What would I do to improve things for frequent flyers?
When the business is losing money, it's difficult to spend more. Motivating employees to be friendly and productive is extremely difficult.
There is a trend to make the ff program as bad as the others and to charge as many weird fees as the others.
Not to be entirely negative, how about
1. small mileage bonuses or extra upgrade coupons for those who are elite for multiple years in a row.
2. bonus miles (as few as 50) for not checking in luggage. Even the non-frequent flyer may want those miles and cut the amount of work the luggage handlers have to do.