Real-time Communication is the New Battleground for Airlines

Those who own the passenger conversation will win, writes Filip Filković, sales director: Africa at Infobip:

Real-time communication is no longer a customer experience upgrade, but the new competitive baseline in aviation. Airlines that fail to control the passenger conversation across the full journey are already losing on loyalty, operational efficiency, and ancillary revenue. The fight for advantage now hinges on who can engage instantly, personally, and continuously, from search to arrival.

At the same time, passenger expectations have fundamentally shifted. Travellers now assume that airlines will recognise them, understand their preferences, and communicate with them on the channels they actually use. They expect personalised, context‑relevant messages, and they expect those messages to arrive on their preferred platform, whether that is email, SMS, or, in much of Africa, overwhelmingly WhatsApp.

The impact is already visible. For example, Virgin Atlantic saw an 11% increase in online check‑ins simply by sending personalised WhatsApp reminders with a direct link to complete the process. That is the power of meeting passengers where they already are.

Crucially, passengers no longer see themselves as “one customer per channel”. They see themselves as a single individual whose experience should remain consistent, seamless and intelligent across every touchpoint. Airlines are being pushed to adopt the same mindset: one customer, one relationship, regardless of where the conversation happens.

Airlines must stop thinking in disconnected channels and start designing for one continuous relationship across WhatsApp, SMS, in-app, email, and agent interactions. Anything less creates fragmentation that the customer immediately feels and the business ultimately pays for.

This is prompting airlines to move beyond the limitations of one‑way email and SMS communication and embrace richer, two-way conversational interaction, powered by Artificial Intelligence (AI) and omnichannel platforms.

Communicating across digital ecosystems

This shift is being driven by how people actually communicate today. Travellers do not just move between airports; they move between digital ecosystems. A passenger flying from Johannesburg to Seoul might use WhatsApp at home, KakaoTalk in Asia, and SMS or in‑app messaging in transit.

In Ethiopia, Telegram dominates; in parts of Europe, Viber remains widely used. While the channels change, the traveller does not.

To make this work operationally, messages must move seamlessly across SMS, WhatsApp, in-app notifications, email, and even social media channels, depending on context, connectivity and urgency.

When airlines fail to manage this continuity, the impact is immediate: passengers miss critical updates, repeat queries across channels, and airlines lose conversion on time-sensitive actions, such as rebooking, upgrades, and disruption recovery flows.

Yet many airlines still treat each channel as if it represents a different customer, instead of one individual whose identity and context should follow them across borders and platforms.

True conversational engagement starts with recognising that a traveller switching from KakaoTalk today to WhatsApp tomorrow is still the same person, and the airline’s communication should reflect that continuity in real time.

The maze of disconnected systems

However, one of the biggest engagement challenges for airlines today is that most still communicate through a maze of disconnected systems, with marketing, customer care, baggage services and even the app team each using their own platforms and channels.

 In an environment where customers expect a single, continuous, personalised dialogue, this level of fragmentation is no longer sustainable.

More critically, fragmentation is not just a customer experience issue, it is an operational and commercial constraint. When disruption management, booking systems, baggage tracking, and service communications sit in separate silos, airlines lose the ability to respond in real time, scale self-service, and monetise key moments in the passenger journey. Passengers feel the disconnect immediately, while airlines lose efficiency and revenue opportunities across the passenger lifecycle.

This is where AI and omnichannel orchestration begin to transform the model. AI acts as the decision engine that enables airlines to personalise the passenger experience at scale, analysing context in real time and triggering the right action on the right channel.

In practice, this includes real-world scenarios such as: proactive delay, cancellation, or gate-change alerts pushed simultaneously across SMS, WhatsApp, in-app notifications, email, and even social channels; automated WhatsApp or chatbot flows during disruption peaks that allow passengers to rebook, request refunds, or receive alternative routing instantly; and AI-assisted booking journeys that guide passengers through complex itineraries, reducing abandonment and confusion during the purchase process.

Whether it is identifying a high‑value traveller and sending a tailored lounge offer, or detecting disruptions and proactively issuing delay notifications, AI enables airlines to move from reactive communication to intelligent, real-time engagement.

The importance of failover and orchestration

However, the value of orchestration lies not only in intelligence, but in reliability.

If a message cannot be delivered on one channel because a passenger is in aeroplane mode, has no data, or is experiencing network issues, the system should automatically switch to another available channel so that critical information still reaches them without delay.

An omnichannel platform ensures that communication across different channels is part of one continuous journey, automatically switching if connectivity fails or if certain apps are restricted in a given country.

Airlines do not need to decide which channel to use; the system ensures the message reaches the traveller with the right context and intent, every time.

Beyond experience, this level of connected communication also unlocks measurable business value.

Implementing a modern passenger‑engagement strategy

Airlines should start by mastering the high‑frequency, repeatable queries that dominate the passenger journey, such as booking confirmations, pre‑flight requirements, gate changes, delays and rebooking during disruptions.

From there, the focus should expand across the full journey. This includes real‑time, context‑aware updates at the airport, followed by post‑flight reassurance, such as proactive baggage notifications, that reduce uncertainty and anxiety.

Market data reinforces this shift. Airline chatbot customer satisfaction averages 73%, while AI-powered systems can resolve up to 80% of routine passenger inquiries, including flight status updates and airport navigation requests. Club Med, for example, automated 42% of customer conversations while still maintaining seamless escalation to human agents when more complex support was required. In parallel, biometric-enabled passenger processing is projected to exceed 80% adoption by 2033, reinforcing the shift toward automation-led travel experiences.

This means designing engagement around four key moments: before the airport, at the airport, after arrival, and through automated support, ensuring every interaction is timely, consistent, and cost-effective.

The future of passenger engagement

In the near future, passenger engagement will be defined by three clear shifts.

First, mobile-first, conversational communication will become the norm, with passengers expecting real-time interaction across messaging channels rather than traditional app-based or email-led engagement.

Second, automation and chatbots will take over a significantly larger share of service interactions, handling everything from booking changes to disruption management and routine passenger queries, freeing human agents for higher-value engagement.

Third, AI will enable more personalised, context-aware engagement across the entire customer journey, ensuring every interaction is informed by real-time behaviour, intent, and operational conditions.

Airlines across the globe are rapidly moving from a digitally connected experience today toward a future in which AI-powered chatbots and virtual assistants handle most passenger interactions. Those that invest early in this type of intelligent orchestration will gain a decisive competitive edge, particularly in fast-growing mobile-first regions like Africa.