SA airports provide audience of over two million well-heeled consumers

Consider this: over 2 million business and leisure passengers, who are discerning and tech-savvy, pass through South Africa’s airports each month; spending at least 66 minutes in the environment when departing. And many of these passengers are the SADC region’s key decision makers.

Before we go further, let’s take a step back to answer the following question: Why do we consistently research? To ensure that our numbers are correct and that we continue to provide advertisers with excellent return on investment and pinpoint consumer insight. As such, we commissioned Millward Brown to study air traveller behaviour and build an effective audience and frequency calculation model which takes into account numerous factors related to air travel environments.

Through the research, we affirmed that the most regular travellers are frequent flyers from the LSM A bracket. They have purchasing power as well as an affinity for big ticket brands such as high-end personal accessories and products.

We also confirmed that consumers in airports experience something peculiar. They are both rushing and dwelling; they’re rushing to catch a flight and waiting to board that flight and also wait to collect their luggage on arrival.

As experienced marketers will know, the peculiarity of this plays out practically. Essentially, it drives synergies and increases the consumer’s ability to assimilate advertising messaging.

We also know that travellers become a sought-after captive audience as they engage airport.tv® screens in high dwell time nodes and mitigate their apprehension and enhance their excitement by keeping up to speed with world news, entertainment and lifestyle. This is the beauty of this fully-fledged digital television channel.

However, not many know that the differences between dwell times in large and small airports is not vastly different for arriving passengers. It is different for departing passengers as they spend longer time periods dwelling within particular areas in large airports compared to smaller airports.

The research also shows that of those who verified an advertisement on airport.tv®, 68% took out a key message and an average of 7.54 out of 10 liked the advertisement. And most importantly, in excess of 74% of brands that flight on airport.tv® were spontaneously recalled; this is way above the norm.

It was also fascinating for us to learn that 40% of respondents reported a willingness to interact with airport.tv® advertised brands on social media platforms such as Facebook, YouTube and Instagram. Have a think about the implications of that for a moment.

The research also shows that OOH media, essentially an established “bread and butter” medium for any ambitious brand, will grow steadily over the next five years and will reach an estimated total value of R5.1billion by 2019. DOOH’s share of this is expected to be 33%. Successful marketers are considering, and driving, the potential this offers.

In comparison with other media, DOOH is ideal for delivering simple messages with impact to a wide audience. But to achieve this, proximity to point of purchase is necessary. DOOH offers this possibility.

Big impact usually costs a lot of money, but sometimes a little money can work a lot harder. A DOOH channel such as airport.tv® has the power to create impact cost effectively. You can target the LSM A consumer with your already-created TV advertisements; and from within your digital budget. Or bring life to your static ads.

When it comes to getting a message across, the bottom line is this: you need to be where your target market is, you need to talk to them in their language and you have to be where your audience’s mind-set is open and ready to assimilate messaging. With the high dwell-time in airports and with the power of airport.tv®, consumers have the time and the frame of mind to forge affinity with brands.

Info side bars:

Airport Ads® has advertising rights to 11 airports in South Africa and at Kenneth Kaunda International Airport in Zambia. To find out how Airport Ads® can take your brand to new heights contact Mzukisi (Mzi) Deliwe on 0861 776 826 or az.oc.egatnavorp@izm or connect @ProvantageSA or go to www.provantage.co.za