KLM is proud of its excellent customer service, but you have to fly KLM to experience it. That’s why for one week, we decided to help out travellers flying other airlines. Introducing #happytohelp... a 24-hour-a-day special KLM customer service team set out to help travellers flying other airlines. The objective of this PR event was to create awareness of this excellent service and, as a result, create brand preference. We put up a glass pavilion at Amsterdam Airport Schiphol and from there personally responded 24/7 to tweets from any traveller that called out for support or simply shared travel nuisances. In addition to text replies, we created as much striking rich-media content as we could (key PR element), to delight those who unexpectedly received support and to encourage sharing.

When travellers run into problems, they start sharing it on social media, so we started off with an extensive six-month analysis of travel-related tweets on Twitter. Based on this analysis, we were able to anticipate support queries. We did not pre-prepare answers, because we wanted to offer genuine personal support. The glass pavilion was equipped with all needed equipment and huge screens so that press and passers-by were able to follow what was going on. Starting 13 October, we answered tweets and offered KLM’s customer support to any passenger for one week. In addition to support via Twitter, teams on the road proactively offered physical support at 4 major airports around the world.

1. We started off with an extensive six-month analysis of travel-related tweets on Twitter.

2. Based on this analysis, we were able to anticipate support queries. We did not pre-prepare answers, because we wanted to offer genuine personal support (this is KLM’s policy).

3. We put up a glass pavilion at Amsterdam Airport Schiphol and equipped this with all needed equipment, including a green screen studio to be able to offer help in any way we wanted.

4. Starting 13 October, we answered tweets and offered KLM’s customer support to any passenger for one week. KLM’s CEO kicked off the event and we invited press to witness this.

5. In addition to offering support via Twitter, teams proactively offered physical support at 4 major airports around the world.

6. We made a compilation video with all the highlights of the week.

Results:

- Total impressions generated by the #happytohelp initiative: 37+ million

- Total video views: 7+ million

- #happytohelp accomplished a significant increase in KLM brand preference in all (8) KLM key markets we researched, except for KLM’s home market, where brand preference does not leave much room for improvement.

- 1 out of 5 people living in the researched focus countries spontaneously recognized #happytohelp.