The Middle Seat Lottery was a targeted national lottery experience that communicated directly with each middle seat passenger on every Virgin Australia domestic flight across the country.

The lottery was supported with OOH, TV and a live event, as well as hyper-targeted seat-back cards specifically for middle seat passengers only. The cards included instructions to enter the lottery via the Virgin Australia app using their booking details.

Entrants then had the chance to win money-can’t-buy prizes like platinum status, a million points and a helicopter pub crawl, transforming the much maligned middle seat into something truly wonderful.

Situation

Fewer than 1% of Virgin Australia passengers prefer the middle seat. As a brand on a mission to make flying more uplifting, we wanted to make one of the least enjoyable parts of flying, wonderful.

Brief

Airlines constantly talk about elevating the flying experience, but few deliver. Our brief was to bring credibility to our mission of making flying a more uplifting experience. To achieve this, we turned Virgin Australia’s middle seats into lottery tickets.

By directly targeting passengers stuck in the middle, The Middle Seat Lottery provoked engagement and enrolment in Velocity Frequent Flyer (Virgin Australia’s member program) with the incentive of unique and wonderful prizes.

Objectives

Increase app downloads

Increase Frequent Flyer member joins

Create mass awareness of the improvement of our entire offering via the in-plane activation

Increase positive sentiment about an unavoidable part of our flying experience

Create a unique experience in the category

In 2022, Virgin Australia launched a new brand platform - Bring on Wonderful - with the intent to make flying a more uplifting, wonderful experience. To prove that it was more than words, we ran directly at one of the most universally understood pain points in flight - the middle seat - targeting passengers in those seats with an uplifting experience just for them.

The Middle Seat Lottery is a first-of-its-kind innovation aimed at making every seat on our planes wonderful - even the ones in the middle.

It turned every middle seat on every Virgin Australia plane into a lottery ticket, with a chance to win unique prizes. Suddenly the middle seat was not just being jammed between two people, but an exciting game, played on a national level - finally giving people a reason to enjoy it, and changing the perception of the middle seat experience forever.

Data gathering

We found fewer than 1% of passengers preferred the middle seat. We needed to change the overall perception of the Virgin Australia flying experience by making one of the least uplifting parts of the flying experience, wonderful.

Target audience

Leisure and business flyers are motivated not by price but by experiences. However they had become complacent and disillusioned with the static flying experience - so it was clear that a little change would go a long way. Especially for our bullseye - those in the middle seat.

Approach

Our approach extended through the line from cinema and TV through to OOH, pre- and post-flight eDMs, on-board announcements, seatback cards and an automated, customised in-app experience.

CTA

Passengers were directed to download the VA app, and become Frequent Flyer members to enter, which then automated their details for entry.

Implementation

Airlines are the most operationally complex environments within which to implement experience change. We worked closely with digital, operations, front line, airport, onboard and legal teams for 8 months to co-create a system to bring this to life. Every middle seat passenger on every domestic flight was engaged in the initiative onboard via audio announcements and seatback comms, with all eligible to enter through an automated, customised experience in-app.

Timeline

Experience Ideation & Prioritisation: Nov-Dec 2021

Scoping, Feasibility & Implementation Planning: Jan-Feb 2022

Digital Development, Operational Implementation, Education & Engagement: Feb-July 2022

Communications (internal & external) Production & Distribution: Mar-Oct 2022

Initiative launch: Oct 24 2022

Media channels and integration

Every middle Seat through seatback cards, announcements onboard and in-flight entertainment on every single flight nationally.

Supporting media:

Broadcast

Social

Digital

OOH

eDM

Scale

Largest experience initiative rollout ever undertaken at Virgin Australia.

Over $230,000 in prizes.

Please see confidential section for campaign results

Most travellers view the middle seat as the worst on the plane. It is universally hated, and is often shown in movies and television as the butt of many jokes about the flying experience. And it is generally culturally understood to be an unavoidable, unchangeable part of the flying experience. We wanted to take action to make sure that every seat on our planes could be viewed as a wonderful, uplifting experience - and our solution was to effectively turn each middle seat into a lottery ticket. In the process, we hoped to get more people to book the middle seat, but also to change the way they viewed it as part of the Virgin Australia flying experience.