One year after setting up an ecommerce department, China Southern Airlines has uploaded over 200 online products onto its official online distribution platform, according to the partial direct sales data released on January 30. Nine products were among the carrier’s first ecommerce services hitting the domestic market, such as official website service for group tour tickets, best rate guarantee, WeChat crowd-funding, WeChat reservation and one-click payment. The crow-funding function for air ticket is the first in the world.
The carrier reported rapid growth for its online direct sales in 2015. In the year ending December 31 2015, China Southern’s online direct sales has increased by 103.60% YoY. Of which, its sales via mobile increased by 189.65% YoY, sales via WeChat increased by 195% YoY and its value-added service revenue increased by 102.44% YoY. The carrier led other Chinese carriers on the results of online direct sales, mobile sales and sales via WeChat.
The carrier’s two WeChat accounts, “CS95539” and “www_csair_com”, accumulated followers exceeding 8 million and set the benchmarks for most carriers in China. The company’s App has been downloaded for about 5 million times. Its online booking platform PV addition in 2015 was about 85 million. China Southern top other Chinese carriers in these numbers, as well as in the number of followers of its digital channels.
The carrier has also offered online check-in service in 153 cities around the world (119 domestic cities and 34 cities overseas). A total of 15 million E-Check-in cases were handled, up by 32.04% YoY. China Southern maintained the higher number of online check-in sites among China’s carriers, and about 32.8% of its services were carried out online during the year. (Translation by Jerry)
