As the operator of the world's second busiest airport, Dubai Airports needs to communicate with a diverse range of stakeholders around the world. Content marketing agency Switch enables them to do just that. English version.
4. Overview
Our Dubai Airports project has been one of our most
exciting. It has proven yet again that the print channel for
content is alive and kicking – in this instance because of
its real-world utility for so many people who don’t have
workplace access to email (and probably never will).
But it has also showcased just how far Switch has come in
helping big clients make the big leap from print to digital –
and reap substantial rewards from both content platforms.
By being involved with Dubai Airports at the inception of
a print project, we have been able to develop a powerful
understanding of the communications needs of a huge
organisation. This has given us the ability to create
meaningful content that can be tailored for audiences as
disparate as a customs officer, an airline CEO, through to a
baggage handler.
These skills are scalable. They are connected. They engage
audiences around the world, turning staff members and the
public into brand ambassadors as we go.
talktoswitch.com
~ 02 ~
6. The Challenge
Dubai Airports owns and operates Dubai International – the world’s second busiest airport for
international passenger traffic after London Heathrow. In 2012, it handled 57.6 million passengers, a
figure that is set to grow to just under 100 million a year by 2020. As if that were not enough, Dubai
Airports also owns and runs the behemoth cargo operation, Dubai World Central.
Managing such enormous potential requires careful coordination with Dubai Airports’ thousands
of staff, its dozens of industry partners, and the flying public itself. But it wasn’t always like this. In
2011, Switch won a reasonably small, but beautifully formed contract: to take over production of
Dubai Airports’ quarterly internal newsletter, Dubai Airports Connections.
talktoswitch.com
~ 03 ~
8. The Solution
First, we changed the name to the
more wieldy Connections. We redesigned the inside pages to make
them more accessible, with better use
of colour, more diverse elements such
as fact boxes and pull quotes, and a
solid relationship with Dubai Airports’
new internal branding.
While the content continued to be
written by Dubai Airports’ in-house
marketing team, we provided a little
copyediting to ensure each edition
was consistent, and provided full
Arabic translation.
talktoswitch.com
~ 04 ~
10. The Result
Connections was so well received that in
2012, Dubai Airports asked us to repurpose
some of the content for an external audience
– but this time online.
The result was dubaiairportsconnect.com,
a bilingual news site complete with an HTML
email newsletter. Designed and built by
Switch, Connect is sent to the group’s key
partners, including the police and immigration,
customs, and hundreds of cargo companies.
talktoswitch.com
~ 05 ~
12. Logical Progression
Armed with this as a tester, in 2013, we then took the whole of Connections online
so that staff members could access it wherever they were. Dubai Airports understood
that many employees have limited or no workplace access to emails, so the printed
version remained an important component of their communications strategy. But
www.dubaiairportsconnections.com gave Connections’ content a life of its own
online, making it accessible to a much wider audience.
Like Connect, the Connections site is accompanied by an HTML email newsletter,
and is published in both English and Arabic. Both sites are feature-rich and fully
social, including additional content such as image galleries, Twitter, Facebook,
Instagram and Linkedin.
talktoswitch.com
~ 06 ~
14. Results
In Connections, Dubai Airports has a complete internal communications package
for its roughly 50,000 staff, in print and online – one that can be re-purposed for
external communications whenever deemed necessary. It meets the needs of a
wildly diverse group of employees from often completely different backgrounds,
income levels and positions in the corporate hierarchy. It is inclusive, in the sense
that it doesn’t dismiss anyone as either too important or too lowly to receive the
clear encouragement and sense of community Connections creates.
The Connect website, on the other hand, exceeded even our wildest expectations.
It has so far received more than 40,000 hits from an email database of less than
2,000, and because all Switch sites are fully responsive, more than 10 per cent of
Connect readers access it through their smartphones or tablets. It is even being
viewed on a Nintendo Wii.
talktoswitch.com
~ 07 ~
16. The Big Leap Forward
As you’ve probably gathered, being the world’s second busiest airport
means Dubai Airports has a lot to talk about. And for years that has been
achieved through a printed annual report. But for an organisation wishing
to communicate with partners around the world, that presented a huge
distribution problem.
So Dubai Airports asked Switch to create a bleeding edge, online-only
yearbook; as far as we know, the first of its kind to be deployed in the Gulf.
www.dubaiairportsreview.com is a gorgeous piece of corporate
engineering. It can be viewed easily on any device, is in both English and
Arabic, and has a host of special functions. This includes some very cool
animated graphs to bring its otherwise dry data to life. We even filmed Paul
Griffiths, the organisation’s CEO, delivering his welcome message.
We also completely redesigned the terminal maps to make them easier
to understand. Then we animated them too. Rather than have one map
crowded with information, the site enables people to choose what they
view: only restaurants and shops for example.
talktoswitch.com
~ 08 ~
18. Results
The contrast between the printed report in 2011 and our online solution was
apparent within minutes of the site going live. Instead of a few hundred copies
making their way by post to be delivered over a period of days, even weeks,
anyone in the world could access the content, in two languages, on any device.
From May 8 2013, when it went live, until the end of August, the site received
5,546 unique visitors, viewing almost 20,000 pages.
Readers came from around the world. Of course the single biggest country
was the UAE, but that still only accounted for around a third of views. The
UK, Europe and Asia also featured heavily – given that these markets contain
significant concentrations of Dubai Airports’ partners this suggested that the
target audience was being reached effectively.
There were also healthy numbers of people viewing the site on mobiles (745)
and tablets (308). The downloadable pdf version provide popular too, with
around 2,000 downloads – approximately one third of those who visited the site.
talktoswitch.com
~ 09 ~
19.
20. Testimonial
One of the best strategic decisions we made
at Dubai Airports was choosing Switch as our
primary partner for the design and production
of our corporate publications. Switch is
extremely efficient and effective in their work
and consistently strives for perfection. We’ve
worked with a number of companies over
the years but we believe that Switch is the
company to lead us into the future of our
employee communications with their excellent
creativity, editorial skill and digital savvy. I
would recommend Switch to any organisation
that is looking to take their communication
needs to a level of excellence.
Atif Elkadi
Manager Internal & Customer Service Communications
Marketing & Corporate Communications
Dubai Airports
talktoswitch.com
~ 10 ~
23. World’s 2nd Busiest airport
50,000 employees / More than 60 million passengers
3 communication channels
Digital and print, fully responsive and bilingual
Internal
Newsletter
External
e-newsletter
Annual
Yearbook
Connections
5,000 printed copies
Connect
microsite
email newsletter
Review
The region’s 1st fully
responsive, bilingual,
multimedia, onlineonly, html5 yearbook
4 times a year
Microsite
Email newsletter
40,000 hits from
an email database
of 2,000
Won major
international award
24. Always talking about you.
If you want your customers in Asia
and the Middle East to talk about you,
you need to talk to us.
talktoswitch.com
Switch Limited
Switch Communications
Switch Limited
1103A, Business Central Towers
Dubai Media City
PO Box 24173
Dubai, UAE
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Singapore, 069874
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Office 950, 9th Floor
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PO Box 31316
Doha, Qatar
Office: +971 4435 5711
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Office: +65 6438 1998
Mobile: +65 9005 4753
Email: owen@switchsg.sg
Direct: +974 4410 1719
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Email: ridwaan@switch.qa
