Last Monday I participated in a company visit to Finavia organized by Ompeluseuran palvelumuotoilijat, a networking group for people who identify themselves as women. The event was hosted by Katariina Kovanen-Piippo, Digital Service Designer, the first and currently only service designer at Finavia and Terhi Aho, Ecommerce Manager, Digitalisation Program. Kovanen-Piippo and Aho shared how services are developed at Finavia and at the end of the visit all the participants got to workshop around a current Finavia case: “How to solve the transfer passengers’ problem using digital and physical channels?”. All in all, it was a very insightful visit and it was great to get to workshop for a short moment around a real Finavia case.
A Little Bit about Finavia
Finavia is a Finnish airport operator with a network of 21 airports across Finland. The Helsinki-Vantaa airport is the main airport which is a transit hub with over 50 000 passengers passing through it every day. Finavia’s customer promise is: “For Smooth Travelling.” meaning that Finavia will do anything to satisfy their customers. This is because one third of passengers choose their flight route according to the reputation of the transfer airport. Finavia has recognized three points through which they can influence customer experience: processes, premises and customer encounters. Their four pillars of customer experience guide the development of the airports: sense of time, security, refreshment and Finnish experiences. The aimed outcome is that the customer should feel energetic and relaxed instead of stressed and irritated after visiting the airport.
Developing Services Together with Customers
The great advantage of developing new or existing services at Finavia is that the customers are always in easy reach. The only thing that is left for the service designer to do is to define what they want to do and who should they ask. According to Kovanen-Piippo, the travelers have been more than happy to test ideas and answer questions. Furthermore, Finavia aims to have the necessary information where it is easily available for the customer. They don’t need to develop their own Finavia app just for the sake of it. If the customer is better reached through the Finnair airline’s app, then that is where the information should be.
Data Sets the Premises for Service Development
Data gained from research has helped Finavia to develop services that cater to their different user personas and customer segments. For example, Finavia has identified six basic customer groups amongst their travelers such as the price sensitive shopper (12% of travelers) and decisive performer (17% of travelers). Additionally, they have recognized that Estonian, Russian and Chinese travelers are a strategically important customer segments for them. When a tender is initiated for a new restaurant for example, it is always done in mind to cater to a certain customer segment.
Measuring the Success of Services
Finavia follows the Airport Service Quality (ASQ) survey monthly. It is a benchmarking program used by many airports to measure passengers’ satisfaction whilst they are traveling through an airport. If some touch point/service seems to be getting a lot of negative feedback, instant action will be taken to find out what might be causing it and how can it be improved. Finavia focuses more on customer touch points rather than customer journeys as there can be several different paths that end up leading to the same touch point.
Written by Lyydia Pertovaara
Links:
https://duunitori.fi/tyoelama/ompeluseura-upea-ura (about Ompeluseura in Finnish)
Service Innovation & Design 
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