QF Targeted Offers

[SeatBackForward]

There appear to be more and more posts suggesting that QF are targeting offers based on searches made by potential customers. I myself am yet to receive any recently, despite regularly visiting the QF site. So it got me thinking:

1) Are the offers only available to those who have cookies and/or tracking enabled in their browsers? I generally have travking turned off, and cookies only enabled for selected websites.
2) Maybe they are able to determine, not only which destination/dates you're searching, but whether you then move off to another website for similar searches?
3) Does using the "Incognito" or "Private" mode on browsers make any difference?

Anyone else have expriences about the above that would suggest the same (or not)

 

[RichardMEL]

Not using cookies would make it much harder obviously but I would imagine if one is logged into their QFF account and doing searches then it's pretty easy for QF to know. Otherwise, hard to know how they may figure it out, unless via IP address, but that is not really reliable given gateways, proxies and the like it's hardly reliable.

I am not sure how accessing third party sites (eg: webjet, skyscanner or whathaveyou) to search flights would be of any use at all to QF - they would not have access to that data, and even if they did, there would be no association to pax name via those searches so I don't see using other websites to do flight searches as having anything to do with QF potentially keeping track to then potentially offer targeted promotions.

IMO

 

[Ade]

I work in the IT and I think the way it works could be that when a customer is logged into their QFF account and make a search for a particular destination, then, QF could see what the customer's activity is.

In addition, how far does the customer go with the booking could also give away potential information. For instance, I used to search for flights to India very frequently and more than twice I was offered targeted DSC for flights with QF flight numbers (codeshare not included)

So I think, QF can, when a customer is logged in, see what routes the customer is interested in, see how far away is the customer from attaining the next QFF level or how much far away from retaining their current QFF level, see how much the customer is willing to spend and what dates. Armed with all these information, QF can then make an informed/educated targeted DSC to the customer.

Happens to me all the time

On a side, completely different note :

And every time I searched, I used to go the page where you ACCEPT the fare/conditions of the booking class (Sale/Saver/Flex). I do this to get a tally of the SC's I'll be earning if I took that particular route. Some might point out that the number of SC's earned are listed in the fare, but I find that that number isn't always the number I get finally. I usually end up with more SC's that what was listed under the $ fare.

As an example, with the issues in HKG, I was looking for a flight via a different Asian city.

I looked for SYD-ADL-KUL-MAA onward, MAA-CMB-SIN-SYD return, netting 165 and 160 SC respectively. However, on the ACCEPT fare page, I was able to get 545 SC in total, rather than 325

 

[SeatBackForward]

I looked for SYD-ADL-KUL-MAA onward, MAA-CMB-SIN-SYD return, netting 165 and 160 SC respectively. However, on the ACCEPT fare page, I was able to get 545 SC in total, rather than 325

Huh? What was the miscalculation?

 

[SeatBackForward]

Not using cookies would make it much harder obviously but I would imagine if one is logged into their QFF account and doing searches then it's pretty easy for QF to know. Otherwise, hard to know how they may figure it out, unless via IP address, but that is not really reliable given gateways, proxies and the like it's hardly reliable.

I am not sure how accessing third party sites (eg: webjet, skyscanner or whathaveyou) to search flights would be of any use at all to QF - they would not have access to that data, and even if they did, there would be no association to pax name via those searches so I don't see using other websites to do flight searches as having anything to do with QF potentially keeping track to then potentially offer targeted promotions.

IMO

I don't think trackers can be that specific, but for instance I think they would be able to be aware that after being on a QF site, you then went to a SQ site for instance.

 

[SeatBackForward]

Ok so for fun, I tried a series of searches on the QF and on the AA site using Edge - I never use edge so it was the vanilla browser with cookies/trackers etc everything turned on.

I'll keep doing this over the next few days to see if anything changes. My previous searches using my usual browser with many of the scripts blocked didn't seem to produce anything.

 

[Ade]

Ok so for fun, I tried a series of searches on the QF and on the AA site using Edge - I never use edge so it was the vanilla browser with cookies/trackers etc everything turned on.

I'll keep doing this over the next few days to see if anything changes. My previous searches using my usual browser with many of the scripts blocked didn't seem to produce anything.

Heya, did you end up getting any targeted offers from QF based on your searches?

 

[SeatBackForward]

Heya, did you end up getting any targeted offers from QF based on your searches?

Nada.

Nothing yet. But I'd love to find out what other dynamics are at play. I've already qualified for WP in 2020, have hit LTG, have a few domestic bookings for 2019 remaining, but nothing in 2020 booked yet. If this plays out, looks like QF wont get any of my long-haul bookings for 2020.

 

[ChrisMars]

I got no target offer in a little while.

I would guess that two other factors are at play. This is just my guess, that's what I would use to implement the target algorithm.

1. how late or in advance are you to re-qualify. i.e if you are WP and have 1000 SC after 2 months in a membership year, I would be surprised you get more 25%/50%/100% SC offers as you are close to requalify.
2. how many SC offers did you already use in the membership year. If you already used some, then I would be surprise you still have access to more.

 

[jpp42]

I was getting a number of targeted offers earlier in the year, during a period when I was behind my normal flying if I were to reuqualify for WP. (My QFF year is the calendar year.) I then used a DSC offer to book a SYD-AKL status run and since then no more targeted offers. I have enough forward bookings to requalify now, and since I'm nowhere near P1 territory, maybe the system "knows" I won't be motivated by SC's at this time.

 

[Ade]

I was getting a number of targeted offers earlier in the year, during a period when I was behind my normal flying if I were to reuqualify for WP. (My QFF year is the calendar year.) I then used a DSC offer to book a SYD-AKL status run and since then no more targeted offers. I have enough forward bookings to requalify now, and since I'm nowhere near P1 territory, maybe the system "knows" I won't be motivated by SC's at this time.

Same story here. I got DSC & 50% offers at the beginning of membership year and once QF "knew" that I've got enough to retain Gold, which, btw I had around middle of my membership year, all promos were stopped

Now, I'm 170 SC short of QF Platinum and QF won't send any DSC offers

 

[whughes3]

I have a trip to HKG coming up next month; for a while I was checking the website for fares and availability (logged on with my FF#); I received no targeted offers of any kind. I finally booked the flights on Tuesday, and within 12 hours I received an offer of 50% extra SC's for flights to HKG booked in the next 7 days: not very useful...

 

[woodborer]

If you pay enough attention during the booking process, you'll see the occassional reference to Adobe Marketing Cloud in the URLs.

I'm not sure how they actually target people, but I think they have a set of rules to determine who gets targetted. I saw a comment somewhere that they might work out who to target, then customise an email based on recent searched.

All we can do is observe the final result, how they are getting there, and who to target is a mystery...

 

[JohnK]

I check airfares on Qantas website regularly and I don't recall receiving targetted offers based on the search although I think I've received targetted offers based on where I visit.

Some are luckier than others in getting these offers.

 

[Airbumps]

I got a 50% Bonus SC offer a couple of days ago for flights up until 20 January. I haven't been searching for anything really so not sure where it would have come from. I've done no flying with QF this year and won't even retain silver.

 

[ChrisMars]

Is this restricted to domestic? international? QF metal?

 

[Airbumps]

Nope - none of the above. Just QF marketed.