American Airlines next year will launch SalesLink Insights, a data portal for corporate travel buyers through which they can monitor contract performance, spending and operational data.
The carrier, which released a new portal for agents earlier this year, already has been demoing SalesLink Insights for its corporate customers and plans to put it in the hands of a beta group of about 50 corporate accounts in November, said American Airlines managing director of sales operations Brett Berman. In the first quarter of next year, it will expand that to more than 2,000 corporate accounts globally.
The portal "provides the dynamic reporting we've always needed," American Airlines SVP of global sales and distribution Alison Taylor said. "We do that through great visuals, great maps and market-level data, and you're able to drill down as much as you need."
Using Prism data as its basis, the portal shows buyers how well they are meeting contract terms as far as spending and revenue share, as well as data on savings, bag fees, Flex Funds and reports on operations like on-time performance and denied boarding instances, Taylor said. It also includes data from American's joint-venture partners—British Airways, Iberia, Finnair and Japan Airlines—and will be able to include other JV partners as they come aboard.
That data allows travel buyers not only to manage their programs but to have a resource to easily explain their programs when needed, Taylor said. "Sometimes, when going to their bosses, a travel manager needs to articulate what they are doing: the savings they get through ancillaries and travel expenses, the things we are waiving for them and the source of Flex Funds to help them out," she said. "This provides that in a one-stop shop."
Beyond the summary level, users can break down and get details by market, cabin and other filters, including "what-if" functionality to show potential savings, Berman said. For example, users could look at what is selling in Europe or in a specific country and see a color-coded map on which green shows areas where American is getting more than its expected share and red shows areas where it could improve. "People have liked the fact that they can see trends developing," Berman said. "One [user] in particular didn't realize how much travel they had to India. It helps travel managers see things in a broader scope and be better at their role."
Data is updated both weekly and monthly, so buyers will be more up-to-date than they are via standard quarterly reviews, Taylor said. With the agent portal, the capability already has "really changed the conversation we have with our agents," she said. "It enables us to have the types of discussions that are more useful for the customer and us."
PRA Health Sciences VP of finance and business operations David Sockolof is among the buyers who has participated in American's demos. He said he found it to be "clearly, incredibly flexible" and, as he deals with multiple travel management companies, useful to see data consolidated in one place, down to booking patterns at a route level.
In addition, he said it could influence policy as well as contract strategy. "Depending on the company culture, when you identify ancillary spend, see seat assignments and who is buying upgrades, all those types of things that could inform policy—we tend to be fairly traveler-centric, so we could look at how to make it easier to negotiate these in the rates for travelers," Sockolof said. "In a culture that's more controlling, they could look at how to be more cost-conscious," like allowing same-day changes only when done on standby.
The platform was designed to scale over time, so it can be enhanced as needed, Taylor said. The carrier already has been incorporating feedback from its demos, including from its corporate customer advisory board, which had its first meeting in May, she said. Eventually, as American comes out with tools related to the International Air Transport Association's New Distribution Capability standards, the portal can be scaled to report on that, as well, Berman said.
Corporate customer reporting portals have emerged as a key focus for legacy U.S. carriers' sales teams in recent years. United launched its Jetstream portal in 2017, and Delta launched its Edge portal in 2014.