Etihad Airways honored for excellence in online advertising

Etihad Airways, the national airline of the United Arab Emirates, was awarded the Global Excellence in Marketing Performance award by the Marketing Performance Awards 2014.

The prestigious award celebrates excellence in online advertising, and this year attracted hundreds of participants across 25 categories, and the winners were announced at a gala dinner at London’s Grosvenor House Hotel, attended by more than 900 global marketing experts.

It is worth noting that the Global Excellence Award in the Marketing Performance category, which targets companies that have managed and expanded their online marketing activities to include more than one region around the world, included major companies such as Nokia, Sony Europe and Microsoft Shop in its finals.

Etihad Airways was named the winner following the successful global expansion of its 2013 online marketing campaign launched from the UK, and the jury was impressed by the “smart execution, scale and overall success” of this expansion undertaken by the airline in collaboration with digital marketing agency DigitasLBi.

The advertising campaign focused on the growth of the online affiliate sales program, its expansion to a number of key markets in Europe such as Italy, France and Germany as well as the appointment of new partners for direct sales in emerging markets such as Brazil, China and India, while strengthening the partnerships with specialized sites by comparing the best offers Travel The company has also included its first email forwarding campaign, which will initially be in English and will then be launched in Arabic and other languages.

The campaign’s total revenue increased by 100 percent during 2013 compared to the previous year as a result of the global expansion witnessed by it, which included an impressive 107 percent growth in direct partner revenues and 66 percent in affiliate revenues.

In this regard, Peter Baumgartner, Chief Commercial Officer at Etihad Airways, said: “Marketing performance is a major driver of Etihad Airways’ revenue through the Internet, and its winning of the Global Excellence Award in Marketing Performance comes especially with the arrival of a number of heavyweight companies in the market to the shortlist. Evidence of the success of the large expansion witnessed last year in those areas.”

He added: “The most important challenge before us remains in studying and setting priorities for the main international markets, and developing long-term sustainable partnerships in those markets to support and sustain the increase in revenues that still fall within the scope of the cost of sales goals. We have ambitious plans to build on the success achieved by that campaign through a number of Important new developments during 2014″.

Winning the Global Excellence in Marketing Performance Award in 2014 follows another recent victory achieved by the company in the field of online marketing activities, as Etihad Airways was able to win the award for the best integrated digital campaign for the “Locate and Connect on Map” tool, which it developed in cooperation with With LinkedIn to provide business travelers the ability to search and connect with their global network while they travel.