Mashable’s Stephanie Walden recently sat down with Kevin Krone, CMO of Southwest Airlines, to discuss the strategic marketing tactics and storytelling strategy the “no frills” airline uses to maintain its competitive advantage.
Southwest’s continued success is derived from their customer service approach – treating customers as unique individuals, and delivering an unmatched customer experience. However, marketing tactics are quickly changing. During the Q & A, Krone discusses how marketing is evolving away from “mass marketing” into targeted, personal engagement. He discusses Southwest’s targeted marketing strategies and how they reach the large scale of consumers they have with storytelling.
Southwest drives success with storytelling abilities. Krone explained how storytelling can become challenging when trying to communicate to consumers on an individual level. However, as the only airline available that doesn’t charge bag fees and change fees, Southwest has thousands of loyal brand advocates who are willing to share their stories. The airline also leveraged their brand refresh in 2014 as a great storytelling opportunity, using social media, mobile, web, television, and offline content to communicate to consumers.
