FastJet takes off: delivering a digital strategy for Africa

INTERVIEW: By 2016 mobile penetration in sub-Saharan Africa is forecast to reach 75%. Unsurprisingly then mobile will be central to FastJet’s digital strategy and it may even be the test case that proves that mobile payments for flights can reach the mainstream.

Shifting deserts, palm-tree fringed sandy beaches, exotic people, big game and soaring snow-capped mountains. E-commerce may still be in its infancy in Africa but one thing seems certain, there will be no shortage of visually stunning content to help FastJet drive its digital strategy forward.

Since launching in the middle of November, the website of Africa’s first low-cost airline has received 50,000 visits, equating to around 260,000 page views and its Facebook page has had 5,000 likes. So it seems that Africa is ready to fly.

“We knew people would be excited but the interest in the website and engagement on social networks has been better than anticipated,” says Matt Bethell from the UK-based web design agency, BozBoz, which won the tender to develop FastJet’s digital strategy.

Pamela Whitby finds out more from Bethell, who project managed the design brief, about the new airline’s evolving digital strategy.

EFT: What were the main factors you had to consider when designing a website for the African market?

MB: Like anywhere else in the world the core principles of web design – namely usability, accessibility and great content - still apply in Africa.  However, for the African market, mobile usage (across a vast array of devices) and page loading times were a massive consideration.  Relatively speaking e-commerce is still in its infancy so we needed to make the whole customer journey as streamlined as possible so as to not put off first time users.  Based on the conversion rates we've been seeing over the first couple of weeks this seems to have worked so far!

As a new brand in the market, it was critical that the site is highly visible in search engines and intuitive for first time users.  Testing and setting up the hosting environment were also important factors.  We had to ensure the site worked equally as well from Tanzania as from the UK and with a new brand it was critical that the website withstood the high volumes of initial traffic we were expecting.

EFT: By 2016 mobile penetration in sub-Saharan Africa is expected to reach 75% but many people still use feature phones? Tell me a bit more about your mobile strategy.

MB:  Mobile is a massive part of the Fastjet digital strategy going forward.  We recognised early on that the range of mobile devices used to access the Internet in our launch countries was huge, so it was critical to design a site that would work and load quickly on older devices as well as new ones.

In the early stages we considered creating a fully responsive website, but because of potential page load and cross browser compatibility issues, we opted for a responsive desktop/tablet website and a separate responsive mobile website (m.fastjet.com) for mobile users. This allowed us to massively reduce the size of each individual page, strip out large jpeg images and only present information that we deemed critical to the end user. This was fundamental in getting page loading times to an acceptable level for mobile use.  To further reduce page load times, we've taken advantage of some new web technologies. While people in older browsers will still get a working, functional website, the experience and appearance would be enhanced for those with modern web browsers. We have also optimised the navigation menu and content for a smaller screen. Mobile users still have the option to navigate to the desktop site if they are on more advanced smartphones and want to access additional FastJet information not available on the mobile site.  The brand colours and theme are maintained across both mobile and desktop sites.

EFT: What are you doing with respect to mobile payments? And does the site cater for the unbanked at all?

At the time of launch unbanked customers can reserve a ticket via the

FastJet website, they then have a window of opportunity (depending on the proximity to the flight) in which to arrange payment at their local FastJet sales office or travel agent.  The ability to pay online with M-Pesa and Airtel, the main mobile payment mechanisms in Africa, will be the next big developments you see on the site. Mobile penetration is high in Africa so a number one priority for us is to get mobile money payment facilities in place via the website. And that is coming very soon!

EFT:Creating a good brand image is obviously very important. What is your approach?  

MB: We were lucky to inherit some great branding (the Parrot mascot) from the agency Someone in London. The challenge for us was to use the visually strong branding but in such a way that it didn't adversely affect site performance, page loading times and so on. We wanted to design a site that was clean, intuitive to navigate and presented all the key content in a compelling, easy to find and visually attractive way regardless of the device being used to view it.

EFT: FastJet is currently flying in Tanzania but hopes to expand to other countries in Africa soon. How adaptable is the website?

MB: With respect to backend functionality, it was a critical part of the design brief to make the site quickly scalable and adaptable in the future.  The site already has the ability to cover multiple countries and currencies and IP recognition will be used in the future to direct customers to the correct part of the site depending on where they are viewing it from. Multilingual options are on the horizon too, which brings its own design challenges.

EFT:  Facebook penetration as a percentage of total Internet users is really high in your launch countries. What are your plans for social media?

MB: Social media is massively important for FastJet. Moving forward Facebook will be a massively important touch point for us to connect with our customers.  Twitter is also big and growing rapidly in

Africa and we will be building our presence on this platform too. 

Phase 1 has been geared towards building awareness by providing engaging content that is relevant to our fans and giving our customers a way to connect with us. So far we’ve been posted photographs related to the launch of the airline such as aircraft being painted, interviews with staff and coverage of the maiden flight. One photograph posted to Facebook attracted 400 likes and engagement generally has been higher than anticipated. We have a photographer on the ground and so far our strategy has been very visually led.

Phase 2 will see the launch of quizzes and competitions which we expect to generate great photographs and video content. There will be more editorial too in the form of a blog. We really want to engage with customers to get across why FastJet is so innovative.  

However, we don't see social as a pure sales/marketing tool but as more of a platform off which to build a FastJet community that likes our service and is loyal to the airline.  By being open, honest and transparent we aim to build trust among our customer base.  Airlines don't always have the best reputation and by utilising social media, we hope to give customers a real insight into why FastJet is different, adaptive, cool and here to stay.

 

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