More Riders

Paul Foer

Dan
You wrote that you are not “aware of any agency that runs a frequent rider program. Anyone know of one?” Unless I am misunderstanding what you are asking about, discounted pass and fare programs are widespread and common throughout public transit. They are not generally called “frequent rider programs”, but their intent and effect are essentially the same as other incentives offered throughout other industries as you mention in your post.

Since you are in Chicago, I refer you to the appropriate web pages for PACE at http://www.pacebus.com/paceonlinestore/storefront.asp and for CTA http://www.transitchicago.com/maps/farechart.pdf

Sincerely

Paul Foer
Transit Marketing Consultant
Foerfront LLC
Annapolis, MD

October 6, 2008 1:17 am

jl

See https://www.ridemetro.org/FareInfo/Default.aspx

October 6, 2008 3:11 pm

Dan Johnson-Weinberger

Thanks, but I think a discounted pass or a multi-ride is different than frequent flier points.

I have a United Mileage Plus credit card that helps me grow more loyal to United every time I use it. I don’t know of any public transportation agency that has a credit card marketing program. Why not? Building up points by using credit cards or dining at particular places is a smart move for airlines’ brand loyalty.

Buying a discounted pass is different. That doesn’t help build brand loyalty or convince someone to ride instead of drive on a particular trip. It just makes each trip cheaper. I think they are good things to do, but I also think building up points to be used for free trips or gifts is another way to build a sense of loyalty and community.

October 6, 2008 4:53 pm

paul foer

Well, that is a bit different and I am not sure if there are such formal programs, but many systems do undertake similar promotional campaigns from time to time. I can see why such a program has pluses and minuses for a transit system. For starters, restaurants and airlines are so different from transit–they have competitors who provide similar services. Transit systems have cars as competitors. You choose United over Delta or American etc for these reasons of loyalty trough incentives. Why build loyalty when you have no other choices?
Now I know I opened a can of worms by saying that–of course it is not that simple, but I think I made the point. People take an airplane because it goes 5oo mph and their car, at best, goes 65 or 70. People go out to dine because either they are away from home or they have extra “disposable” income-thus there may be choices of hundreds of restaurants. They can choose when to arrive and leave. They can choose where to sit. They can order from a detailed menu. The steak can be cooked to varying degrees and served with or without onions, fried or grilled. They are given personalized service. They are seated in comfortable chairs. And they pay through the nose for the privilege.

So restaurants and airlines have to build brand loyalty and in profound ways, transit is different.

On transit you have one choice for service provider normally. They decide when to come and go etc etc….
Transit is chosen for different reasons, but mainly because one has no other choice, or because transit is either a lot less expensive than the car (almost always and therefore used by lower income riders who are “loyal” not to any brand but to the one choice they have) or it is easier and faster than the car (think NYC)–but those times are rare indeed. Now, back to NYC. If I live in metro NYC, I have the choice of helicopter, ferry (slow or fast), subway, train or bus or car (in which case I may have choices of routes and choices for parking-and parking may have competitors therefore may have “loyalty” opportunities as well) then I could see where a frequent flyer type of program may entice and build loyalty. But remember-those airlines and restaurants and other forms of transportation not only have competitors, they are profit-motivated concerns. They really need you to ride more because they make more money each time you ride. Does a transit system? Barely.
Transit is not only given a franchise and a territory, it is not expected to make money but is expected to be subsidized. It is a public service–very much different from an airline or restaurant.
Having said that, I do think there might be ways to enter transit customers into contests, provide some incentives, give-aways, bonuses, freebies etc. However, I have tried to explain why the frequency type of loyalty builder may not be common.

Also, what are the practical concerns of record-keeping, clearinghouses, etc when most transit systems accept cash. And even then, they can’t give change-so how can they administer such programs. Larger systems are moving toward cashless fare, sell a lot of different fare media and can probably handle such a rewards program, but many cannot.

Finally, what this hammers home is the simple fact that what really attracts and builds customer loyalty is not fancy gimmicks, marketing or promotion in and of themselves. What does do this is really good service–on-time, reliable, comfortable, fast, frequent and on routes designed to get people to and from where they want to go. No amount of marketing or frequency programs can overcome poor service design or performance. Think about the fact that there are more Southwest Airlines flights to Providence or Indianapolis from BWI Airport near Baltimore every day than there are buses between Baltimore to the state capital of Annapolis, just 25 miles away. And mile per mile, it’s a lot cheaper and lot faster to go the 400 miles to Providence or the 600 to Indianapolis than to take the slow and expensive bus. You take a certain number of round trips within a given period on SW and get a FREE FLIGHT!!! Recently they even sent me a coupon for a discounted car rental.

By saying that discount passes do not convince people to take transit instead of a car, you are of course saying that transit does not compete with transit but does compete with the car. Exactly! So making transit competitive with the car is the issue. If incentive discounts don’t do it, as you say, why will a slightly different kind of frequency program be any different? But what is the difference between building up points to be used for free trips, or getting less expensive trips when you buy more trip passes?
I hope this has added some value to this discussion and I am glad you brought up these questions.

Sincerely

Paul Foer, MA
Transit Marketing Consultant
Instructor-Rutgers University/National Transit Institute
Foerfront LLC
Annapolis, MD

October 7, 2008 1:10 am

Dan Johnson-Weinberger

Thanks for the discussion Paul. But I have to profoundly disagree with your implicit thesis that transit is for the non-choice rider and therefore extra marketing or communication to earn more riders is irrelevant.

First, every additional rider is additional revenue. That is reason enough for transit agencies to use every communications tool at their disposal to earn every additional rider they can.

Second, every additional rider is another potential voter to elect public officials that will shift government budgets into better and expanded transit. The more that transit earns the support and loyalty of their riders (including elected officials), the more elected officials will be likely to support transit in the budget, creating a cycle of expansion, investment and improvement.

Third, transit competes with driving, biking, walking, carpooling, taxicabs and staying home. Just because there is only one transit provider doesn’t mean there isn’t vierce competition.

The idea that transit should act like a lazy government agency and not hustle for every single rider possible is at the heart of your post — at least how I read it — and that is toxic to growth. That’s the attitude that I believe is the enemy of transit expansion and investment. Transit is not any different from any other form of transportation in the sense of getting more riders means getting more revenue. We should be as aggressive and smart as airlines or cars in selling our product as they are in selling their products.

Now, of course, providing excellent service is the best thing any agency can do. Getting on-time, frequent service on the streets is the best way to attract riders. But if potential riders don’t know about that service, then where will the riders come from? And every agency has at least one great route that they can do a better job promoting. That’s where getting more riders through better communication comes in. I’m sure you would agree with that.

Thanks again for sharing your thoughts Paul and sparking a good (and ongoing) discussion.

Dan

October 7, 2008 1:37 am

paul foer

Dan
Primal Scream! You are disagreeing (vehemently as you said) with something I never said and have never advocated. Please re-read my post. There is no implicit thesis in it and you are talking to (lecturing?) a public transit advocate who is committed to public transit locally and nationally. I never said transit should act like a lazy government agency as you said. But transit systems often do that. Transit, as it is currently configured throughout our country, IS overwhelmingly for the non-choice (dependent? captive?)rider. Right or wrong, it is fact except, as I said, and then expounded upon for New York, and in certain metropolitan areas. AND therefore, the best way to attract customers is not through stand-alone marketing, especially a frequent rider type of program, when the real goal is good service. People take United (in your example) or Southwest (in my example) because they have good service in the first place. Then they choose Southwest over United or over American or in place of Delta over another because the service works for them AND because of brand loyalty built through marketing and rewards programs etc.

TRANSIT IS NOT LIKE THAT
We compete with cars.
As configured, cars are expensive but they work better than transit.
The fault for this lies in our entire social and economic and land use structure, as well as with agencies, some of whom are lazy and indifferent. But marketing programs alone, especially the type you propose, must come after service improvements or in concert with service improvements. That was and is my thesis. Nothing implicit there.

While every additional rider is additional revenue,as you say, and every additional trip per rider normally is as well, it is also additional wear and tear, dwell time and may cost more to attract that rider than is available or is worth it to spend. Yes, believe it or not, increased ridership and improved customer service is not at the top of the list for every transit system. Believe it or not. But overall, and to most of us, at least on the surface (every pun intended) of course more customers are what it is about. More revenue is often a part of that as well. But because transit systems have protected territories or franchises if you will, and because profit is not their motive–they behave differently than do airlines and restaurants. I certainly hope this has been made clear.
My main thesis remains–most transit systems have some sort of multiple use fare incentive or discount already in place and they are good things. They act as rewards. Whether they build customer loyalty or attract new customers in the same way or with the same results as the types of plans you suggest or whether we need to do more is worthy of study. TCRP or some other group may have undertaken such studies. What I say is that consumer behavior regarding transit is different than that regarding a restaurant or airline. Why? Mainly because of choice. You want people to choose transit, you have to give them reason to choose transit over choosing their car. That is the competitor. The goal is to build loyalty to transit and not to any particular systems because people have no choice about which system to take. Again, in order to definitely belabor the point–this will only happen when transit becomes so compellingly attractive over using the car. Fuel prices are doing that right now. And most systems cannot add more service to keep up with this demand–and most are raising fares and in so doing they are also driving away some customers.
Marketing and incentive plans to build loyalty have a role to play in this, but a small one, and one subsequent to real service.
Finally, just to pick out one of your points–you say that transit competes with ,bicycling, ridesharing, and taxis. Can you substantiate that? I think you are partially mistaken due to a variety of reasons. With taxicabs for example, there is absolutely no competition in terms of level of service, but there is certainly in terms of costs. A typical taxi ride in a city might be $25 whereas the bus might be $1.50. With that wide variation in expense already in place, why would a transit operator want to offer a discount or frequent rider reward to get someone out of a taxi?

Thank you.

Sincerely

Paul Foer, MA
Transit Marketing Consultant
Instructor-Rutgers University/National Transit Institute
Foerfront LLC
Annapolis, MD (The views herein are my own)

October 7, 2008 4:48 pm

Dan Johnson-Weinberger

Paul,

Then I disagree fundamentally with your thesis that better communication is less important than service improvement. Better communication *is* service improvement. Marketing is part of communication. It’s just communicating to potential riders.

Every potential rider has a choice. They can choose to walk, bike, carpool, rent a car, borrow a car or not take the trip. Cost and convenience are two of the major factors that drive which choice to make. The idea that transit is for the captive or non-choice rider begets a lazy attitude that isn’t growth oriented and doesn’t look to more riders every month as the goal. Instead it has an attitude of welfare-transportation — just put out a mediocre service and take whatever captive riders show up. That organizational philosophy will not generate a major investment in transit expansion from our governments.

Every transit agency should be hustling for more riders every month, and part of better service is better communication.

Dan

October 8, 2008 6:49 pm

Paul Foer

Dan
A I go around the country teaching on this topic,I often pose this question: Would you rather be the best transit system in the world but nobody knew about you, or would you rather be the worst system that everybody knows about? Nobody has ever answered affirmatively to the second question. The answer I get 80 percent of the time is that communications and service are both important and one without the other usually will not work. In fact, a lot of research shows that marketing and communication improvements in and of themselves are nowhere near as effective in building ridership as are service improvements even on their own–but taken together, they are even more effective.

So where do you disagree with me? Simply put, if my bus is dirty, hot and never comes on time, I could care less if you give me loyalty building things such as frequent rider cards or send out nice news releases or make colorful schedules. If you believe that communications are more important than is service to most people who ride buses and subways each day, I’d guess that is because you don’t ride regularly. Yet–you agree about the importance of cost and convenience–and you did not respond to my analogue of the taxicab price differentials (Which was posed to explain that the $25 taxi generally does not take people out of buses, but when the $1.50 bus pulls away a taxi customer, you don’t need to give them another discount–they need better service)

As far as your second paragraph about choice, lazy attitudes and mediocre service, I am only telling it like it is. Certainly I never have suggested that is a correct way to run transit, nor do I suggest that every transit system is run in such a fashion, and when it is, it is not always the fault of the transit systems. BUT….for the most part, that is the way it is–like it or not. Transit is geared for the dependent rider for the most part as far as buses are concerned, and less so for rail.

Of course we should improve and of course we should focus on growth, but let me be very clear–nothing, absolutely nothing will improve ridership more than offering top notch service. We generally do not do that and for that reason and many others, we are still stuck in a mode of providing welfare transportation–in general. I emphasize that–in general. It’s not my organizational philosophy with which you disagree. You just don’t seem to appreciate that I point out the reality of the situation.

I completely agree with your last statement that “Every transit agency should be hustling for more riders every month, and part of better service is better communication.” No argument from me or most other transit professionals on that one I would venture to say. However this “communication” is as you say, only “part of better service.” Building loyalty will be generated by convenience, ease of access, comfort, safety, cleanliness, etc., etc. and no amount of “communication” can overcome deficiencies in those areas–nor will frequency/loyalty building programs IN AND OF THEMSELVES. The biggest phenomena happening now of course is that as the price of operating a car becomes prohibitive, elasticity is reached and demand shifts to the less expensive alternative. Can we keep those customers by lowering price or by providing better service? (Hint: fares are not coming down)

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Paul Foer, MA
Transit Marketing Consultant
Instructor-Rutgers University/National Transit Institute
Foerfront LLC
Annapolis, MD (The views herein are my own)

October 10, 2008 8:30 am

Dan Johnson-Weinberger

But you are still making a distinction between communication and service. Yes, there are lots of other aspects to good service from a transit provider besides communication. But to the people who are tasked with developing communications plans (including the GM or President), it’s a bit self-defeating as a communicator to say that other things are far more important than communication.

Your first hypothetical sets up the same false distinction. You can’t run the best transit agency if no one has heard about you. Then where will the riders come from? And where will the government support come from? The only way to be the best transit agency is to ensure that everyone knows about the service offered. Otherwise, how could an agency be the best? Or even adequate?

Thanks,
Dan

October 14, 2008 4:19 pm

Paul Foer

Dan By continuing to adhere to your main argument you now say, “The only way to be the best transit agency is to ensure that everyone knows about the service offered.” I believe that either you did not read or you missed my point. Apparently you know the answer to this but the hundreds of transit professionals I have trained and addressed in a dozen states must all be wrong by saying that being the best and having customers who know that are both essential to success. One without the other is…like a bus without its wheels…or something like that.

I again ask where it is you so vehemently disagree with me and I have to question whether you actually read my posts. I think we’re on the same side, at least I thought we were, but I am not so sure anymore. When you continue to hold fast to your initial thesis yet are still unable to explain why if a taxi ride is $25 and a bus ride is $1.50 why you feel it is necessary or worthwhile for the bus system to build brand loyalty through some kind of frequent rider program. The reason it does not compete at about five percent of the cost is because of SERVICE!!! No price reduction or customer loyalty program will make this up for the bus when 16 trips are still less expensive than one with the taxi.

Unfortunately, this has slid into sophistry. Arguing that communications is service is just bordering on the pedantic. If you want to continue, I suggest that if you have not done so already, that you work in a transit system and study transit systems. Then go and read TCRP Report 111 “Elements Needed to Create High Ridership Transit Systems” which is a good start. TCRP stands for Transit Cooperative Research Program, a part of the TRB or Transportation Research Board. For example, this report cites a TranSystems study of WMATA (Washington Metro) that looked at improvements desired by bus riders. 49% said on-time arrival, 31% said more frequent service, 25% said longer hours (service span), 22% said less crowding, 13% said closer bus stops, 12% said go more places and 10% said faster service. These top desired features are all service issues-they are not communications. The things you seem to be strongly advocating in place of what I call service improvements (those top items just mentioned) come in way at the end. For example, schedule info. and signage gets 9%, and in line with my taxicab analogue, lower fares gets 8%. Even customer service (well-that really is communications and service as I think we would agree) rated a paltry 7%–in last place.

We both want more and better transit–agreed?. We do not have to compete, but unless you are willing to find some studies or other experts or professionals who will dispute my central thesis, I think we have worn this discussion thin. However, I would still be interested in reviewing a copy of your publication as you had promised to share with me when we first talked.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Paul Foer, MA
Transit Marketing Consultant
Instructor-Rutgers University/National Transit Institute
Foerfront LLC
Annapolis, MD (The views herein are my own)

October 15, 2008 1:35 am

Dan Johnson-Weinberger

Paul,

I don’t think you’re reading my posts. I’ve read all of yours. And you don’t want to accept that part of better service is better communication. That’s what I’ve said. Do you disagree with that? You certainly seem to with your false distinction in your hypothetical. Now you are saying that they both are essential. Your hypothetical question:

Would you rather be the best transit system in the world but nobody knew about you, or would you rather be the worst system that everybody knows about? Nobody has ever answered affirmatively to the second question.

draws a distinction between being the best transit system in the world on the one hand and communication so that everybody knows about you. I think that’s a meaningless question. Part of being the best is making sure that all of your potential riders know about all of your routes. And part of being the best is making sure that your taxpayers know about the return on their investment that you are delivering for them.

And the way that better communication can have a bus compete with a taxi is easy — if there’s a bus route that a potential rider doesn’t know about (think particularly of a visitor at an airport or in an unfamiliar part of town), unless the agency focuses on a communications plan that gets the route information to potential riders aggressively and widely, then the potential rider will take a cab instead of a bus. We’re losing riders because many of them don’t understand the routes and we’re not telling them about it. And one way to get more riders to build a sense of loyalty to transit so our partners like the airport authority or a civic group that greets people at airports or the municipality itself can help get the word out to potential riders.

As for your other point that on-time performance is more important than communications, so what? This blog is about communications, not about running buses or trains or the other aspects of operations. Are you saying that transit should not improve their communications and instead work only on the other aspects of operations? If you’re not, what is your point?

And I encourage you to check out the magazine. You can buy one by clicking at the top of the site at the “What are you waiting for?” image or you can subscribe.

Dan

October 19, 2008 6:52 pm

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