Airbus: SMARTER SKIES

Credits & Description:

Advertiser: AIRBUS
Agency: GOOD RELATIONS
Category: Travel, Tourism & Leisure
Senior Account Manager: Elli Karagiorgas (Good Relations)
Senior Account Manager: Ellie Backhouse (Good Relations)
Director: Darren Young (Good Relations)
Associate Director: Kirstin Kaszubowska (Good Relations)
Managing Director: Richard Moss (Good Relations)
Account Director: Edd Ross (Good Relations)
Head Of External Corporate Communications: Emma Boya (Airbus)
Senior Account Executive: Hannah Hayes (Good Relations)
Senior Associate Director: Jess Tozer (Good Relations)

Execution
The mechanism that drove the Smarter Skies solution was a 10-country survey in May revealing passengers wanted future travel to be more sustainable, more frequent and less stressful – smarter. We developed a news story around air travel creating a real World Wide Web, announced ahead of Farnborough Airshow accompanied by a VNF, two infographics, and compelling images. Airbus engineers conducted research to assign a dollar value to the excess time and fuel wasted, and identified five validated solutions in supporting of smarter ATM. We brought these to life and launched Smarter Skies atop ‘The Gherkin’ with top-tier global and trade media, and key stakeholders including ATAG, SESAR and Sustainable Aviation. We supplied Smarter Skies animations, image sets, infographics and VNF. Working with specialist designers, we created a large-scale lightshow to project a visual narrative of the inefficiencies of current ATM systems, filmed in central Berlin and seeded on social media.

Client Brief Or Objective
We launched The Future by Airbus in 2010 as the Concept Plane, featuring game-changing technologies to answer the need for faster, more sustainable travel according to our global research. The Concept Cabin followed in 2011, with nature-inspired morphing features to suit predicted trends in demographics. Following phenomenal media reaction, we needed a breakout concept that could move the focus from the aircraft to the skies beyond – addressing and inspiring a wider audience: passengers, regulators, suppliers, airlines, employees, future talent. Further research on passenger trends confirmed there was a need to fly more, but also smarter – we needed Smarter Skies.

Campaign Description
We have worked with Airbus since 2010, bringing to life The Future by Airbus – a pioneering vision of sustainable aviation in 2050. Our brief in 2012 was to continue to position Airbus as a leader in innovation and eco-efficiency, and to extend the vision from the aircraft to the skies beyond. The challenge therefore was to communicate the abstract, complicated concept of air traffic management (ATM) for consumers but also its various stakeholders, globally. We commissioned research to create the basis for our first news story, then ran workshops with Airbus engineers to identify and validate concepts suitable for media exploitation. A team of Airbus stakeholders and our own suppliers constructed the visualisations and produce a lightshow reflecting the concepts. We then launched Smarter Skies to the outside world through an event and lightshow stunt which became a viral video. We ensured momentum for Smarter skies by developing toolkits for local market roll out. Smarter Skies – and The Future by Airbus campaign by extension – is a forward-thinking concepts and far-reaching impact within one of the fastest-moving industries in the world. Smarter Skies enabled Airbus to put a stake in the ground on a highly debated topic The campaign was a success in terms of global media and social media reach, but was also positively received by various stakeholders within Airbus and the wider aviation industry. Furthermore, the Smarter Skies we introduced remain relevant until change happens.

Effectiveness
Phase 1: o98 pieces of coverage across 22 countries o95% of coverage featured quotes from Charles Champion, Executive Vice President of Engineering at Airbus – with over half featuring branded imagesPhase 2:o536 pieces of coverage across 37 countries oThe Airbus Smarter Skies VNF received 80,000+ viewso680,000+ people saw the Facebook post hosting the lightshow video – the greatest reach ever for Airbus on Facebook o8,000+ new Twitter followersoTweets about the lightshow secured 6x the usual reach and were @Airbus’ most popular ever with 500+ retweets oThe lightshow video garnered 165,000+ views on YouTubeROIoPR value: €9,031,363 EURoFees and costs: €600,000 EUR oSmarter Skies continues – collateral used in 25 regional and industry events since launch

Strategy
How to communicate air traffic management (ATM)? We devised a bold programme that took Airbus out of its comfort zone to create a vision around not only what we will fly, but how we will fly in the near future. Airbus examined engineering developments beyond aircraft design that could alleviate congestion, emissions, noise, and cost implications of more passengers in flight. Five concepts based on validated research and technology were identified which could create Smarter Skies. The strategy: Phase 1 – Scene Setting – July 2012•Research on potential savings of fuel and time if ATM were improved by 2050•Media story highlighting potential savings, introducing the idea of Smarter SkiesPhase 2 – Launch Event / Stunt – September 2012 •Exclusive event in London to present the concepts to media and industry, and engage stakeholders in detailed discussion•Projection mapping lightshow visualised concepts in Berlin ahead of ILA Airshow, promoted through social media

Relevancy
Airbus, the world’s leading aircraft manufacturer, develops the commercial aircraft which hundreds of millions of consumers fly every year. Airbus understood the need to move beyond speaking about their products and engage with consumers directly to position the brand as innovative and sustainable. This was the genesis of The Future by Airbus, created in 2009 as a pioneering vision of eco-efficient aviation in 2050 – a global consumer engagement programme that supports a more sustainable, more connected world. After two successful iterations of The Future by Airbus vision, we were tasked with the challenge of bringing it to life again.