Garuda Indonesia (GI), the flag carrier of Indonesia, apparently has a concrete interest in e-commerce industry. After successfully exclusively collaborating with Tiket.com not so long ago, it has already designed a number of plans to strengthen its bargaining position in the industry. This has put GI as the most prominent flight company to enter the e-commerce market. It has been confirmed by the company’s Director and Excecutive VP of Marketing & Sales, Erik Meijer. He stated that his company is now trying to push more sales through online transaction, despite the fact that most of transactions the company has are still done in the conventional way.
“We look to push sales through e-commerce. We are aware that each and every segment has its own trademark. I’m pretty sure that this won’t totally substitute the offline market or travel agencies,” Meijer told IndoTelko.
The initial plan was to partner with Tiket.com, in which GI has done a wonderful job in sealing the deal, and Traveloka. As being cited from the same source, the online transaction has contributed to 11%-13% of GI’s ticket sales. GI obviously wants to push the number even higher, and partnering with third parties is one of the company’s ways to do so.
Meijer added that internally, GI is in middle of leveling up its Customer Relationship Manager (CRM) system. This is aimed to improve the company’s profiling database in order to reach even more customers as well as broader market.
GI’s plan of to seriously enter the e-commerce industry has actually been apparent since months ago. If you recall, back in the middle of 2013 GI appointed Daniel Tumiwa, former Multiply Indonesia’s Country Manager and Indonesian E-Commerce Association’s (idEA) Chairman, as its VP of E-Commerce, one of most important positions at the company.
The timing of the appointment was perfect. GI hired Daniel Tumiwa right when the Indonesia’s online travel industry was in the state of starting a glorious growth. At that time, Tumiwa commented that customers want to experience more in reserving ticket online.
Besides strengthening its internal premises, GI has also established proper infrastructure to enhance its capability of serving the best digital reservation. As a matter of fact, the company has launched the Garuda Indonesia mobile reservation app which is compatible with all smartphone platforms, including iOS, Android, BlackBerry, and Windows Phone.
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