Ads Come To Your Boarding Pass

Jul 15, 2008 4 Comments by Jeff

Geo-targeted advertising on print-at-home boarding passes has started. Why didn’t I think of this first?

A new company recently funded with $20 Million, has signed deals with multiple airlines for ads that will be specific to where we are flying to.

According to Venture Beat, Sojern’s ads started appearing today on Delta. The other airlines that have signed thus far include:

Here’s Sojern’s demo. According to their video, the airlines want to make each trip more enjoyable for us with these ads. That really touched me.

I think if the ads are being printed on my paper and using my ink, I should have a choice of whether or not I want them. What’s your feeling?

Oliver says:
July 15, 2008 at 6:46 am

Well, if you look at the boarding pass sample in this image, it appears that they actually offer you to skip the ad, eh, “Destination Highlights” during printing.
Rob says:
July 15, 2008 at 8:21 am

Thanks, Oliver. I’ve updated our post. It looks like there’s no problem for the traveling public. If you want to keep the ads you can, and if you don’t, just hit delete.

Aloha,

Rob
Beat of Hawaii
Josh Goldman says:
July 15, 2008 at 8:26 am

Oliver is correct, and appreciate the correction Rob. Each consumer has a VERY obvious button at print time that says “Print Boarding Pass Without Offers.” Sojern does NOT want someone to HAVE to take the content, they hope that consumers will want it.

If they do their jobs with good targeting and good offers, that should be the case. To draw an analogy from the offline world, I don’t care for the ads in my copy of Newsweek each week (untargeted) but I absolutely want to keep the ads I get in my Scuba Diving magazine each week, as I find the ads and offers there very compelling to me while reading that mag (targeted).

Thanks for the discussion

Josh Goldman
Norwest Venture Partners (investor in Sojern)
Honey says:
July 15, 2008 at 3:10 pm

I agree.

The article I read earlier today in USA Today said customers will have a choice about printing the boarding pass with ads or just the boarding pass. Hard to believe anyone would choose the ad version.