Houston Airports’ new mobile-friendly website was recently recognized as the first place winner in the “Customer Service Technology Innovation” category during the annual Airports Council International-North America (ACI-NA) 2016 Marketing and Communications Conference in Salt Lake City. 

The winning submission was chosen as the best among entries in the category submitted by airports throughout the U.S. and Canada, and was judged by a panel of marketing and communications professionals.

ACI-NA represents local, regional, and state governing bodies that own and operate commercial airports in the United States and Canada. The annual Marketing and Communications Conference honors innovative strategies and tactics being deployed by communications, marketing and customer service professionals in the airport industry.

"We launched the new website in May 2016 to enhance the customer experience," said Kathleen Boyd, Head of Marketing for Houston Airports. "It was built around the airport journeys of our passengers, including arriving, departing, connecting, picking-up and dropping-off. We aimed to put information required by our passengers at their fingertips."  The website features flight search, live TSA wait times, parking availability by lot or garage, and concessions "Open Now." Houston Airports also worked to improve the functionality and appearance of its in-airport interactive kiosks, including interactive maps.

The website project represented a distinctly collaborative effort on the part of the Houston Airports team, led by individuals representing Marketing, External Affairs and Information Technology.

Monthly in-airport users of the new website (http://www.fly2houston.com) increased almost 27,000 percent--from 4500 to 1.2 million--while sessions increased 700% and desktop users doubled. Mobile users skyrocketed from 57 percent to 89 percent of total users, and the new website’s social media-savvy approach elicited a more than 300 percent increase in traffic from social media referrals.

For more information, please visit http://aci-na.org/content/houston-airport-systems-new-mobile-responsive-website.