Onboard and Ancillary retail

the "fourth dimension" of ancillary revenue - merchandising, pricing and cross-channel retail

Historically, ancillary revenue has focused on three main dimensions - supplementary (upgrades, excess baggage, priority boarding) , complimentary (hotels, car hire, insurance) and loyalty (frequent flyer). As the travel market has evolved, businesses are seeking to engage with their customers through the entire customer journey, and offer a broader range of products and services beyond their traditional portfolio.

We have defined this approach as "the fourth dimension" of ancillary revenue, and it is driven by a need for travel companies to both identify new revenue streams and also to capitalise on their existing assets to provide their customers with a seamless experience.

Using IVIS solutions for you can provide the following services to support your business in delivering broader retail to your customers:

Integrate suppliers
Critical to the success of any retail platform is the supply and distribution of products and the information about those products. IVIS group have worked with some of the largest retailers in the world and understand the challenges in building these relationships. The Sonetto® applications, allow you to integrate new partners, manage the quality and supply of information and build effective and targetted promotions.

Retail through the customer journey
Using the Sonetto® Ancillary Retail Management (ARM) components, you can extend your existing multi-channel solutions to offer customers the following types of retail services, in a single basket:

• Booking - Supplementary items (e.g. Upgrades, check-in, baggage..)
• Pre-flight - Complimentary items (e.g. Hotel, Insurance..)
• Departure - "Reserve & Collect" (e.g. Apparel, books...)
• In-flight - Destination based (e.g. Attraction tickets, guided tours...)
• Arrival - Pre-ordered holiday items (e.g. Snorkel equipment..)
• Destination - Pre-ordered "Via Hotel" (e.g. Scuba gear, waveboards..)
• Post-flight - Community & Loyalty (e.g. Comments, plan next trip..)

"Our biggest mistake was not recognising early enough that the best online retailers are not powered by airline reservation platforms"

Major US Airline

Rules driven merchandising
Use the Sonetto® ARM rules engine, relationships between products and services can be created automatically to provide cross-sell and up-sell as well as bundled products. Taking this further and utilising the asset of customer data combined with product information, allows you to make targetted promotions based on lifestyle, destination or customer preference.

The same power of the rules engine is available at the time of the transaction, across all channels, so dynamic pricing and promotions as well as personalised merchandising become a reality. The triggers for these rules can be as diverse as customer profile, availability, date, capacity...giving you flexibility and agility in managing your business.

Channel management
To deliver these ancillary retail services throughout the customer journey, requires integration with applications as diverse as existing booking systems, kiosk terminals, websites and on-board systems. Using Sonetto® Channel Information Management, in conjunction with the Sonetto® iTools, it is possible to offer all ancillary retail services across your multi-channel landscape.