Customer engagement
Reaping the rewards of keeping passengers ‘on board’
LOOKING at the data around rail travel, the challenges facing the sector are stark.
For instance, anonymised modal data provided by CKDelta, in partnership with Teralytics, shows that the percentage of journeys made by train between London and Birmingham fell from 51% in February to a low of 26% during the height of lockdown in April.
After the initial lockdown, there were few signs of customers rallying back to rail. By September, the percentage of rail journeys made between the capital and Birmingham peaked at 37%. In contrast, the percentage of road journeys made between the same cities jumped from 49% in February to 62% in September.
This decline in rail usership has led to some operators shifting their focus from engaging customers to other priorities, to ensure survival over the coming months.
This could be gravely short-sighted. The ongoing COVID-19 crisis will come to an end. However, operators that fail to engage their customer base during the pandemic and to build relationships on a foundation of collaboration and trust could see customers shift from rail on the whole as ‘normality’ returns.
This shift would pose a significant challenge to the health of the industry in the months and years ahead. Engaging early and often can build and maintain consumer trust.
Engage early, engage often
As the worst of the pandemic subsides and customers take tentative steps back towards travel, their level of trust in public transport will dictate their willingness to return to rail.
By establishing and maintaining a positive reputation among customers, rail operators can instil confidence and demonstrate to customers that services are safe and reliable.
By bringing customers on board and treating them as collaborators, operators can establish buy-in and ensure they have a stake in the success of rail services.
Developers such as East West Rail have positioned the delivery of the railway as a community asset in which customers have a stake. Early engagement undertaken by East West Rail has established buy-in and built trust with future passengers and supply chains, ensuring that the imperative for investment remains strong in the face of the pandemic.
This standard should be replicated across the sector. Setting the tone in this regard is a valuable opportunity that many operators risk missing out on - placing their services at risk. Building a relationship with customers and acting on their feedback is critical to evolving to suit their needs.
Digital delivery
Data from the Office for National Statistics tells us that of those who worked from home this year, 86% did so because of the pandemic.
At the height of lockdown, 46.6% of the UK population worked exclusively from home, with many under guidance to refrain from leaving the house. When everyone becomes a ‘hard to reach stakeholder’, we need to be more targeted and strategic to ensure people hear from us and we hear from them.
The best way to achieve this is to employ future-facing digital engagement tools to target communications, raise awareness, and encourage people towards a specific call to action. In this instance, we can actively encourage people to ‘return to rail’ as the pandemic subsides.
Digital technology means we can take engagement to customers, rather than asking them to come to us. In the midst of a pandemic, this is more important than ever.
This is an opportunity for rail operators to improve the digital services they offer. Customers will no doubt have questions and queries throughout this time, and rail providers need to be ready with answers. It is important that they plan their delivery accordingly.
In a digital age, traditional communications strategies are no longer as effective. Even the digital strategies of five years ago are less effective in the constantly evolving digital world. This makes the funding of external training on engagement more difficult for operators.
To combat this, external consultants can be brought in to support internal engagement teams, freeing them up to focus on more pressing matters.
Local champions
Rail operators can build trust and confidence in the services they deliver by collaborating with local authority figures such as parish council leaders, community representatives and celebrities, to encourage members of the wider community to rally to rail as lockdown restrictions are eased.
Google’s ‘Dear Local’ campaign, featuring the likes of Anthony Joshua and Sheridan Smith, is a prime example of how a ‘return to normalcy’ can be fostered through creative partnerships and build trust among customers.
Working with local champions is one way of telling the local story and ensuring that communities ‘buy in’ to the return to rail.
By describing tangible benefits, influenced by customer feedback, developers can sell a vision for customers that is safe and reliable. This in turn can create grass-root customer advocacy, building a base of loyal travellers.
Keeping customers engaged
Customers want to feel like part of the picture and feel a sense of ownership over projects and services that have a direct impact on their lives.
Rail operators can further their relationship with customers by providing them with an opportunity to shape the future of services. They will have views and opinions over how their local train station is run, or how improvements could be made to services in a post-COVID world to make them feel more comfortable.
The pandemic will not last forever, but the damage done to the rail industry could have potential ramifications for years to come. Taking a grassroots approach to adapting services and delivery based on customer feedback could provide a first step in instilling confidence in customers and ensuring they return to rail.
Despite the bleak outlook for rail, the ongoing pandemic will not be the death blow for rail transport across the UK.
Train travel’s convenience and minimal environmental impact against car trips will always prove popular for regular journeys.
However, it’s up to rail operators to take steps now to ensure that their customers feel comfortable returning to their services promptly once the sting of the COVID-19 pandemic is eased.
“Customers will no doubt have questions and queries, and rail providers need to be ready with answers.”