How to get more quality email newsletter subscribers as OTA?

This is great work done by the Flight OTA (Online Travel Agency) Travelstart.co.za to get more quality newsletter subscribers. Very innovative.

What is Travelstart.co.za doing to improve the quality of quality email subscribers? If a user penetrates the site deep the user will be offered to be an email subscriber and get a free flight voucher worth R650 (42 USD). Why implement an idea like this? See the below analysis.

Re-production

Step 1

Enter main page Travelstart.co.za (see pic 1) and click on sign-up (see pic 2). And the user will be able to be a newsletter subscriber, but will not be granted an R650 (42 USD) free flight voucher (see pic 2).

Picture 1 (press on pic for re-direction)

Picture 2

Step 2

Test to press on Hotels and Cars in the header. There it's not even possible option to be a newsletter subscriber. But its more or less not an issue. Why? Flight OTAs (Online Travel Agency) on the most market have approx 1%-3% of their revenue through hotel bookings, Flights+Hotel and Cars, the rest is Flights (97%-99%). And it's more or less a waste of time trying to improve the proportion hotel sale because of Booking.com and Expedia have a duopoly in B2C online in many markets (especially Germanic language markets, see link). Of course many OTAs want to improve the proportion hotel sale, but that particular avenue of pleasure has been closed off because of Booking.com and Expedia impressive work regarding hotels.

(press on pic for re-direction)

Step 3

Test to press on packages (see pic 1). After that press on random package offer (see pic 2). Then a message will appear in the header "WOOHOO! Get free flight vouchers worth R650 when you sign up to the Travelstart newsletter" (see pic 3). Why do like this? I would guess the longer time the customer spends on-site and deep-penetrates the site the more likely the customer will stay loyal. Then a site really wants it to really stay like this, so why not try to keep it this way and give a free flight voucher worth R650 (42 USD)? I think its a rather innovative way by Travelstart.co.za.

Picture 1 (press on pic for re-direction)

Picture 2 (press on pic for re-direction)

Picture 3 (press on pic for re-direction)

Discussion

It's important to have in mind that South Africa is a very special market regarding "Flight only" online, Travelstart.co.za has more or less monopoly as OTA (Online Travel Agency) in South Africa. But on the other hand as the founder of PayPal Peter Thiel said, "I have a single ide fix that I am completely obsessed with on the business side which is that If you are the starter of a company, entrepreneur or founder of a company you always want to aim for monopoly and you always want to avoid competition so hence competition is for losers" (quote link where he explains his statement). Travelstart.co.za worst competitor is brick and mortar stores that anyway have to keep higher margins on "flights only". It's a no-brainer to understand that it's possible for Travelstart.co.za to promote a flight voucher worth R650 (42 USD) when your worst competitor is brick and mortar, and also keep in mind; to obtain and find the voucher worth R650 (42 USD) you need to show deep interest of the site otherwise you will not find the voucher. As an online company you always try to get a spillover effect from brick and mortar. Of course the brick and mortar Travel Agencies stores often dislike online, they want to keep it old-school with customers visiting the offline Travel Agency. A friend of mine was Country Manager at a Flight OTA (Online Travel Agency) in an EAGLEs country (see link) said, "have you heard Christian!, now the Travel brick and mortar stores want to ban Google, they are crazy". The above scenario with Travelstart.co.za email subscriber voucher R650 (42 USD) would be hard to apply on mature markets as North America and most European countries because of:

• Flight OTAs dependency of Flight MetaSearch as Skyscanner, Kayak, Hipmunk, Momondo, Wego, Skiplagged, Idealo, Flygresor, Finn, Aviasales, Jetradar and Jetcost etc are in full control of the "flight only" market.
• Flight OTAs severe competition between many OTAs on Flight MetaSearch.
• Point 2 was a strong condition why now point 1 rules the market.
• The interaction between point 1 and point 2 makes point 2 very dependent on point 1.
• Important for Flight OTA and Flight MetaSearch are to understand the meta battle between OTAs on meta, but that is another article I will write later on - "Flight only" - optimizing yield and poker time on MetaSearch - ways of taking advantage of the system?"

As flight OTA with the goal to promote and sell "flights only" through a nice site, blog, adwords, newsletter, affiliate, facebook/facebook ads, LinkedIn, TV ads, Instagram, SEO and others - I can say that this will most likely not work in North America and many European countries. Only unnecessary complicated marketing as Flight OTA, the complicated issues are somewhere else (primary not a marketing issue). But in some markets this marketing way will work. Especially undeveloped OTA markets.

Hope you enjoyed the article! If you have any question or anything else, please write in comments or you are free to contact me on LinkedIn (see link).