Is Delta Monitoring Flyertalk?
 

Just a thought: Does anyone know if DL still has any reps/agents/ambassadors viewing FT threads? It seems like one time they did, but that was a long time ago. Anyway, if they do, hopefully repeated frustrations with the onboard offerings will be noticed (though I know they absolutely have to be noticed already).

A few weeks ago I sent in a complaint about a recent upgrade and subsequent downgrade fiasco. On the same complaint form I wrote a lengthy paragraph related to the current onboard offerings and lack of inflight service. (I’ve been trying to mention it in every communication with DL such as email, surveys, Twitter, etc). Earlier this week I received a very thorough reply and apology about the UG issue and specific details of what went wrong. They tossed a heavy amount of miles my way and it satisfied that issue. But not one peep of an acknowledgement about the onboard services and lack there of.

Some of the other programs do have reps on FT. Haven't seen a DL one though in a long time. My guess is if any are left, by 10/1 they'll be out the door.

lDL has a team of analysts responsible for reviewing comments on this forum and others; just because they don't make their presence known doesn't mean they aren't tracking our comments. However, I hit DL where it hurts them the most, i.e., depriving them of premium cabin revenue and giving it to AA and UA instead.

That's ludicrous. Delta has no such "team". Delta keeps their own analytics through their own surveys and put no weight in a fringe message board

Dunno, I thought I remembered reading that they definitely have people lurking here. Maybe not so much to gauge sentiment and more to look for hints of fraud/shenanigans, but...

I do think it would be nice if DL had people like the Starwood-now-Marriott Lurkers on FT.

EDIT: I think Hilton also? WN occasionally gets posts from official accounts too. And there is a UA Insider but don't think they post that often (still, I don't recall ever seeing an official DL account posting in my 5 years on FT... maybe once?)

I would guess DL does this also. I know for sure that AA does/has in the past.

Exactly - a company that runs on DL's scale is going to be looking at analytics or aggregate data. I'm surprised that people are that passionate about this - just vote with your wallets if you still need to fly that much. It's just a business relationship and there's nothing personal about it.

Can confirm that Delta just looks at analytics through their own survey's and occasionally their official social media platforms, not message boards or other internet sources.

Sorry to disappoint, but even WN with far less resources than DL regularly reads posts on this forum... I know because my cousin has worked for both airlines and even shared jokes about the comments that were made during meetings about some posts. And no, I never said that DL exclusively looks at this forum; they would be crazy not to look at more important data such as that of Google nor is it the sole job description of a team of analysts to just look at message boards.

People seem to believe that because gate agents, flight attendants, or pilots aren't aware of specific departments at each airline's headquarters, somehow they magically disappear so that the DL apologists feel better.

They might (and do) in an unofficial capacity look at forums but they don't use it in their analytics or official uses.

I could be wrong, but I bet if someone on here were bragging about a blatant violation of the CoC or Skymiles terms and conditions they’d probably get to the bottom of it.

Respectfully, you previously stated that this wasn't done and now you are backtracking...

The bottom line is that DL, just like several of its competitors, do look at this forum and from time to time they do discuss and make decisions taking inputs from their own data as well as outside data (again, from multiple sources). Probably the most extreme example of this was when Emirates got fed up of bloggers mocking them and writing how easy it was to book EK F with AS miles and overnight EK made AS drastically increase F award mileage for flights operated by EK; same for Marriott firing several staff responsible for the Bonvoy fiasco well before Covid when even their most loyal elites outright ridiculed the new program.

in what way does WN have less resources than Delta?

people sure do like to believe their opinion is A LOT more important to a multi billion dollar corporation than it is. I can tell you DEFINITIVELY with 100% certainty there is no "Flyertalk Team" at Delta. The site is considered fringe opinion.

WN has always been more cost-conscious than DL, not attacking DL for this since the latter is a true network carrier. DL's analytics teams are a lot bigger than those of WN... same for other critical departments such as marketing, network planning, and revenue management.

I'm a pretty objective person and I was simply stating facts. Whether DL values my opinion or not, to be quite blunt, is of no consequence to me. I'm responsible for my company's travel budget and when our DL account manager comes begging us for business, I will simply present to her all the bookings that went to AA, B6, and UA due to DL's cavalier attitude towards inflight service and politely explain why we are avoiding DL like the plague. The number one rule in economics is that consumers are rational beings looking to maximize their purchasing power so we have no reason to book domestic Delta One when AA, B6, and UA (on 781) are charging less whilst providing much better service.

I’ve been flying UA a lot more lately due to price, but every time someone sits down next to me on United I’m reminded why I keep going back to DL. I really like having the empty adjacent seat next to me. Just no winning these days.

No one has said there's a FT team or even person at DL. It's simply been pointed out that companies do look at sites like this (I hardly call FT fringe, one of the better/best known FF discussion boards) to see things that a survey can miss. It doesn't mean big decisions are based off comments on such sites, nor that they actively read the sites. However any company worth two cents know to periodically take a look at what is being said about them online.

I can tell you that DL definitely monitors Flyertalk. A vast source of data, high value customers, some not so high :) etc. They would be stupid not to.

... some are high value, some are just high :D

Well, that would certainly be a way to liven up the F cabin these days. Lol

Monitoring is different from actively participating, unfortunately.....and in the other direction, there once were some DL DOs and a few cases where we organized something special to recognize some PMNW/DL employees, of course with DL's acquiescence or better.

Heck I never expected to influence a Delta marketing team on this forum. I did however expect to influence the regulars on this forum about the good and bad of Delta service.

I primarily influence through my company's negotiations with DL. Our poor DL account manager is going to hear me singing: "NO no no noooo noooo noooo, no, no, helllzzz noooooo!" until DL improves its pathetic inflight services.

So this account is fake? :p

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/memb...milesteam.html

There have been other reps over the years, they do come and go....

Well good luck with that. Delta is working hard to keep the FAs safe, happy, and non-unionized.

David

They monitor it to some extent. I received a PM about 2 years ago from the “SkymilesTeam” account regarding an issue I posted about on the DL forum. Does DL make decisions off of what they observe and read on FT and if so to what extent? I guess only DL knows that answer

Some recent FAs acknowledged their embarrassment and offered their apologies on how minimal their service has become. YMMV.

Right let's see if they can keep all those wonderful FAs who don't want to serve soft drinks employed if their revenues continue to worsen as they lose more premium cabin corporate accounts

yes Delta monitors FT. Infact, they're monitoring it right ... now ... ;)

Can confirm that you're incorrect...FT is monitored, just like any other customer discussion forum is.

DL clearly has a strategy they're going for right now, one that focuses on capturing safety-conscious economy customers. For better or worse I don't think you're in their target demographic right now and I bet the loss of revenue from you is expected. From my perspective as an avid but not frequent flyer and the perspectives of family and friends who couldn't care less about airplanes, DL is the only viable choice right now because of their commitment to seat spacing and mask wearing, and any service compromises as a result of that are acceptable. YMMV.

Delta almost certainly monitors this forum, either manually or (more likely) via sentiment / trend analytics provided by various different providers.

The role of forums like FlyerTalk have declined precipitously with the dominance of Twitter, Facebook, etc which is where sentiment analysis is most used these days.

But the likelihood that this forum is not one of the source lists for general input analysis is unlikely - not because we're important, but because it's easy to add a few more source targets to sentiment analysis tools.

Pretty much all customer-facing enterprises monitor social media. including niche social media such as FT. But, that doesn't mean that there is a team pouring through thousands of posts full of drivel. Decent CRM social media software an easily pull out key search terms, not only from FT but from other sites and present a useful picture.

Monitoring doesn't mean every post every day. The same as polling and focus groups.

As o OP's specific, a complaint about a specific issue which is resolveable (even if not to the customer's satisfaction) is a horse of a different color from broad-based comments about hard & soft product. Those simply get noted as a metric and acted on or not. Best to focus a complaint on the one thing which can be dealt with. By inference, if the same customer complains about the same thing regularly, it means that the customer is a complainer but DL is not at risk of losing that customer's business.

We They do not actively monitor FT. :D

It's really quite sad (but not surprising) that a non-union company cares more about its employees than their union peers at OA.

This captures it best. There isn't a DL call center where DL employees comb thru every FT post looking to "take action," but many Delta employees including members of the skymiles team regularly review flyertalk.

I can't speak to DL from personal knowledge, but UA absolutely monitors FT, among other things to learn of IT bugs and the new ways we've figured out to maximize FFP value (aka, "game their systems"). I would assume DL does same.

Exactly which is why I don't make any comments on Skymiles loopholes because I know with certainty that DL staff actively read this forum; not going to make it easy for them to further devalue Skymiles.

Back in the warmer days of FT-DL relations (2008 or so), DL employees were actively engaged with the FT community, both on the board and at the DOs.

Analytics is useful for certain things (eg: "safety conscious consumers are a better source of revenue than premium cabin passengers") but a specialty board like FT is great for getting specific (some may say esoteric) feedback from a sector of the customer base who actually know more about the product than most employees. Frankly DL would be stupid not to monitor the board. (A lack of bidirectional participation is more likely from a desire not to engage with the constant whining of a noisy few, whose conduct can sometimes border on harassment.)

In contrast, something like Twitter is useful for managing PR, but not so useful for the same sort of technical feedback.

Completely agree! I think a large portion of FT'ers definitely fit the model of being a customer base who (in many times) actually do know more about the product than some employees.

I've learned so many things over my 5 years on FT and they have come in handy many times. I think it would truly benefit DL to monitor this board and observe the discussions. On many social media platforms (Twitter/FB) the content is mostly from non-status members complaining about policies they encountered on their once-a-year flight. FT consists of more frequent fliers (many who have status and are likely to be in Premium Cabins).

I can completely understand DL choosing not to "engage" in discussions on FT. But I think it would be a huge mistake for them to ignore the community entirely.

I know for a fact that DL monitors ALL social websites. I have first hand knowledge of employees who have been disciplined for posts that DL considered to be inappropriate.

And let's be realistic, this is consistent with pretty much every company. Marriott in particular has fired a lot of employees even for minor social media offenses.

I'm not being critical of DL. They have rules and guidelines and expect them to be adhered to. There's nothing wrong with that. I have clients that do the same thing.

I know many employees who read FT since they get information here that they don't get from DL but they don't have accounts and would never post anything.

I have a rule for myself that I never post anything I learn from an employee if it isn't publicly available information.