of this segment. The company First Choice has two major brands or services to promote often simultaneously. Its customers benefit by using both its holiday packages and its airlines. Both the industries are highly competitive, and therefore as outlined above the airlines industry is broad and the company has to compete with well known names like BOAC, TWAC and a host of other flight operators both domestically and internationally. Similarly a separate competitive market exists for holidays, with companies like ‘Captain Cook’ in the forefront. It is therefore impossible for the ‘First Choice’ company to project itself as ‘the first choice in holidays’. In that case its airlines operation will suffer. To amalgamate both into one image, means we have to find a new niche. This new niche is the projection of the company as a ‘Packaged corporate tour and travel provider’. The organization wants it to be known in both the industries as caring, prompt and service oriented. This will also have to be packaged. Situation Analysis A corporate identity is established by distinguishing its attributes like Name, logo, colour choice, fonts that are used, Web site, letterhead and communication style fix the company in the minds of the audience. The mission of the company is expressed by its actions, and values shown with regard to sample events and those who act on the behalf and at the behest of the company and its stand to public issues like calamities, charity, ecology and human values will project the company in a particular fashion in the minds of the customers and public. The identity can be made effective by using many tactics like associating with personalities: Sports men, stars and the like, sponsoring events, and advertisements. The company’s activities are very huge. It is not possible to arrive at specific conclusions for all the company activities with a single research sequence. Therefore we have to break the process into two. 1. The Audience for the company in the Holiday segment 2. The Audience for the company in the Air travel segment. At a cursory glance including their excellent website we can arrive at some conclusions. Extensive research is required to know what exactly consumer perception of the company is. For this we may have to conduct surveys including on-line surveys by offering some incentive to responders. We also will have to collect the experience of air line travellers and the perceptions of the company from them. Secondly we will have to use small surveys in the territory where the company operates and see by analysing data, what is the rating for the company as a choice. This is achieved by sending questionnaires that request the consumer to respond with the top five choices in the industry which he ranks. All this can be done with extensive planning and are likely to incur costs. This research and survey is important. According to sources, “..negative publicity episodes have become increasingly common over the past several years. To a marketing practitioner, such incidents represent a serious threat to a firm's well being. A better understanding of consumer reactions to negative publicity may enable marketers to more effectively deal with these threats. “ 2 Negative publicity both by events, word of mouth and actions of rivals are important. Is there any negativism felt regarding any aspect under consideration? Is one of our important quests, for which such surveys are necessary. Current Views The Audience for the company in the Holiday segment may be people from all walks of life who may have considered vacations based on cost, affordability, services provided, past experience and the suggestions of friends and peers. The Audience for the company in the Air travel segment apart from the ones in the holiday segment are the corporate filers, the corporate and functional persons who combine holidays with work and international commuters on business. Important issues 1. The Audience for the company ought to be corporate fliers who also have holiday packages. That segment is fast growing and therefore targeting them is a prime necessity. Holiday segment also consists of the population who seek a company that takes care of all its holiday hassles including flight bookings and return journey. Media Selection. To the targeted niche market, the segments are identified as corporate tours and commuting packages. The audience for this segment are corporate users. To them mass publicity and advertisements in the media have limited reach. We cannot dispense with it altogether, but the highlight ought to be on direct selling, projecting the company as ideal for executive travel and vacation packages. This can be further made effective by obtaining endorsements for advertisements and banners for sites. Direct contact with corporate decision makers have the advantages of being associated with them, and therefore bring in more influential clients who will flow in by the effect of word of mouth.3 “..Word of mouth is costless and proposes a shared-cost approach to the allocation of promotional spending and to the creation of customer value.” . Direct selling offering special packages for customers is recommended as a long term strategy that involves lesser cost. Also evolve a marketing plan including use of websites, search engines and affiliations for the non corporate user including providing the scaled down version of the corporate package for individuals. Design special information leaflets that are useful and oft referred by people like time tables, destination theme based coffee table books, brochures and corporate gifts with motifs of the company’s services like desk top travel planners are some of the strategies to be considered. Sponsoring travel events for sports and public events are a major source of publicity. The company ought to enter a charitable activity especially related with the environment. Assessment and Plan Development A corporate identity is established by distinguishing its attributes like Name, Logo, and Colour choice, fonts that are used, Web site, letter head and communication style. The mission of the company expressed by its actions, and values shown with regard to sample events and those who act on the behalf and at the behest of the company and its stand to public issues like calamities, charity, ecology and human values will project the company in a particular fashion in the minds of the customers and public. The identity can be made effective by using many tactics like associating with personalities: Sports men, stars and the like, sponsoring events, and advertisements. The concept of the audience current is that the company is either an airlines or a holiday company. Many prospects will see and perceive it as either one or another. Very few who have used both the services will appreciate its presence in both industries and see the connection between them in terms of its service and advantages to them. This is amply clear when we examine the company’s services and structure: Let us take the First Choice Airways. It is one of UK’s leading leisure airlines. Has a fleet of 32 aircraft operating from 15 UK airports, with six million customers and 30,000 flights world wide. It is also the official transporters for Manchester United FC, and UK government. It also moves cargo with the division Viking Aviation. The planes are Boeing's 777-style. The service won the British Travel Award for Best Charter Airline and the Golden Globe awards. All these form an integral part of the promise for a better positioning of the company in the selected niche as a corporate holiday package giver and a complete cargo and commuting solution between destinations. The holiday packages offer leisure travel experiences, UK & Ireland tour Continental European and Canadian specialist businesses, Tour based on water sports clubs, inland waterways, activity adventure and specialist ski services Sector, accommodation, cruise and North America escorted tours, and joint ventures make it ideal to combine the business trips, holidays and pleasure trips into one package and promote the concept of ‘paid vacations’ and corporate venues and inter city commuting. The audience are both in the UK and in the international market, especially at all the destinations where the company operates. Each customer in this segment is unique. Within UK the company has to project the image of airlines suitable for commuting, week end holidays, and long vacations to exotic locations outside. It must project itself as a ‘one stop’ shop for the corporate managements of UK business as a service for all the above needs for its executives. The company must also play up the cargo handling. Packages must be developed for corporate customers and individuals separately. The organization must have a separate PUBLIC RELATIONS office specially created to handle this assignment, and it ought to be staffed with executives who are capable of direct selling to top decision makers in corporations and business, and the department ought to have its own IT and website management office. The advertising and direct selling ought to be managed by the P.R.O office. Selecting and Setting Objectives Improvement orientated objectives: The Company shall provide the new designed corporate package in negotiation with corporate. This will highlight the shortcomings and needs of the industry which will then be filled. The company then will project itself as the “First” company to provide such a solution. The clear objective is to project the company as a single entity, which caters to Corporate and individuals as a travel and airline in one. Action Plan Corporate propaganda by word of mouth and direct selling for packages touted for corporate users and prospective clients. There will be sponsoring of events like foot ball and conveyance and stay facilities for spectators in the individual category. In we have to project the image of airlines suitable for commuting, week end holidays, and long vacations to exotic locations outside. The corporate in UK ought to be approached with a package deal for their executives both for business travel and their holidays. Companies ought to be given packaged travel plans which will be beneficial and cost saving. They may also be linked to the cargo delivery. It should be a service for the client’s executives. Individuals can be wooed to using the service on a basis of similar packaged holiday programs in seasons like football seasons. Resources needed People: A qualified and well known public relation officer, who is an adept at advertising and personal contact, must be the head. He or she must be allotted with a separate office which houses a website development unit and staff to create and keep communications with Top Corporate decision makers. The department ought to be staffed with qualified executives in sales, at least 15 in the UK and three or four at the locations outside the US for customer canvassing. The advertising unit must also take special care to sponsor such events as International foot ball, cricket and see that advertisements both in the internet, and media like TV and papers are inserted to attract the traveller to these events with packages for them. Therefore it has to be staffed with high quality advertising and web management staff. Equipment Other than communication equipments and word processors, a server for web development, statistics generation and contact management ought to be in place. This involves use of computers broad band internet and communication facilities, including printed forms, books pamphlets and publications. Funding The cost of salaries travel and other incidental advertising ought to be funded with 6% of current allocated funds for this purpose, and an additional 10% of funding ought to be made with the measure of the results in the first quarter of the operation. When it should be done. The corporate business end ought to be begun immediately and pursued with vigour all through the year. At each New Year, new packages, announcements and gifts ought to be made a part of the campaign. For the individuals, all seasons that are favoured for sports, for any event that attracts people to any place will be the target. Thus matches, auto races, exotic events at destinations ought to be religiously followed and sponsored when ever possible. Timetable For evaluating the direct selling strategy to the corporate, a 365 day period is envisaged. This is broken into 2 sessions of six months each. The following table will help assess the effectiveness of the campaign: Activity Work done Results in terms of commitments Result in terms of revenue Image as seen by customers Direct selling to Corporate How many corporate visited? Type of package offered and terms accepted How much revenue was generated by this What is the feed back Active sponsor and advertising of sport events What was the advertisement and how it was delivered How many customers requested for the specific package seen by them through the advertisement The general increase in customers and increase of customers specific to the event. Is the company brand associated with this events and sponsorship? When the available data is analysed in the back drop of current available data on company position, it will be possible to evaluate the effectiveness of the programme. Conclusion Direct selling to corporate users and prospective clients is recommended for creating a niche. Sponsoring of events like foot ball , boarding and lodging at the city or venue is recommended for brand building in both the holiday market and airlines. Individuals must be offered choice packaged holiday programs in seasons like football seasons. Recommendation Word of mouth and direct selling for packages ought to be developed and executives trained to meet the decision makers of giant multinationals and corporations. Suitable packages tailor made to the needs of these customers ought to be created. The website of the company must be re-done to boost this image, and the site must be a point to which the corporate clients can directly communicate needs and orders. Special package deal for their executives both for business travel and their holidays can be offered. Sponsor major events like foot ball and advertise conveyance and stay facilities for spectators using the company services. Use the website to announce long vacations plans and the advertisement of exotic locations. Create packaged holiday programs in seasons like football seasons. Appendices Tench & Yeomans (2006) 2 Griffin, M., Babin, B.J. & Attaway, J.S. (1991), ‘An Empirical Investigation of the Impact of Negative Publicity on Consumer Attitudes and Intentions’, Advances in Consumer Research, 18, 334-341 link: http://oxygen.vancouver.wsu.edu/otcgi/llscgi60.exe?DB=0&ACTION=ViewNative&QUERY=%70%75%62%6C%69%63&RGN=%61%63%72%74%69%74%6C%65&OP=and&QUERY=&RGN=%61%63%72%63%69%74%65&OP=and&QUERY=&RGN=%61%63%72%63%69%74%65&OP=and&QUERY=&RGN=%61%63%72%63%69%74%65&OP=and&QUERY=&RGN=%61%63%72%63%69%74%65&OP=and&QUERY=&RGN=%61%63%72%63%69%74%65&OP=and&QUERY=&RGN=%61%63%72%63%69%74%65&OP=and&SUBSET=SUBSET&FROM=1&SIZE=10&ITEM=10 3. Burke, G.I. 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