May Day air ticket blind box marketing model!

In one week, the whole nation will usher in the hottest golden week in history, the "May Day" holiday, and the blind box activities for air tickets launched by various OTA platforms have also entered the final stage. In recent days, Weibo and WeChat Moments have been frequently flooded with blind boxes for air tickets. It has to be said that the marketing activities of several major OTA platforms have indeed successfully attracted the attention of consumers. Some netizens set five alarms in one day in order to grab the blind boxes, and they were "clearly arranged."

From observations over the past few days, although the event was very popular, consumers' evaluations and feedback varied, and the industry was filled with various voices, some questioning, some agreeing, and some standing idly by.

Can “blind box” products with certain “gambling” attributes allow OTA platforms to “bet on success” in one fell swoop? And who will be the biggest winner among consumers, platforms and airlines?

1. The marketing involution of major OTAs based on “blind boxes”

The internal "war" of the "blind box" economy has spread to the field of tourism and travel.

After the blind box of air tickets launched by Tongcheng Travel during the Qingming Festival this year became a hot topic on Weibo, in time for the upcoming May Day holiday, starting from April 20, Fliggy, Qunar and Ctrip successively launched blind box products of air tickets. Tongcheng Travel also launched the second phase of the event, and a marketing competition based on "blind boxes" kicked off.

According to the prices of various air ticket blind boxes , Fliggy has the lowest price at 66 yuan, followed by Qunar Travel at 88 yuan, Tongcheng Travel at 98 yuan, and Ctrip at 99 yuan.

With airfares rising sharply due to the upcoming May Day holiday, blind boxes of air tickets priced less than 100 yuan on various platforms are enough to attract consumers just because of the price. Moreover, each platform has provided a "cancellable without appointment" plan without any additional handling fees, thus relieving consumers of worries.

In terms of participation rules, the platforms have their own similarities and differences.

• The event time is basically chosen in the second to last week of May Day, which happens to be the peak period for consumers to decide on their May Day travel arrangements and purchase air tickets.
• As for the purchasing channels of air ticket blind boxes , except for Fliggy which can only be purchased on the APP client, the other platforms have also added WeChat mini-program entrances.
• In terms of the event participation threshold , except for Tongcheng Travel, if consumers want to be eligible to participate on other platforms, they must invite 3 friends to help. Due to limited quantity, each platform adopts scheduled sales at different time periods, starting from 10:00 in the morning to 20:00 in the evening, with a total of 6 rush-buying time nodes, giving consumers a wide range of choices.

After comprehensive comparison of the products, we found that each has its own highlights.

• In terms of participation opportunities, each person is limited to one opportunity on Fliggy, one opportunity each on Tongcheng Travel APP and Mini Program, and no restrictions are imposed on the other two platforms;
• In terms of additional costs, Fliggy and Tongcheng Travel include infrastructure fuel costs, but Qunar.com has not yet made it clear, and Ctrip requires users to pay for airport construction fuel at their own expense;
• In terms of departure time, the departure date of Qunar.com is freely selected by users within the prescribed range, while other platforms are randomly assigned.
• In terms of product design , Fliggy and Tongcheng Travel launched blind boxes of double-person air tickets, while other platforms offer single-person tickets. Tongcheng Travel has also added hidden versions such as round-trip tickets, business class tickets, and upgrades to prepare "unexpected surprises" for users. Ctrip took a different approach and created a differentiated product of the same type, launching two hotel blind boxes of different levels.
• In terms of route arrangements , Ctrip covers 12 departure points and provides more than 100 routes. Fliggy and Qunar both cover popular tourist destinations, and Tongcheng Travel covers more than 200 domestic city airports.

It can be seen that each platform has put a lot of thought into this blind box product of air tickets. Although it was joked by the industry that it was suspected of "involution", the platform also has its own original intention.

Zhang Chao, product manager of Tongcheng Travel's air ticket blind box, said that he hopes that through this marketing campaign, he can provide users with high-quality and affordable travel products and services, promote domestic tourism consumption, and thereby drive the recovery of the domestic tourism economy. The person in charge of Ctrip said that with the May Day holiday approaching, they hope to provide tourists with more options for holiday travel through this event, giving users a high-quality, cost-effective and inspiring journey. The blind box series products launched this time will also bring more possibilities for the platform transformation.

2. Actual experience of purchasing blind box products of air tickets on the four major platforms

So, are “blind box” products really affordable or just a gimmick? You won’t know until you try it. The air ticket blind box is so popular that Wenlv also mobilized his friends to participate in the purchase. Afterwards, he collected everyone's experiences and ideas when grabbing the blind box products, and conducted actual test analysis, sorting out the results from several dimensions such as the complexity of the purchase process, the type of blind box destination, and flight time.

1. Complexity of the purchasing process

If you are a novice user, you have to participate in the air ticket blind box activities on the four major platforms, namely Fliggy, Qunar, Ctrip and Tongcheng Travel. The overall process requires 7 steps except for Tongcheng Travel, which has 6 steps. Overall, Tongcheng Travel's air ticket blind box gameplay is relatively simple.

2. Blind Box Destination Type

The platforms cover a variety of destination types, including popular domestic tourist destinations, niche tourist destinations, and unpopular tourist destinations. Common popular destinations such as Beijing, Sanya, Shanghai, Chongqing, Nanjing, Chengdu, Changsha, etc. have all been booked by users. Among the Sanya route, only one lucky person among my friends won the lottery.

Therefore, except for extremely popular tourist destinations which are relatively rare, the probability of winning other types of destinations is roughly similar. However, the air ticket blind boxes are highly random, so users have to rely on their luck.

3. Flight time

Most blind box flight times are in the morning or at night. Although there are regular flights, their number is relatively small. When the departure time is random, the probability of drawing a flight during the May Day period is small, the probability of drawing a flight on Friday or the weekend is relatively small, and the probability of drawing a flight on a weekday is higher.

As a result, users may face problems such as not being able to draw the destination they want, or not being able to go due to time conflicts when they draw. If they are unlucky, they may not even be able to draw their desired destination.

After this actual test, most of the friends who participated in the event treated the blind box products of various platforms with the mentality of joining in the fun. Among those who participated in the evaluation, some chose to give up because the flight time conflicted with the working day, the destination was relatively unpopular, or the flight time was too early or too late. Some friends even think that it is possible that some consumers will be directly discouraged after seeing the participation rules. For example, one has to download the APP to participate in the rush purchase and redemption, and one has to invite friends to help to get the qualification to participate, etc. It is less friendly to the "lazy" and "socially anxious" groups.

3. Is it just a gimmick or a real benefit?

Nowadays, blind box activities on various platforms are about to or have entered the final stage. Judging from market feedback, the popularity of air ticket blind box products on various platforms remains high.

According to platform data, all of Qunar's blind box air ticket products were sold out on the first day of sale, and the fastest redemption and ticket issuance took only 1 minute. The redemption volume of travel products was the highest during the May Day holiday, and the ticket issuance rate of the route with the highest redemption rate exceeded 50%. The search volume for "blind boxes" on the Ctrip platform has increased 40 times compared to the previous period. Since the product was launched, its popularity and attention have continued to rise.

Judging from the user portrait, more than 70% of the participants on the Qunar platform are born after 1995, and the participants on the Ctrip platform include young consumers of Generation Z, high net worth individuals, and users who plan to travel during the May Day holiday and travel during off-peak hours.

As the popularity rises, users' complaints also follow. Many netizens reported that the experience was poor when participating in the platform's blind box air ticket buying event. The platform often had "bugs" such as busy system, network errors, payment failures, and inability to load product information due to too many people queuing, which was extremely testing for patience.

On the other hand, blind box products are naturally a good thing for users who draw their favorite destination and have smooth travel time; but for users who are not so lucky, there are also many "complaints". For office workers, winning a workday is tantamount to declaring it invalid. Students, constrained by their studies, also say they "can't afford it". Even if they win the hidden round-trip koi, they don't have the courage to ask for leave to play.

Some consumers also found that when purchasing Ctrip’s 999 yuan hotel blind box, the price of booking the same hotel room through Ctrip on the same day was lower than the blind box product, which aroused consumers’ doubts.

Ctrip responded that since the hotel calendar room rates are controlled by merchants and refreshed in real time, the resources in the hotel blind boxes are also refreshed in real time. The situation encountered by consumers means that the resources are being refreshed in real time. Since the price changes led by merchants are not fixed in time, in addition to periodic refreshes, the system will check again when the consumer confirms the cancellation. If an inverted situation is found, the consumer will be prompted to change resources. "In addition to setting up a screening mechanism to prevent inverted prices, Ctrip has also added a manual verification team to ensure the discount of hotel blind boxes, so as to help consumers choose suitable hotel products and improve their consumption experience."

Netizens’ “complaints” also truly reflect some problems with the air ticket blind box products. Wu Liyun, associate professor at the Institute of Chinese Culture and Tourism Industry of Beijing International Studies University, analyzed in an interview with the media that the current blind box of air tickets does have some consumption risks:

1. Some platforms avoid redeeming tickets during holidays. If users who have redeemed their tickets are unable to travel, the redeemed blind boxes cannot be refunded or the "blind box fee" will be lost;
2. Most of the tickets are for “unpopular” flights , and the destinations may not necessarily be where consumers prefer;
3. Some young people blindly follow the trend and may not consume in the end, resulting in a waste of resources.

In response to the "blind box air ticket" products currently on the market, the China Consumers Association also issued a "May Day" consumption reminder on the 23rd, reminding consumers to be rational and that "going on a whim" is not advisable, and they must consider travel time, dining and accommodation, and destination conditions. Other industry insiders pointed out that domestic laws and regulations on the "blind box economy" are still imperfect, and supervision is difficult to implement. "Air ticket blind boxes" require regulatory authorities to strengthen management to avoid damage to consumer rights.

Some industry insiders also told Wenlv Analysis that blind air ticket boxes generally have strong attributes in attracting new customers in product design and market sales promotion. The cost of acquiring customers in the civil aviation market continues to rise, and the number of high-net-worth users is limited. They have been scrambled for by various companies. People who are price-sensitive and do not fly frequently have become a blue ocean of incremental users that various companies are vying for, but whether the platform can retain users through this strategy remains to be verified.

In this regard, Li Chen, vice president of Fliggy, said that the purpose of launching the blind box product of air tickets is to attract new customers and traffic, which is one of the business demands. The platform also hopes that good products can be seen by more consumers, but what matters most is the experience the product can give to users in the link design. As long as the market reputation is good, the more people spread it, the more people will participate, and achieving the platform's desired goals will be a natural result.

In fact, the successful integration of the "blind box" IP into the tourism circle also reflects a change in the marketing ideas of the OTA platform. The person in charge of Ctrip said that consumers are curious about unknown things and hope to explore the unknown and gain surprises. In the era of "everything can be a blind box", the marketing ideas of OTA platforms also need to be more closely aligned with user needs.

As for how the life cycle of this blind air ticket box will evolve in the future, both Fliggy and Ctrip believe that the product form may change with consumer demand, but the use of marketing methods to help the tourism market recover is a long-term existence, and the platform will continue to optimize the product based on activities and user feedback.

A relevant person in charge of Tongcheng Travel also said that the epidemic has brought huge impacts on the tourism industry and airlines. Whether it is free flight or blind box air ticket products, they are all aimed at stimulating travel demand and driving the recovery of the entire tourism industry in the post-epidemic era. Free Flight is a short-term promotional product, but in the long run, each platform will definitely transform existing products into normalized products that are more suitable for long-term existence by adjusting certain factors based on short-term products. Just like the current blind box product for air tickets, Tongcheng is also considering making it a regular operation, especially focusing on promotion during peak travel periods such as holidays.

At present, with the explosive travel during the domestic "May Day" holiday approaching, air ticket prices have seen a retaliatory rise. Ctrip data shows that the current "May Day" air ticket bookings have surpassed the same period in 2019, an increase of 23%. The average economy class ticket price for "May Day" is 1,021 yuan, exceeding the average price in the same period in 2019.

In this context, blind boxes of air tickets priced less than 100 yuan do provide consumers with an opportunity to get discounts, and the full and lossless refund stipulated by the platform also eliminates consumers' worries about participating in blind box activities, providing support for the platform and airlines to attract new customers.

However, it should also be noted that if a win-win situation between consumers, platforms and airlines is to be achieved through the blind box model, the most fundamental core lies in whether it can ultimately provide consumers with complete quality services and guarantees, and whether promises and fulfillment match. Ultimately, products and consumer experience are king. Otherwise, the current popular "selling point" is likely to become a buried "explosion point."

Author: Zhao Limin; Editor: Guo Hongyun

Source: Wenlv