The Effect of Social Media

on Short Line Railroads

Providing Passenger

Services

Social Media

Social Media is a means of communication of information that is:

Shared

Searched

Promoted

Disputed

Created

Endless in Distribution

An Experience engaging multiple generations as part of their daily lives

A Platform encompassing business and personal communications

An application supporting marketing and sales strategies, stand-alone public relations initiatives and public and government affairs.

Facebook The largest online social network founded in 2004. Statistics Data Total monthly active Facebook users 1,310,000,000 Total number of mobile Facebook users 680,000,000 Increase in Facebook users 2012 – 2013 22%

Average time spent on Facebook per visit 18 minutes

As an example, the scope of Facebook alone underlines the importance to the Short Line Rail industry:

Social Network Users and

Penetration

Simply put, social media is a critical aspect of our business. Passengers are engaged in social media. We are part of the conversation, or we are not.

Central Issues

GENERATIONAL ADOPTION

A challenge and an opportunity.

Passenger rail is an historic reference for adult generations.

The Silent Generation (1930-1945) traveled by rail and continue to do so, embracing rail travel as a customary way to travel and a nostalgic connection to the past.

Baby Boomers (1946-1964) traveled by rail and may continue to do so as a means of transportation and a package experience.

GenX (1965-1979) may have traveled by rail abroad, but have become accustomed to air and car travel as a quick and relatively inexpensive form of transportation.

Millennials (1980-1991) are most familiar with air and car travel; however, they have a high awareness of eco-focused modes of public transportation and are a demographic open to alternative modes of travel.

Central Issues

APPLICATION

As a discipline, social media can

Reach all passenger demographics with a targeted message, strategy and campaign.

Inform, entice, engage and grow a following that is a revenue driver

Attain greater awareness and adoption of rail travel and booking conversion

Central Issues

REAL-TIME COMMUNICATIONS

Social media is an ideal vehicle to communicate key messages

An important means to communicate changes as they occur:

• Schedule Changes

• Delays and Cancellations

• Crisis Communications

A nimble tool to stay ahead of news and foster trust with passengers and followers

Central Issues

CATEGORY AWARENESS

Short line railroads are a narrow category in the tourism segment.

Short line rail has not achieved prominence within the four dominant sectors of the travel and tourism industry that account for more than 60 percent of total output.

• Food Services

• Air Travel

• Accommodations

• Recreation and Attractions

The US Department of Commerce outlook for these sectors presents challenges and opportunities - scenic passenger rail falls within the attractions sector.

Accommodations: This subsector is the largest of the four and accounts for 19 percent of total travel industry sales. Accommodations benefited from international overseas traveler growth of 6 percent in 2011. Air Travel: This subsector is the second largest and accounts for 16 percent of travel industry sales. Airlines continuously seek ways to increase revenue by offering access to new markets as they work to reduce costs and fuel consumption by grounding inefficient aircraft and scaling back unprofitable routes. Food Services: This subsector accounts for 16 percent of travel industry sales. The National Restaurant Association predicts 3.5 percent growth for the restaurant industry in 2012. Recreation and Attractions: This subsector accounts for only 10 percent of total travel industry sales as attraction visitation has been in decline.

Opportunity

PARTNER ENGAGEMENT

An opportunity to engage travelers consuming any or all of the four dominant sectors of the leisure industry as a product extension:

PACKAGING

Cooperative marketing with accommodation partners through packaging places your railroads at the top of the purchase tier and a high-value reason to communicate with followers.

DINING BY RAIL

Rail dining experiences are relevant to the traveler with dining a top travel experience, tapping into the experiential interests of followers.

Opportunity

RECREATION AND ATTRACTIONS

An extraordinary means to engage customers through social media sites:

Launch of the Eastern Flyer, offering three trips between Tulsa and Oklahoma City in February 2014.

Custom website featured key information

Press releases were distributed to key media

Exclusive Facebook page was created at the end of December 2013. In only 5 days, the new page had over 500 “likes”.

Opportunity

The Eastern Flyer

Social media was a central element in reaching fans on all of the Premier Rail Collection Facebook pages --visitors were invited to “like” the new addition to the collection.

Tickets sold-out quickly and fans were asking for more rides.

Posts featured passenger activity options in Oklahoma City, answered questions about the ride, highlighted the on-board dining and shared photos fans took as the equipment began to arrive in Oklahoma.

Press Coverage was linked and video footage was shown.

New Facebook likes are added every week even though the trains are not running. It has become a community sounding board to share news and developments.

Opportunity

Holiday trains are another social media success for Iowa Pacific and the Premier Rail Collection. Our 2013 campaign utilized giveaways to promote our holiday trains at the beginning of the season in November.

A Facebook application called Rafflecopter was utilized and each train offered a raffle to win a family four pack of tickets on each of our trains running holiday rides such as Polar Express or the Train to Christmas Town.

Fans only had to like our page, share the link and encourage their friends to like our pages to be entered into the drawing. The response was overwhelming with some pages more than doubling their fans within 24 hours.

Opportunity

Public Relations Optimization

Social media provided an exponential PR extension. The April 13th national broadcast of Pullman Rail segment on CBS Sunday Morning resulted in:

• Featured Video on CBS website

• 5000+ Redirects

• Retweets – e.g. Choose Chicago to 41,000 followers

• Syndication - Yahoo

• 350 new Pullman Facebook likes on day one

• 15,000 hits to Pullman website

• 100 Calls to Res Center

• $$ bookings

Opportunity

Social media is central to the successful marketing and operation of our passenger railroads.

Thank you for the opportunity to share our insights. I will be happy to answer questions you may have.