When Battling Behemoths...

Virgin Atlantic's post-9/11 campaign zeroed in on a specific target audience and reaped big sales

Virgin Atlantic marketing executives acknowledge that the “rules of engagement” changed for the airline industry after the terrorist attacks last September. Fortunately, those rules didn’t stay changed for long. By January, after months of depressed ticket sales, business had begun to build again, and with it, aggressive competition among carriers.

For Virgin Atlantic, which books about 1 percent of total airline travel, the challenge was clear: It wanted

to take an aggressive stance in the recovering market but would have to do something special to stand out against the barrage of big “destination” campaigns being rolled out by the industry’s giants.

The airline’s agency, CMG Communications, answered the challenge with a $3 million “Lovin’ London Tour” and a TV campaign that for the first time used spot cable exclusively.

“We’re going after an audience that’s hard to reach,” explains Marlene Miller, CMG’s vice president and media director. “Cable is so targeted. It allows us to cherrypick the networks we want, and we always narrowcast. We get more eyeballs for our dollars.”

“Lovin’ London” was designed to reach out to Virgin’s very specific target demographic: international travelers aged 35-54, with a male skew, earning over $75,000, highly educated and passport-carrying.

“Our goal in initiating this campaign was to send [that demo] a strong brand message across key markets but with a schedule flexible and nimble enough to take advantage of the rapid changes in airline pricing,” says John Riordan, Virgin Atlantic’s vice president of marketing. “Post-9/11, after a long quiet period, we wanted to get out there early with TV spots that touted Virgin, London, Value.”

For the campaign’s 15-second commercials, CMG Communications came up with a “retro rock” look inspired by posters of the ’60s and ’70s. The spots aim for impact, adds Riordan, using no voice-over but lots of “socko” London visuals.

“We wanted the commercials to get our target audience to lift their eyes from their book or paper and look up at the TV set,” he says.

Savvy travelers might also have noticed that the spots included an inside joke planted to tweak the competition: In one image, an ad appears on the side of a British bus with the slogan, “No way. BA/AA”—a sly spin on commentary originally addressed to the proposed merger between British Airways and American Airlines.

“Lovin’ London” broke in four markets: New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington, D.C.

The cities are Virgin Atlantic gateways, and all boast well- established cable interconnects that not only reach their entire DMAs but also are capable of digitally inserting spots aimed at viewers most likely to watch news, financial and sports programming.

Rep firm National Cable Communications won Virgin Atlantic local sponsorship of Olympic coverage on MSNBC and CNBC, and coveted spots on CNN’s Larry King Show, A&E’s Biography, ESPN’s golf coverage, and various segments of Fox News. There were also buys on Discovery Channel, Comedy Central, TBS, History Channel and The Food Network, reflecting over 60 percent fixed position placement. With an open-ended flight plan running through the end of the year, Virgin is not ruling out adding other cable networks to its TV mix if they reach the audience it wants.

“The demo we’re after are not heavy TV users,” Miller says “But they are heavy cable viewers.” While MRI and Scarborough data helped CMG choose spot cable over spot broadcast, signature cable shows also played a key role.

“Quality cable programming was what pushes you over that edge,” Riordan says. “We had the truly correct choice of programming that helped us decide.”

Because a key goal for the campaign was to stimulate sales, NCC added network promotions designed to get consumers to act.

The rep obtained Virgin Atlantic sponsorship of History Channel’s popular “Boys’ Toys” promotion on cable interconnects in Los Angeles and San Francisco. Additionally, Adlink, the L.A.-based interconnect serving more than 3.4 million homes, will produce a Virgin-sponsored Lovin’ London calendar highlighting upcoming events in that city. Time Warner Cable in New York separately produced a Brooklyn Museum promotion tied to a Virgin-sponsored London trip.

Two months into the campaign, Virgin Atlantic has begun to tally some results. “Since the campaign started, we’ve seen an increase in bookings, an increase in the call volume to our reservation number, an increase in traffic to our Web site,” Riordan says. “We’re very happy.”

Adding spot cable to Virgin Atlantic’s array of media made sense, adds Steve Suter, brand development manager for NCC. “It’s been a tough time for the travel companies,” he says “But Virgin has key feeder markets that spot cable can really maximize, offering DMA-wide schedules that are highly targeted and in conjunction with cable-only promotional opportunities.”

Cable won 40 percent of the Lovin’ London media budget. Other media used included a “significant” amount of newspaper, some heavy outdoor advertising and a “smallish amount” of local radio, Riordan says. CMG also created a microsite linked to Virgin’s main Web site offering a rock-and-roll trivia contest, playing off the cable, print and outdoor campaigns.

While all the media worked together, the cable commercials appear to have been stand-outs.

“On days we ran newspaper, our call volume was up 50 percent,” Riordan says. “But when we checked the ad source through our reservation agents cable was mentioned as the medium. A lot [of callers] said they’d seen our TV ads.”

“The demo we’re after are not heavy TV users, but they are heavy cable viewers.”

—Marlene Miller, Vice President and Media Director, CMG

Reprinted with the permission of Adweek Magazines.

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