Amadeus takes flight down under
Challenge: Expand the Amadeus story
Amadeus is well-known in the travel industry for the Global Distribution Service (GDS) that it provides to travel agents. The business has made significant inroads into diversifying its portfolio, but awareness of its two newer business units – Airlines and Strategic Growth Businesses – were low.
Solution: Target new audiences with new stories
Our proactive media relations program sought to increase awareness of the newest business units by:
- Developing interesting stories for each business unit that would resonate with the media. For example, we developed the media strategy to launch Australasia’s first fully automated airport in Adelaide, secur ing coverage in Australia’s most influential daily business newspaper, The Australian Financial Review, as well as numerous technology, aviation and travel media.
- Creating thought leadership platforms for specific Amadeus’ spokespeople to pitch media interviews and contributed articles. For example, we developed a platform focused on employee duty of care for travelling employees for the General Manager of Amadeus Australia, which resulted in coverage in New Zealand’s most influential business magazine NBR, as well as Travel Business Buzz.
Establishing relationships with important media beyond the travel trades. Firstly, we secured meet-and-greets to educate these target journalists about the breadth of Amadeus. Once they had this background, we carefully selected exclusive stories to pitch to them, which saw Amadeus covered by new journalists and new media titles, including Australia’s most read online news site News.com.au.
Impact: More coverage, more titles, more Amadeus
In 12 months, WE Buchan increased coverage by 140% (compared to the previous year), securing a total of 437 pieces of editorial. Two-thirds of the coverage appeared in tier one media, including important national media that Amadeus had never appeared in before to reach new audiences. Further to this, 40% the coverage secured was not about the GDS, ensuring the message about Amadeus’ diversified portfolio was getting out there.
