Spotnana and American Airlines Personalize Travel Offers

As consumers, we are all accustomed to personalization in many facets of our lives. Amazon recommends products to us, and Netflix recommends shows we might like. This heavily fuels our desire to go back to these sites again and again.

Personalization is a powerful driver of loyalty and convenience that remains largely untapped in the travel industry. This is a key reason why corporate travelers often visit multiple sites before they book a trip instead of managing all their bookings through a single corporate-approved booking tool. 

I’m excited to announce a partnership between Spotnana and American Airlines that powers modern retailing for the travel industry. Together, Spotnana and American are bringing new personalization features and conveniences to corporate travelers that use Spotnana’s Travel-as-a-Service Platform.

The power of modernizing the infrastructure for travel

In 2012, the International Air Travel Association (IATA) introduced New Distribution Capability (NDC) as a new standard for the travel industry to transmit data and enable airlines to offer a wider variety of fares and amenities. Adoption for corporate travel has been minimal, however, and this is something Spotnana aims to change by providing the travel industry with a new modern, cloud-based infrastructure.

Travelers can now use Spotnana’s Travel-as-a-Service Platform to access American’s diverse suite of products and services that are exclusively available through American’s NDC and direct channels including elevated offers such as Main Plus and Flagship® Business Plus™.

Key benefits for business travelers accessing American’s modern retail offerings through Spotnana’s online booking tool include the ability to purchase ancillary products in advance, modify or cancel trips on a self-service basis, view corporate negotiated rates, unlock access to Preferred and Paid seats via a comprehensive seat map, and receive relevant shopping results tailored to AAdvantage® membership benefits.

This significant milestone for Spotnana is a preview of additional offerings that will be available through a direct connection to American’s NDC Application Programming Interface (API) in the future.

Enhanced offerings for great selections – travelers gain access to products exclusively available through American’s NDC and direct channels.

My last company, WTMC, was the first in the world to reach NDC Level 3 certification, back in the mid-2010’s, with an integration to American’s NDC API. The effort to achieve this certification helped me understand the limitations of using a traditional Order Management System, which relies heavily on adding unstructured comments to the Passenger Name Record (PNR) to communicate essential information. 

The integration with American uses Spotnana’s extensible, cloud-based System of Record and open APIs to manage data flows. We do not rely upon a PNR for order management, and we automate complex transactions and modifications seamlessly as a result.

The future of digital distribution and modern retailing

Spotnana wanted to break new ground and develop an integration with American Airlines that goes beyond digital distribution as we know it today. 

The first capability we’re introducing enables travelers to join American’s AAdvantage® loyalty program with one-click enrollment at the time of booking. This new capability is just one great example of the innovation this partnership brings to the market.

Seamless loyalty program enrollment – travelers can join American’s AAdvantage® loyalty program with one-click enrollment at the time of booking.

The new era of personalized travel offers is here 

Personalization can mean many different things in the travel industry. Spotnana strives to create a more tailored traveler experience by using data and technology to present more relevant and enhanced offers, eliminating any desire to book trips elsewhere. 

Spotnana’s approach to personalization includes enhanced capabilities that are expected in top travel platforms such as the use of traveler profile data to optimize search results, the display of clear branding to designate corporate approved vendors, and the ability to reflect corporate negotiated fares with savings indicators.

Individuals booking through Spotnana also benefit from instant, personalized service from the agents at our travel management company who use the same platform as the traveler and are able to apply company travel policies and access relevant traveler information. 

The future of personalization in travel includes the ability for corporations to work with their preferred suppliers to negotiate custom offers and bundles of services in addition to negotiating corporate rates. It should be possible to negotiate extra legroom and Priority boarding, for example, and have those offers represented in the travel shopping experience. Spotnana’s modern infrastructure has been designed to support this level of flexibility and more. 

It’s a lifelong dream for me to give corporations and suppliers a seat at the same table, so they can work together to solve for the best traveler experiences. That day has finally come.

An open platform for innovation across the travel industry

I want to offer my heartfelt gratitude to the extended team at American who has worked tirelessly with us to develop these new capabilities. American is a true industry innovator and pioneer. Our partnership is just getting started, and we are looking forward to developing many more exciting new capabilities together.

The integration we’ve developed is the first of its kind in the travel industry and goes beyond integrations that have existed between any airline and travel platform to date. This integration is also just the beginning of what is possible through our open Travel-as-a-Service Platform, and the first of many direct connections we plan to build with the world’s leading travel suppliers. 

We created Spotnana to provide an open platform that benefits everyone in the travel industry. We’re building longer tables where everyone can work together, not higher walls designed to keep others out. We invite everyone to come build with us.

Sarosh