A Statistical Analysis of the Social Media Impact of American Airlines - US Airways Merger by Unmetric, a social media benchmarking firm and a partner of SimpliFlying If you work in an airline or airport organisation and wish to download the slides, please email contact@simpliflying.com

1. Time Period: Jan-Feb 2013

2. THE
SOCIAL MEDIA
BENCHMARKING
COMPANY FOR BRANDS
We monitor and analyze the daily activity on the social media
outposts of over 11,000 brands in 33 sectors across Facebook,
Twitter, YouTube and Pinterest.
Our clients use Unmetric to analyze competitors, benchmark
their performance, and compete intelligently

3. ANALYSIS OF
BRANDS ON
FACEBOOK
Facebook
Fans, Conversations, Engagement,
Campaigns, etc...

4. Fan Base
American Airlines has huge fan base on Facebook compared to US Airways.
However, US Airways grew much faster
700,000
579,367
600,000
500,000
400,000
300,000 16.00%
14.30%
200,000 14.00%
100,000 58,409 12.00%
0 10.00%
American Airlines US Airways
7.60%
8.00%
6.00%
4.00%
2.00%
0.00%
American Airlines US Airways

5. Engagement
American Airlines’ Facebook updates have been twice as engaging
as the ones by US Airways
US Airways 50
American Airlines 102
0 20 40 60 80 100 120

6. Update around the merger
The update by American Airlines was their
most engaging post about the merger
with an engagement score of 310.
The update by US Airways about the merger
between US Airways and American Airlines was
their most engaging post during the time period
analyzed with an engagement score of 306.

7. Average Engagement
The posts that talked about the merger had better
120 engagement for both American Airlines and US Airways
107
100 93
90
80
59
60
40
20
0
American Airlines US Airways
'Merger' Related Posts Average Engagement Feb'13 Average Engagement

8. Customer Service on Facebook
1400 1272
1200 Average Response Time
1000
800
600
400 1 hr 29 mins
200 95
0
American Airlines US Airways
American Airlines has come out as a better 13 hr 40 mins
customer service oriented airline than the US
Airways by replying to a huge 1,272 fan queries.

9. How Sentiment Changed Before & After The Announcement
American Airlines
60.00% increased their positive
sentiment after the
merger, but US Airways
50.00% reduce by a lot
21.10%
19% 22%
40.00%
22.60%
30.00%
20.00%
34.20%
31.70% 30.50%
23.90%
10.00%
0.00%
Before After Before After
American Airlines Positive Negative US Airways

10. ANALYSIS OF
BRANDS ON
TWITTER
Twitter
Followers, Customer Service Metrics,
Campaigns, etc...

11. Follower Base
American Airlines has twice the number of followers on Twitter
than US Airways and their growth rate is higher too
600,000 513,466
500,000
400,000
300,000 262,326
200,000
100,000
0
American Airlines US Airways
6.70% 6.60%
6.60%
6.50%
6.40%
6.30%
6.20% 6.10%
6.10%
6.00%
5.90%
5.80%
American Airlines US Airways

12. Customer Service
50,000 44,315
40,000
Average Response Time
30,000
20,000
10,000
1,528
- 15 mins
American Airlines US Airways
A mind blowing 44,315 replies to customers on
Twitter by American Airlines reveals that it is
better organized to reply to customer queries
on social media than US Airways 1 hr 12 mins

13. ANALYSIS OF
BRANDS ON
YOUTUBE
YouTube
Views, Shares, Uploads, Top Video, etc...

14. Video Views
American Airlines has more number of views
and a higher view growth rate than US Airways
3,000,000 2,808,555
2,500,000
2,000,000
1,500,000
1,000,000
35.00%
500,000 226,755 28.70%
30.00%
0 25.00%
American Airlines US Airways
20.00% 16.10%
15.00%
10.00%
5.00%
0.00%
American Airlines US Airways

15. Subscriber Base
American Airlines has 10 times more number of
subscribers to its YouTube channel than US
Airways and their subscriber base is growing
faster too.
12,000 11,364
10,000
8,000
6,000
60.00% 55.40%
4,000
2,000 1,074 50.00%
0 40.00%
American Airlines US Airways
30.00%
22.30%
20.00%
10.00%
0.00%
American Airlines US Airways

16. Videos around the merger
American Airlines and US
Airways stronger together
as the New American A New American is
Arriving - Commercial
XXX
Behind the
Scenes –
Announcement
Day

17. Number of Views around the merger
Both the airlines posted 3 videos about the merger on their YouTube page and the American
Airlines’ videos were the most watched
US Airways 11,502
American Airlines 72,124
0 10,000 20,000 30,000 40,000 50,000 60,000 70,000 80,000

18. Final
Verdict
When
it
comes
to
social
media
presence,
American
Airlines
has
been
outperforming
US
Airways
on
virtually
every
possible
metric

19. THANK YOU
Please contact us at
info@unmetric.com
for more information
About Unmetric :
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