Expanding the ‘Orlando experience’

Airports have been ranked by organisations such as Skytrax, ACI World (through ASQ), and J. D. Power for their customer experience for years, but no formal identification of the factors that contribute to customer experience has been established. The authors worked together over the past three years to determine the significant factors that create world-class airports offering outstanding customer experiences. Also, the methodologies, techniques, technology, benchmarks, metrics and best practices used by recognised awardwinning airports were compared with the Orlando International Airport customer experience programme. Additional training was developed for all Greater Orlando Aviation Authority (GOAA) employees to reinforce the existing customer service programme and assist in individuals and departments to embrace their role in providing the ‘Orlando Experience’. A gap analysis was performed to compare the current executive leadership’s idea, and that of management and rank and file, of their role in providing improved ‘Orlando Experience’ with the traveller’s perspective. The result is improved customer experiences throughout MCO and awards by J. D. Power for the past two years for the best airport in customer satisfaction for mega airports. This paper is intended to share the results of research, meetings within the airport staff, focus groups conducted, extensive social media analysis and methodologies employed to provide an enhanced ‘Orlando Experience’, which may be employed by other airports desiring to improve their customer experiences.