Spafax Stories

enRoute, Air Canada’s award-winning in-flight magazine, can put another feather in its proverbial cap: world’s best in-flight. The good folk at CNNgo surveyed the world’s best in-flight magazines and said enRoute is “basically what an in-flight should (and could) be.” As the creators of enRoute, we couldn’t agree more. We’ve always thought enRoute should be the best magazine period, regardless of where one reads it. We’re pleased to the arbiters at CNN agree. Spafax has produced enRoute for Air Canada for more than a decade. The magazine sits at the center of a multiplatform media brand that includes web, mobile, in-flight entertainment and more. This multiplatform content strategy enhances not just enRoute as a print product, but our overall work for Air Canada, as well as the client’s overall brand. It is this kind of thinking that makes Spafax, we believe, one of the world’s premier content providers of media and in-flight entertainment.

Spafax Canada celebrated May Day in its own fashion by announcing the release of an enhanced IFE selection on Air Canada (read the press release here) by doubling the amount of movies and TV available to passengers, publishing a new app for Toronto food critic legend Joanne Kates (if you live in or are visiting Toronto, this app is essential), and then learning that Air Canada’s enRoute magazine and Sparksheet have teamed up for a total of 13 nominations for this year’s National Magazine Awards. The nominations include 4 to enRoute Art Director Nathalie Cusson for art direction for an entire issue as well as art direction for a single article. And that’s not all: we’ve also redesigned enRoute’s award winning website and will soon have an even larger announcement about our partnership with Air Canada. All in all, a good May Day here – the result of a hard working, dedicated and talented team.

There has been much gnashing and jawing over Facebook’s recent purchase of Instagram. On one side, you have the Instagram loyalists who feel a bit betrayed by the whole matter. On the other side, you have the strategists who see what Facebook is up to. On every side, you have that crazy price: Instagram is worth $1,000,000,000?!?!? The New York Times is worth less than that, according to its latest stock price. More than one tweet mentioned this fact. And more than one also noted that Kodak is now bankrupt. There is irony, sadness and tragedy in all of that but there is also fact. This is the age we live in. Facebook saw Instagram as a great platform (called as “simple as a poetry chapbook” here) and good at something, with fierce loyalty, and so they made their move. Facebook has so much money, the bright minds there can probably make this decision while waiting for a latte at Starbucks.

The Instagramers are upset that the owners of their beloved app “sold out.” But wouldn’t you? If after 18 months and just a few rounds of VC financing the largest social media network in the world comes up and says, “Here take a lot of our money” you would do exactly what the minds behind Instagram just did. Of course you would. Because you know it would never get better. Facebook is like that person who goes to an open house and bids way above asking price. Just to get it over with.

Few people, however, have noted what this really is: a content play. Instagram is NOTHING but content. They don’t even have a functioning website. They are an app and exist in people’s phones and on various servers around the world. That’s it. They aren’t a physical thing. They are everyone’s photos. The place isn’t even monetized. Like all good apps, an ecosystem has built up around them but otherwise, they are people sharing photos with each other. Content. Good content that is personal and that people care about. The ultimate UGC (which, I suppose, applies to all social media). Facebook might be the biggest thing on the planet but it does not invite warm fuzzy feelings. Buying Instagram won’t change that. But it does show that Facebook is finally thinking of perhaps better ways to populate their rather ugly website (and apps – why is that Facebook makes such awful apps?) and that – good news for everyone – quality matters. Instagram has 30 million users. Facebook is close to 900 million. So this wasn’t a play to get bigger. Zuckerberg et al bought Instagram to get better. Through content. All content providers should rejoice.

At our London headquarters, Spafax publishes inflight entertainment (IFE) guides for numerous airline brands, and it’s always good to receive positive feedback following market research. Despite increasingly sophisticated onscreen menus for the month’s movies, TV and audio offer, demand for print guides continues to be strong. It seems counter intuitive, in this day of touchscreen technology and interactive websites, but the power of print remains strong and research shows its what passengers want.

A recent client survey revealed younger passengers, normally considered the natural consumers of digital content, read IFE guides most widely. Another client, which presents its entertainment on the back pages of its inflight magazine, is planning to separate the two and invest in a dedicated print guide. Ironically, this has something to do with the increase in the number of video and audio options now available to passengers. More choice often leads to confusion (famously called “the tyranny of choice”); a well-done guide can cut through the confusion while at the same time highlighting the variety of options available.

The formula for success is a combination of fun and functionality. An IFE guide’s purpose is to market the variety of entertainment but in order to drive traffic to the screen; it has to be more than a menu that offers clear signposting and useful information. Passengers engage when the design is contemporary, the imagery celebrity studded, and the tone of voice lively. Alongside functional but pithy synopses, they’re inspired by authoritative recommendations, star interviews, insider snippets – that is, everything the average passenger already recognizes from the world of entertainment media.

We have recently won an account with a major carrier, and the client wants to showcase its vast selection of entertainment offerings but also wants their passengers to find the entertainment properly. So what did they do? They decided to increase the pages of their previous IFE guide by introducing a full news and features section before the comprehensive listings. Customers appreciate the editorial values of an entertainment magazine and, in turn, this enhances perception of the clients’ personality, and showcases their dedication to providing quality inflight entertainment. (All inflight entertainment content is an act of curation, after all.)

Creative fun is not a service add-on but is fundamental to influential communication. The listings in a guide seem straightforward. But they are a call-to-action. And play a large role in the overall inflight experience.

This isn’t a new idea. But it’s something that is floating around in so many different places that it’s starting to feel true. In the content business, I’ve always told my editors that spotting an idea twice is coincidence, but three times is a trend. I didn’t make that up either. But I believe it. A big idea from last year’s International Content Summit focused on Slow Content (I wrote this up in Sparksheet here). More than one speaker talked of consolidation. When Google+ went big last year, I wondered about social media overload. And now Chris Brogan, smart guy that he is, has labeled 2012 as the Year of Consolidation. And this is good news for everyone. The rush to “new” is going to slow, while we start to take deep breaths (yes, collectively) and hunt out quality. Good ideas will trump flash. This is good news for all content marketers who believe in substance to drive results. And maybe, just maybe, the internet will stop being an outlet for cute kitties.
(not that we have anything against kitties….)