Qantas Airlines: Analyzing Social Media for Brand Perception

This report examines Qantas's social media strategy and its impact on brand perception, particularly in the context of a crisis following employee strikes. The analysis highlights the company's missteps in launching a social media campaign immediately after a major operational disruption. The report identifies three critical factors for organizations using social media: demographics, timeliness, and strategy. It then proposes a course of action, recommending a humanitarian-focused campaign to rebuild goodwill, targeting specific demographics through various social media platforms with a focus on graphical and interactive content, and a planned campaign duration. The report emphasizes the importance of a well-considered strategy to avoid public backlash and effectively engage the target audience. The report concludes with the importance of aligning social media efforts with broader marketing objectives to ensure positive brand perception.

Running head: MANAGEMENET COMMUNICATION
MANAGEMENET COMMUNICATION
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note:

1MANAGEMENET COMMUNICATION
a) What future actions can Qantas take to build a positive public perception of the
brand?
Social media is a place where there is very little control on what people can express.
Though abusive language and obscene pictures are banned from most of the sites, people can
express their feelings in whatever way they desire to. Qantas had committed a big mistake
when it decided to engage the public in social media just days after the disastrous incident
happened when most of its flights were stranded because of mass strike of employees (Yin et
al. 2012). This had given a very tough time to the fliers and commuters many of whom had to
be stuck far away from their homes at different airports. There were people who had
emergencies of reaching homes or at other places. The incident has been deemed by one of
the worst crisis faced by the airlines in the recent times. To repair the damages caused by this
incident to its goodwill, the airlines was determined and desperate to do something in order to
repair its damage. In doing so it started the social media competition. The Reuters reports
“Qantas Tuesday invited users of the micro-blogging site to enter a “Qantas Luxury”
competition, asking people to describe their “dream luxury in-flight experience” and possibly
win a pair of Qantas first-class pyjamas and a toiletries kit. The timing of the PR exercise was
questionable, coming just a day after Qantas and its unions broke off contract negotiations
and after Qantas grounded its fleet in late October, a drastic move that stranded thousands of
angry customers.” (Barnett 2011)
In the future in order to rebuild the image of the company in social media the
company should now engage in humanitarian activities and should take up some social issue
which is not directly linked to its business process. The company for example, can take up a
campaign to raise money for the underprivileged children in the poor region of the world
where it operates its airlines (Pfeffer, Zorbach and Carley 2014). This will help the company
get some sympathy of the people and many people will engage in the social humanitarian

2MANAGEMENET COMMUNICATION
activity and donate for the cause. The justification is that, it will help the company to increase
its goodwill and also engage people into its social media domains across various platforms.
b) Identify three important factors for an organisation to consider when using
social media.
Demographics: The first thing to consider in social media marketing is demographics
of the audience (Brito 2011). All the businesses have their own target audience to whom
they target their marketing campaign. The demographics of the social media audience
constitute of the different groups and division of population, on the basis of region,
identity, gender, age and other factors (Aral, Dellarocas and Godes 2013). If the target
audience is wrongly chosen the social media campaign will be a failure. An advertisement
of the airlines if are shown to people who have little chance or opportunity to fly, in terms
of income, then the money invested is wasted (Berthon et al. 2012).
Timeliness: Another important factor to consider in order to launch and successfully
run a social media campaign is timeliness and understanding of circumstances (Macarthy
2018). As an example the case study of Qantas can be mentioned here. The time of
launching the “dream luxury in-flight experience” was totally wrong as people were
frustrated with the recent incident of mass strike and stranding of most of the aircrafts of
the airlines. It could be some social issue campaign to bring back the goodwill, or it could
have been a “resurgence” campaign dedicated solely and honestly to express how the
airlines have fought the crisis bravely and bounced back.
Strategy: The most important factor for an organisation while using the social media
is to ensure that the proper strategy is in place (Bharadwaj et al. 2013). In case of the
Qantas airlines the strategy it used nosedived and backfired. The crisis it faced due to the
grounding of the aircrafts was in itself a very unique one. To come out of this crisis and to

3MANAGEMENET COMMUNICATION
win back customer confidence the company decided to launch the social media campaign
to engage the people and asked them what kind of luxury they expected in the flights.
This backfired and people used the independence to post any kind of comments against
the airlines. Therefore the strategy must be brain stormed and filtered before finally
implementing.
c) Using the Communication Plan Template in the case, devise a course of action
for Olivia Wirth to recommend to Qantas management
1. Timing 3 months of the year (June, July and
August), this will be the experimental
launch of the campaign. If it is successful
the time and frequency can be increased.
2. Audience The existing Qantas Airlines fliers and the
potential fliers consisting of the target
demographics. In the social media platforms
demographics can be targeted who can view
the advertisement.
3. Sender The company will be the sender and the
department that will conduct the campaign
is the CSR department.
4. Key Message The key message will constitute of the
donation opportunity in cash or kind for the
poor people and the refugees in the areas
where Qantas Airlines has its operation.
5. Desired Outcome The desired outcome is better engagement
of the audience who are targeted and getting

4MANAGEMENET COMMUNICATION
back the goodwill that was harmed due to
the crisis it faced.
6. Medium Various social media platforms like
Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
7. Material Mainly graphical and interactive posts will
be given which will engage the audience
and there will be donate button that the
users can click and donate or pledge for
donation. Graphics are helpful in engaging
more people (Jussila, Kärkkäinen and
Aramo-Immonen 2014)
8. Frequency This social media campaign can be
conducted for 3 months every year and then
the response of the audience can be
measured to decide further about the
possibility of expanding the campaign.

5MANAGEMENET COMMUNICATION
Reference:
Aral, S., Dellarocas, C. and Godes, D., 2013. Introduction to the special issue—social media
and business transformation: a framework for research. Information Systems Research, 24(1),
pp.3-13.
Barnett, E., 2011. Companies must learn from Qantas Twitter gaffe and TripAdvisor
blackmails. [online] Telegraph.co.uk. Available at:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/social-media/8912701/Companies-must-learn-from-
Qantas-Twitter-gaffe-and-TripAdvisor-blackmails.html [Accessed 9 May 2018].
Berthon, P.R., Pitt, L.F., Plangger, K. and Shapiro, D., 2012. Marketing meets Web 2.0,
social media, and creative consumers: Implications for international marketing
strategy. Business horizons, 55(3), pp.261-271.
Bharadwaj, A., El Sawy, O., Pavlou, P. and Venkatraman, N., 2013. Digital business
strategy: toward a next generation of insights.
Brito, M., 2011. Smart business, social business: a playbook for social media in your
organization. Pearson Education.
Jussila, J.J., Kärkkäinen, H. and Aramo-Immonen, H., 2014. Social media utilization in
business-to-business relationships of technology industry firms. Computers in Human
Behavior, 30, pp.606-613.
Macarthy, A., 2018. 500 Social Media Marketing Tips: Essential Advice, Hints and Strategy
for Business Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Google+, YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, and
More!. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform.

6MANAGEMENET COMMUNICATION
Pfeffer, J., Zorbach, T. and Carley, K.M., 2014. Understanding online firestorms: Negative
word-of-mouth dynamics in social media networks. Journal of Marketing
Communications, 20(1-2), pp.117-128.
Yin, J., Lampert, A., Cameron, M., Robinson, B. and Power, R., 2012. Using social media to
enhance emergency situation awareness. IEEE Intelligent Systems, 27(6), pp.52-59.