What Airlines Can Do to Improve Customer Satisfaction

There’s an overwhelming sense among travelers that air travel just isn’t what it used to be. While flying during the “golden age of travel” is romanticized to an extent, it’s true that spending time on a plane these days can be less-than-glamorous.

And yet, people keep flying. The COVID-19 pandemic reignited travelers’ desires to take the trips they’d always dreamed of and, let’s face it, you simply can’t always get where you want to go without taking to the skies. But the disconnect between passenger volume and passenger satisfaction is a problem for airlines: An unhappy (or even ambivalent) customer who is booking with a specific airline because they don’t have another choice is not one who will stick around if an alternative arises. Those alternatives may not exist yet, but as more efficient and sustainable forms of travel are being developed, airlines must future proof by improving their customer experience now.

U.S. airlines are struggling with Net Promoter Score

Net Promoter Score (NPS) is, at its core, a simple calculation of the share of consumers who would recommend a particular brand to others (“promoters”) minus the share who would not (“detractors”). It’s often used as a tool to measure customer satisfaction with a brand or experience. What’s most notable about NPS for airlines is the stark difference between that metric and other key metrics that are utilized to paint a picture of brand health.

On average, more than half of recent flyers have a favorable opinion of major U.S. airlines and find them to be a good value, and over 2 in 5 say they are considering purchasing from them.  Those shares strengthen amongst consumers who are more highly engaged with the category: Loyalty program members, first-class travelers, and credit card holders return more favorable results across all categories.

However, Net Promoter Score is a notable outlier compared with the other metrics. It averages negative, meaning the share of detractors is higher than the share of promoters. NPS follows the trends for other metrics in that it is the lowest amongst those who are less engaged with the category. Yet still, the fact that loyalty members and credit card holders are not likely to recommend an airline brand they frequently interact with to others is concerning.

Perhaps some of this relates to the dearth of choice when it comes to airlines — there are very few major carriers in the U.S. and flight decisions are more often driven by schedule, route and price than brand loyalty. Still, the struggling NPS numbers suggest that airlines must make strides to improve the customer experience.

Customers are more likely to recommend full-service airlines than low cost carriers 

While the overall averages of airlines provide a sense of how the industry in general is performing, it does hide some stark differences between tiers of carriers. When the individual NPS scores are broken out, it’s clear that the legacy, full-service airlines are performing better than low-cost carriers.

That said, NPS is in the double-digit negatives for all airlines among those who have flown in the last year, suggesting that even though the full-service airlines are outperforming low-cost carriers, many travelers are still dissatisfied. 

The data makes it clear that airlines across the board have a lot to do in order to improve NPS. To identify what exactly needs to be done however, they must understand what factors contribute most to NPS scores.

Improving NPS will require airlines to deepen loyalty and streamline scheduling 

In order to understand the factors that contribute to NPS for airlines, Morning Consult conducted a drivers analysis to measure the connection between agreement with 16 statements about air travel and the likelihood to recommend airlines. The results, mapped below, can provide brands with a framework to understand which factors contribute most to NPS.

Statements in the top right quadrant are strengths airlines should highlight. Respondents were both more likely to agree with these statements, and they had a stronger connection to a person’s likelihood to recommend an airline. There’s a common theme between the statements that land in this quadrant: they refer to operational effectiveness. In other words, these are the very basics of service.  A traveler who has a ticket expects to get on the plane and for it to take off on time. As these are things that many travelers agree are true about airlines, there is little convincing to do. Rather, brands can reinforce and remind travelers of the priority they already place on operational matters to move the needle on NPS.

Perhaps the most important quadrant, though, is the bottom right — this includes statements that are associated with a higher NPS, but that travelers are less likely to agree are currently true about airlines. These elements represent potential differentiators, whereby if an airline can deliver in these areas they can stand out from their competitors. Among these statements, two key themes emerge.

The first is loyalty: being a member of a program, using only one airline or being able to redeem points or upgrades all fall within this category. This reinforces the idea that creating deeper relationships with customers and rewarding those who return can play a significant role in improving NPS, but also that currently loyalty program structures aren’t delivering for members, given the overall negative NPS among this group.

The second is seamless scheduling without surprises: “I can easily cancel or reschedule flights” and “I don’t have to pay many hidden fees” are both statements that can improve NPS, but that are not broadly thought to be true about the airline experience today. Investing in a more streamlined approach to reservation changes and ensuring clarity in pricing upfront can improve the customer’s experience, and as a result, bump up NPS.

Ultimately, Net Promoter Score is a metric which all major U.S. airlines should be looking to improve, perhaps with the goal of making travelers excited to fly rather than dreading taking to the skies. If they can address the services and features that travelers are most likely to crave, the next golden age of travel may be just around the corner.